Minority Studies: A Brief Sociological Text
Minority Studies is a course that deals with the differential and negative treatment of groups (and of individuals as members of groups) who suffer from less wealth, power, (economic, political, social, coercive), and status and less access to wealth, power, and status than other groups in American society. There are racial/ethnic, sex/gender, age, religious, and disabled minorities as well as economic and educational minorities. Furthermore, minority group status may and often does encompass more than one category. Minorities are defined by the dominant group in society and are contrasted to the dominant group in both subtle and obvious ways. A dominant group is positively privileged (Weber) unstigmatized (Rosenblum and Travis)1 and generally favored by the institutions of society (Marger)2 particularly the social, economic, political, and educational systems. Classical Sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920), recognizes several interlinked relational patterns that lead to stratification; whereas Marxists reduce all inequality to economics (the differences in access to and use of wealth—all of one’s financial assets—between the Bourgeoisie and the Proletariat), Weber expands stratification into three related yet distinct components: Class, Status, and Party.
We may speak of a ‘class’ when (1) a number of people have in common a specific causal component of their life chances, in so far as, (2) this component is represented exclusively by economic interests in the possession of goods and opportunities for income, and (3) is represented under the conditions of the commodity or labor markets.3
In other words one’s class situation is based solely on economics—one’s wealth or access to wealth, or, as Weber writes
‘property’ and ‘lack of property’ are therefore, the basic categories of all class situation,4 however, class does not constitute a community or in Marxian terms a “Class for Self.” Weber argues that one’s economic position in society does not necessarily or even usually lead to class-consciousness. Status, however, and status groups are often class conscious. Status is related to social esteem, the honor in which one is held by others
we wish to designate as ‘status situation’ every typical component of the life fate of men that is determined by a specific, positive or negative, social estimation of honor . . .Property as such is not always recognized as a status qualification, but in the long run it is, and with extraordinary regularity.5
In other words, status and class quite often, but not always, go hand-in-hand. Weber argues that when there is a stable economy there is greater stratification based on status or social honor, but when there is economic instability, the primary mode of stratification is based on class or wealth. Class and status are two components of stratification, but for Weber, all stratification is based on dimensions of power—the ability to influence over resistance. Class, status, and party, then are three separate dimensions of
structures struggling for domination6.
Moreover, dominant group members have greater access to wealth, power, and status partly because dominant group membership automatically confers privilege. A minority group (and there is some controversy about whether we should even be using the term) is a group that is negatively privileged (Weber), stigmatized (Rosenblum and Travis),7 and generally less favored by the institutions of society (Marger).8 A dominant group is an ascribed, (unearned and socially defined), master status which is defined only in relationship to the minority groups in a society. Rosenblum and Travis have argued that
Ruth
Dunn
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Author(s)
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Ruth Dunn
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Place of Publication
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Online Version
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Publisher
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Rice University
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Publication year
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2010
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Year available
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2010
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Total pages
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324
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Language
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English
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पुस्तक पढ्नको लागी (To Read This Book ) :-
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