Introduction to Sociology

Yanıt Açıklaması: Weber theorized that Calvinism fostered the Protestant ethic of hard work and asceticism and that Protestantism was an important influence on the development of capitalism. Calvinism is rooted in the concept of predestination, which means that before people are born, some of them are selected for heaven and others for hell. Nothing anyone does in this world, Calvinists believe, can change this. The Calvinists consequently were eager to find out whether they were among those chosen for salvation. Worldly success—especially the financial success that grew out of strict discipline, hard work, and self-control—was regarded as proof that a person was among the select few. Money was accumulated not to be spent but to be displayed as proof of being among the chosen. Capitalist virtues became Calvinist virtues. It was Weber’s view that even though capitalism existed before Calvinist influence; it blossomed only with the advent of Calvinism .

Yanıt Açıklaması: Functionalist sociologists like Durkheim have often seen religion as an important source of solidarity. Religious beliefs, rituals and collective worship help to create a “moral community” in which all the members know how to behave towards one another. However, religion has also been a factor in destructive social conflicts such as struggles between Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims in India, clashes between Muslims and Christians in Bosnia, and “hate crimes” against Jews, Muslims and other religious minorities in the United States and Europe.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Matriarchy and patriarchy are the terms defining family patterns according to the power relations. Matriarchy is the social organization based on female power. In matriarchal societies the head of the family is the mother. The term was adopted by 19th Century anthropologists and social theorists. Matriarchal societies are not societies in which women rule over or dominate men. In this respect, matriarchy is not the reversal of patriarchy. Matriarchal societies are egalitarian societies; they are free of domination. However, there are social codes and guidelines. The correct answer is A.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Values, norms, religious and moral rules, manners and customs are learned by new generations in the course of education and socialization. On the other hand, law means that the rules guiding the social life are expressed in a written form and systematized so as to cover the sanctions to be imposed by the state. The answer is C.

Yanıt Açıklaması: The main interest of functional sociology has been culture as norms, values and a way of lifestyle rather than culture as high culture. Emile Durkheim is accepted as the founding father of functional approach in sociology. He addressed some basic questions about how culture came into being in his work, Primitive Classification, written with Marcel Mauss, his nephew and the most important student. According to them, culture only became possible when human communities began to separate and classify things in their environment.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Unlike Durheim, Stark and Bain bridge see religion as meeting the needs of individuals rather than those of society as a whole.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Sociologists define religion as a cultural system of commonly shared beliefs and rituals that provide a sense of ultimate meaning and purpose by creating an idea of reality that is sacred, all encompassing the supernatural. These are three key elements in this definition: Religion is a form of culture which consists of the shared beliefs, values, norms, and material conditions that create a common identity among a group of people. Religion has all these characteristics. Religion involves beliefs that take the form of ritualized practices-special activities in which believers take part and that identify them as members of the religious community. Religion provides a feeling that life is ultimately meaningful.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Weber is most famous for arguing that Protestantism produced modern capitalism; later in his comparative studies he attempted to demonstrate that each of the great world religions laid down the tracks along which Europe, the Islamic world, India, and China moved in their distinctive directions. According to Weber-in his classic book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism - religion responds to the basic human need to understand the purpose of life. In doing so, religion must give meaning to the social world within which life occurs. This means creating a worldview that can have social, political, and economic consequences.

Yanıt Açıklaması: American Sociologists Roger Finke, Rodney Stark and Willams S. Bainbridge have attempted to develop a more comprehensive sociological perspective on religion. Their approach has heavily been influenced by the exchange theory that is based on the principle that all human interactions can be treated as a form of exchange. Their explanation on religion consists of a number of insights into religious organizations, institutions and religious change. Unlike Durkheim, Stark and Bainbridge see religion as meeting the needs of individuals rather than those of society as a whole. Unlike Marx, they see religion as meeting universal human needs rather than those which stem from class inequality and exploitation. Furthermore, they reject the view, shared by classic sociologists of religion that the development of industrial capitalist societies would undermine religion. Stark and Bainbridge, in their rational choice theory, suggest that religion answers universal questions and it offers compensators that meet universal human needs. According to them, religion can neither disappear nor seriously decline.

Yanıt Açıklaması: According to Mead, the language phase allows individuals to respond to each other’s opinions or emotions. Emotions like anger or happiness, and opinions about a person or a subject are conveyed through the language. B is the correct answer.

Yanıt Açıklaması: The concept ‘cultural reproduction’ expresses the process of transferring the culture of the dominant class from generation to generation through the education system. Thus, education is a very important institution in the reproduction of social inequalities . In a more general sense, it is a concept that sheds light on how communities continue to exist and remain stable over long periods of time. Cultural reproduction, therefore, is closely related to the process by which individuals internalize their social cultures. The correct answer is B.

Yanıt Açıklaması: The subjects that are studied by the sociology of law can be summarised as follows: Justification, functions, placement and evolution of social control systems; legal forms of thought in relation to a particular political economic order; legitimating principles and effects, transfer of correct legal forms of interpretation, the evolution of the legal language system, the levels of constraint or freedom in the legal order. The correct answer is B.

Yanıt Açıklaması: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, religion responds to the basic human need to understand the purpose of life.

Yanıt Açıklaması: In totalitarian states, all institutions are totally controlled. This type of state is deprived of legitimization. In order to control society as a whole, any kind of violence and fear can be used. There is an absolute supervision and surveillance on the subordinates. There is no differentiation of public or private sphere. Almost everything in the social sphere is under absolute control. The most remarkable example is the government of the National Socialist Party (Nazi) in Germany

Yanıt Açıklaması: Culture industry refers to rationally organized-bureaucratic structures that considerably control and supervise modern culture, such as television networks. The correct answer is A.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Murdock claims that universal functions of the family are sexual, reproductive, economic and educational functions.The answer is E

Yanıt Açıklaması: The Social Research Institute, founded at the University of Frankfurt in 1923, is known as the Frankfurt School, in short, in the social science literature. The Frankfurt School is also commonly referred to as Critical Theory. Especially, the analyses of Theodor W. Adorno (1903-1969), Max Horkheimer (1895- 1973), Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), Leo Lowenthal (1900-1993) and Herbert Marcuse (1898-1979) on culture, ideology and the media are very important. Representatives of this school conducted important studies in the period after World War II, mostly on fascism, authority, bureaucracy, technology, mass communication, culture industry, and art.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Cyber-crime: The developments in information technology have facilitated international organized crime to a great extent. Technology-based crimes are as follows: illegal access to telecommunication systems, listening to and watching others, theft through telecommunication services, violation of copyrights by copying various materials such as films and CDs, pornography in cyber space, violent contents, racist propaganda, cyber harassment, telemarketing frauds, interference in electronic fund transfers, electronic money laundering and creating criminal conspiracies through telecommunication.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Social norms could be basically classified into five groups; religious rules, moral rules, manners and customs, fashion rules and legal rules. Values gain efficiency through norms. The social norms emerge in the form of religious rules, moral rules, manners and customs, etiquette and legal rules in social life.

Yanıt Açıklaması: Theoretical question questions ask what underlies beneath the social facts. Therefore, the correct choice is E.