SOCI201 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Gini Coefficient, James Truslow Adams, Caste System In India

• School: University of Delaware
• Department: Sociology
• Course: SOCI201
• Professor: Best Joel

Document Summary

In our society, some have a lot, some have a fair amount, and others not so much. In other societies, many people have much less than even poor americans. But we view it as a product of individual effort ( american dream ) Horatio alger, jr. (1832-1899)-alger wrote dozens of popular novels about poor boys who became successful. Karl marx (1818-1883)-marx saw society as a product of economic arrangements. The base is the basic way that society handles economics. The base shapes the superstructure and the superstructure maintains the base. In his view, conflict was central to society (working/proletariat vs. Labor and capital"s 19th century struggles could be violent. Compared to our society which sets legal limits for striking. Class can be mapped (education levels in manhattan). Social mobility is the ability to move through the class structure. It is more limited than americans" like to imagine: parents" class correlates with their children"s class.