Sociology questions - Essay Example

Compare and contrast assimilation and pluralism. How are they alike and different? What forms can assimilation take? What forms can pluralism take? In the process of assimilation, groups of distinct characteristics in terms of race or color converge to form and share a common culture which would eventually seek to diminish societal differences. It is particularly concerned with overcoming adversity and oppression of a minority by means of necessitating to adapt whenever possible to the dominant White culture.

Pluralism, on the other hand, prevails if groups decide not to separate from their former identities or preserve being identified as they originally are. Assimilation may assume the form acculturation or cultural assimilation in which the group learns the culture, language, and value system of the dominant group. By integration, the structural assimilation from may be on the primary level where minor group members enter the cliques and clubs of friendship in the dominant society or on the secondary level in which group members penetrate organizations or public institutions made by the dominating class.

Intermarriage is another form of assimilation which allows members of the minor group to have marital engagement with the members of the dominant group to bring the lower status at a much higher level. In the case of pluralism, acculturation is a form taken by the group as it chooses to maintain its own identity whereas cultural differences are almost negligible in structural pluralism and the groups may be designated at different points within the social structure. Equivalently, pluralism may take integration without accumulation as the third form.(2) The experience of conquest and colonization differed for men and women.

Summarize the gender differences in the experiences of African Americans, American Indians, and Mexican Americans. Why did these differences occur? In general, gender differences have stereotyped Afro-American men as hypermasculine and oversexed while Afro-American women are the ones capable of being ‘welfare queens’ and giving a significant number of births. African American men and women alike have shown great support at political struggle toward feminism and egalitarian views of men’s and women’s roles though Afro-American women display much liberalism.

Mexican American men, on the contrary, have often been supposed to possess traditional gender functions though it still depends on the generation to which a man belongs and the type of experience with family under force of labor. Despite certain standards traditionally set by parents for their daughters, the latter, as Mexican American women in the making, behave with more complexity in critique of their gender roles. Though Latinas had acquired higher traditional expectation in the past, Mexican American men are still more likely to be traditional in the way they perceive how women should handle family and child care.

Women in American Indian societies, however, are typically the supernaturally enforced ones who pattern having appropriate behavior from sophisticated, often spiritual, set of principles. For instance, there were virgins who substantially participated during Sun Dance ritual even if tribal convention had held males in regard for gender-crossing roles. Such type of society further set limitations males to take leadership over war or religion except for those who opt for women’s duties as their major preference.

These gender differences occur in response to how individuals, male and female alike, respond to the process, either assimilation or pluralism, and to the prejudices and discrimination in the societies in which they exist to interact and affect people other than themselves and be influenced correspondingly in turn.(3) Define and explain “modern racism.” How does this form of prejudice differ from other forms? What are the relationships between modern racism and support for government policies that address problems of racial and ethnic inequality?

Modern racism pertains to a more subtle prejudicial behavior which is not readily perceived or literally brought out but which may be figured out in a sensitive manner of understanding one’s culture based on experience. This form of racism is felt at depth in workplaces where managing individuals outwardly express fair opportunity for everyone yet such concern is conspiringly carried out otherwise, with the intent to call someone’s attention that the treatment, not conspicuous to everyone else, is especially addressed to him so that in response he ought to act accordingly.

Compared to other forms of prejudice, it differs in the sense that, other attitudes of prejudice may be due to one that arises during the heat of inter-group competition, the type which is learned through socialization and originally unintentional, and the prejudice form that is merely caused by needs to enhance an individual’s personality. Furthermore, these forms may be classified as cognitive, affective, or conative prejudice which points to people’s belief of truth, likes and dislikes, as well as inclination to specific behaviors.

In opposition to policies by the government to resolve issues on ethnic and racial inequality, modern racists oppose race-based social justice programs. Hypothetical testing and analyses examined support for government on the efforts of the latter to make amends for injustice within the social dimension and results manifest that high modern racists have constant aversion toward reparations in this aspect.Works CitedHealey, Joseph F. Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Class: The Sociology of Group Conflict and Change.

Pine Forge Press, 2009.“Prejudice: Its Forms and Causes.” Minority Studies. http://www.delmar.edu/socsci/rlong/race/far-02.htm. 18 Aug 2007. Web. 23 Oct 2010.