Describe and analyse an aspect of your life which has been affected by COVID-19, using what you have learned in this unit.

Connection and Separation Charlotte Overgaard, 2020

Sociology of Everyday Life

Social Capital

• The concept of social capital embodies the idea “that involvement and participation in groups can

have positive consequences for the individual and the community” (Portes, 1998: 2).

• The initial approaches to social capital were provided by Bourdieu and Coleman who both used

social capital as the social construct in a micro-sociological theory, where social capital is a

resource that actors derive from their relationships and can use to pursue their interests (Portes,

1998).

• Social network theorists have mainly continued to emphasise the informal bonds between people

(van Oorschot, Arts and Gelissen, 2006; Pichler and Wallace, 2007: 424).

Putnam: Bowling Alone

Social capital – extended to formal relationships and macro-level analysis With Putnam (2000), two important developments took place to shape how social capital is used by social scientists.

Firstly, the concept of social capital has been brought from a micro-theory into a macro-sociological theory of societal structure, culture and collective action. Putnam argues that social capital not only has a private dimension, but also a public one (Portes, 2000). Social capital, he further argues, can have positive benefits for the wider society within which it is lodged and it can be treated as the property of countries and regions.

Macro-sociological theories thus see social capital as the cement of society that makes it possible for people to cooperate in the collective interest (van Oorschot et al., 2006: 150-151).

Secondly, increased focus was placed on formal participation, rather than informal participation alone (Pichler and Wallace, 2007: 424): the active participation or membership in say non-profit organisations is an indicator of how well our society is faring.

Forms of relationships

Bonding and bridging (Putnam)

Weak vs strong (Granovetter)

What do you see? People who are disconnected or people who are

connected?

Promise or Peril? Technology

Social network

Virtual Communities

• Some argue that new technology create new virtual communities. Even if we don’t go bowling in leagues, we form online communities that are supportive (Shirky 2008)

• Allows us to connect with like-minded individuals • “OK to be a geek, OK to be gay”(Gardner and Davis 2014)

• Bridge across social boundaries – research has found that frequent users of the Internet tend to have more diverse (race and politics) discussions

• Prosumers: we don’t just consume, we also produce

‘Real’ world problems: technology as distraction or engagement

More communication, more connectedness

Quality of those networks

• Create broad social networks, but they are shallow

• Superficiality breed isolation

• Lack norms of reciprocity

• Boost number of connections, but lack the strengths

• Alienation – lacking a sense of purpose

• However, facilitate social connections

Millennials + technology = disaster = a moral panic (Cohen)

Young people and technology

• Strengthen bonds outside the family

• Develop offline networks

• A way of hanging out

• Important for maintaining friendships

• Only a minority use it to start relationships with people outside their offline communities

• But also, bullying, body-image, less happy (reading for this week), exhausting to be a polished self all the time.

Exclusion

Homophily = The tendency to form bonds with those who are similar to us

“Similarity breeds connection” (McPherson, Smith-Lovin and Cook 2001)

Can create a culture of conformity, promote nepotism and marginalise people on the basis of age, race, gender...

Some people have more access to connections to others and those with connections have different social power

Conclusion

Not much … complicated