UGC NET Sociology Basic Concepts and Institutions Flashcards

24 sample cards from the Basic Concepts and Institutions deck

Sampled from the end of the deck, so these are different cards from the ones shown on the syllabus page.

1. Define 'polity' and distinguish state from government.

   Polity is the institutional organization of power and political authority. The state is the permanent set of institutions claiming a monopoly on legitimate force over a territory (Weber); government is the temporary body that directs the state.

2. What is Emile Durkheim's sociological definition and functional view of religion?

   Religion is 'a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things... which unite into one single moral community called a Church.' Functionally it reinforces social solidarity, the collective conscience and shared values through ritual.

3. Summarize Weber's thesis in 'The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism'.

   Ascetic Protestantism (especially Calvinist predestination and the idea of a worldly 'calling') fostered disciplined, frugal, profit-seeking conduct that provided cultural conditions for the rise of rational modern capitalism.

4. What is the distinction between 'sacred' and 'profane' (Durkheim)?

   The sacred is set apart, forbidden and treated with awe and ritual; the profane is the ordinary, everyday, mundane realm. Religion is organized around this fundamental binary classification.

5. What are the manifest and latent functions of education?

   Manifest: transmission of knowledge/skills, socialization, cultural transmission. Latent: social networking, status placement, social control, and (per conflict theorists) reproduction of inequality.

6. What is Bourdieu's concept of 'cultural capital' in education?

   Cultural capital is the non-financial assets (language, tastes, dispositions, credentials) families transmit; schools reward the dominant class's cultural capital, reproducing class inequality while appearing meritocratic.

7. Distinguish 'law' from 'custom', noting customary law in Indian society.

   Custom is an unwritten, traditionally sanctioned practice enforced informally; law is formally codified and enforced by the state. Many customs (personal laws, panchayat norms) coexist with or become law; customary law is recognized for tribal communities.

8. Distinguish equality, inequality, hierarchy and marginalization.

   Equality = equal access/treatment; inequality = unequal distribution of resources/opportunities; hierarchy = a ranked ordering of social groups; marginalization = pushing groups to the social, economic or political periphery, denying full participation.

9. What is Louis Dumont's central thesis in 'Homo Hierarchicus' about caste?

   Caste rests on the opposition of pure and impure; this ideology of hierarchy (Brahmin at the top) encompasses and subordinates power and wealth - hierarchy is the dominant value of Indian civilization.

10. How does the caste system differ from the class system?

    Caste: ascribed, hereditary, endogamous, ritually ranked by purity/pollution, traditionally closed. Class: based on economic position, achieved, open, allows mobility, ranked by wealth/income/occupation.

11. What is M.N. Srinivas's concept of 'Sanskritization'?

    The process by which a 'lower' caste or tribal group adopts the customs, rituals, beliefs and lifestyle of a higher (especially twice-born) caste to claim higher status - a form of positional/cultural mobility within the caste system.

12. What is M.N. Srinivas's concept of the 'dominant caste'?

    A caste that dominates a local area through numerical strength, ownership of land/economic power, political clout and a relatively high ritual position, enabling decisive influence over other castes.

13. Distinguish sex from gender, and define patriarchy.

    Sex = biological differences (chromosomes, anatomy); gender = socially constructed roles, behaviours and identities attached to being male/female. Patriarchy (Sylvia Walby) is a system of structures and practices in which men dominate, oppress and exploit women.

14. What does the 'social model of disability' argue versus the medical model?

    The medical model locates disability in the individual's bodily impairment. The social model argues disability is created by social barriers, exclusion and attitudes - society disables people with impairments; the solution is removing those barriers.

15. Why do sociologists treat 'race' as a social construct rather than a biological fact?

    Genetic variation within so-called races exceeds variation between them, so race has no consistent biological basis. It is a socially constructed category that groups people by perceived traits and is used to justify inequality (racialization).

16. How does sociology distinguish 'tribe', 'ethnic group' and 'race'?

    Tribe = a community with common territory, language, kinship and often pre-state political organization (Scheduled Tribes/Adivasis in India). Ethnic group = people sharing culture/ancestry/language who see themselves as distinct. Race = a category based on perceived physical traits.

17. Distinguish biological evolution from classical social evolutionism.

    Biological evolution concerns species change via natural selection (Darwin). Classical social evolutionism (Comte, Spencer, Morgan, Tylor) held societies progress through fixed unilinear stages (e.g., Morgan's savagery, barbarism, civilization) toward greater complexity.

18. What is 'diffusion' in anthropology, and what is diffusionism?

    Diffusion is the spread of cultural traits, ideas or technology between societies through contact. Diffusionism (Elliot Smith's hyper-diffusionism, the German Kulturkreise school) explains cultural similarities by borrowing/spread rather than independent invention.

19. What is 'modernization theory' and what does Rostow's model propose?

    Modernization theory holds societies develop from traditional to modern via industrialization, urbanization, education and rational bureaucracy. Rostow's 'Stages of Economic Growth' runs from traditional society through take-off to the age of high mass consumption.

20. How does dependency theory criticize modernization/development?

    Dependency theory (Andre Gunder Frank, 'the development of underdevelopment') argues poor 'periphery' nations are kept underdeveloped by exploitative ties to rich 'core' nations; underdevelopment results from global capitalism, not internal backwardness.

21. Define 'globalization' and Roland Robertson's concept of 'glocalization'.

    Globalization is the intensifying worldwide interconnection of economies, cultures and politics through flows of capital, goods, information and people. Glocalization (Robertson) is the adaptation of global products/ideas to local cultures - the simultaneity of the global and local.

22. What is Arjun Appadurai's framework of global cultural 'scapes'?

    Appadurai analyzes global cultural flows through five dimensions: ethnoscapes (people), mediascapes (media/images), technoscapes (technology), financescapes (capital), and ideoscapes (ideologies/political ideas).

23. Distinguish vertical, horizontal, intra-generational and inter-generational social mobility (Sorokin).

    Vertical = movement up/down the status hierarchy; horizontal = movement between positions of equal rank; intra-generational = mobility within an individual's own career/lifetime; inter-generational = status change between parents and children.

24. What is the difference between an 'open' and a 'closed' system of stratification regarding mobility?

    An open system (class) permits substantial social mobility based on achievement; a closed system (caste, estate, slavery) restricts mobility, fixing status by ascription with little movement between strata.

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