essay COURSE CITIATIONS ARE ATTACHED
Hachley101
Week2_lecture_Socialcapital.pptxClaims and Claimsmaking: Analyzing a Claim
Social Problems
SYG2010
Lecture 2
Professor Rennie Lee
Analyzing a claim
Claim: “Anyone can make it in America if they work hard”
Counterclaim:
1.) Social and cultural capital play important roles in educational and occupational success
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Social Capital Theory
Forms of capital (Coleman 1988):
Physical Capital: tangible and observable material forms
Human Capital: Skills and knowledge acquired by an individual
Social Capital: Relationship characterized by an obligation to others which creates a system of exchange and reciprocity
Consist of some aspect of the social structure
Facilitate actions within the structure
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Social Capital Theory
Social Capital:
Consist of some aspect of the social structure
First, we must identify the aspects of the social structure and their function
Facilitate actions within the structure
Then, we use social capital to explain different outcomes for individuals within this system
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Social Capital Theory
Example:
Universities are often sites of dating and meeting potential partners (aspect of a social structure)
People can use their social capital (i.e. friends who know a person) to introduce you to someone you find attractive (facilitating actions within the structure)
Use of social capital explains why someone may have a different outcome even though they have a shared desire (lust/attraction)
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Social Capital Theory
Example:
Immigrant groups or networks are often productive for employment prospects (aspect of a social structure)
Immigrants can use their social capital (i.e., friends who know a person) to introduce you to someone who knows about job openings (facilitating actions within the structure)
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Social Capital Theory
How does this work?
Obligations, expectations, and trustworthiness of structures
Giving someone something creates give you credit and creates an expectation of reciprocity
Have you ever had someone remember your birthday and bring a gift to you? After that, you feel compelled to remember their birthday as well.
This is a social obligation and expectation of reciprocity
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Social Capital Theory
How does this work?
People then can “cash-in” their credits to get something from the other person
Social capital facilitates social interaction
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Social Capital Theory
Trustworthiness of the social environment, or the extent to which you think obligations will be repaid determines the extent to which people will exchange based on social capital
Less you trust someone, the more likely you extend based on other forms of capital (i.e. economic capital) or require institutional guarantees (i.e. laws, police enforcement, etc.) to ensure exchanges
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Social Capital Theory
Trustworthiness is determined, in part, by the social organization of the environment (closed versus open)
Closed systems are characterized by interdependence – this creates stronger obligations among its members
Open systems are characterized by independence among many members – this creates obligations among a few of its members
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Social Capital Theory
Information channels
Social capital can be used to access information
Norms and Effective Sanctions
Effective norms are powerful forms of social capital as they facilitate or restrict peoples’ options
Prescriptive norms, or those reinforced by social support, status, honour or other rewards, are also valuable in creating social capital
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Social Capital: Closure
Network with Closure
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Social Capital: Intergenerational Closure
Network involving parents (A,D) and children (B,C) and with intergenerational closure
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Social Capital
Coleman (1988):
“Social capital within the family that gives the child access to the adult’s human capital depends both on the physical presence of the adults in the family and on the attention by the adults to the child. (p. S111)”
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Concerted Cultivation vs Natural Growth
Concerted cultivation versus Natural Growth (Lareau)
Organization of daily life
The use of language
Social Connections
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Alexander Williams
Reside in Black middle-class neighborhood
Only child
Busy with activities during the week and weekend
Music and sports
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AW: Language Use
Engage in conversation that promotes reasoning and negotiation
Pointed questions
Develop and practice verbal skills
How to summarize
Clarify
Amplify information
Reasoning and accommodation is common
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AW: Social Connections
Close to extended family but limited interactions with cousins
Limited play with neighborhood children
Interaction with children own age
Adult-organized activities
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Harold McAllister
Poor, Black family living in public housing
Mother, sister, and often two cousins
Mother is high school graduate and relies on public assistance (AFDC)
Single-parent household
Neighbors with difficult lives
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HM: Organization of Daily Life
Daily life revolves around the home
Leisure activities: TV, playing ball
Child-directed activities
Parents intervene in specific areas
Grooming, meals, chores
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HM: Language Use
Less talking than middle-class families
One-word directives
Does not draw out conversation or ask for details
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HM: Social Connections
Frequent outside play
Neighborhood children and extended family
Mixed age
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Lareau (2002)
Concerted Cultivation (middle class families):
Characterized by the following:
Parent actively fosters and assesses child’s talents, opinions and skills
Children’s leisure activities are organized by adults
Children can negotiate or contest parents’ directives
Weak extended family ties – concentration on nuclear family
Children play in homogenous age groups
Criticize institutions on behalf of child
Child is expected to intervene in intuitional settings to advocate their needs
Results in an emerging sense of entitlement on the part of the child
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Lareau (2002)
Accomplishment of Natural Growth (working class families):
Characterized by the following:
Parent cares for child and allows child to grow
Child “hangs out” usually with kin
Children rarely challenge adults’ directives
Children accept adults’ directives
Strong extended family ties
Children play in heterogeneous age groups
Sense of powerlessness within institutions
Conflict between childrearing at home and at school
Results in an emerging sense of constraint
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Three Questions:
How do these concepts – concerted cultivation and accomplished natural growth – reflect social capital?
How do/will these different childrearing styles affect future outcomes?
Which one most accurately reflects your childhood?
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Video: 1st Generation College
Watch this video:
http:// www.nytimes.com /2015/04/12/education/ edlife /first-generation-students- unite.html
How does class background shape the college experience?
How is this related to the concept of social capital and cultural capital?
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Cultural Capital (Bourdieu)
Culture is a resource
Provides access to rewards, can be monopolized, can be inter-generationally transmitted
Allows peoples to develop tastes for certain lifestyles
Within most of the literature, this is interpreted as “elite status cultures” or “highbrow” activities
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Cultural Capital (Bourdieu)
Limitations of “highbrow” conceptualization
Linking cultural capital to context determinants of capital may vary by culture, society and field (location/sphere of interaction)
New definition (Lareau and Weininger 2003)
“Institutionalized, i.e. widely shared, high status cultural signals (attitudes, preferences, formal knowledge, behaviours, goods and credentials) used for social and cultural exclusion”
Legitimization of certain status over others reflects cultural capital
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Cultural Capital (Bourdieu)
Hays (1996): Intensive Mothering
Child rearing should be child-centered, expert-guided, emotionally absorbing, labour-intensive, and financially expensive
Using cultural capital around these concepts indicates you are meeting these “standards”
Further, cultural capital is used to navigate the system
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Cultural Capital (Bourdieu)
Linking Cultural Capital to the Institution
Institutions apply cultural capital frameworks to determine status of individuals – interact based on these presumptions
Education: the “standards” educators use to evaluate students or their parents reflect cultural capital beyond “highbrow” expectations
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Cultural Capital (Bourdieu)
Education
Cultural reproduction: cultural capital within education reinforces existing inequalities
Cultural mobility: cultural capital within education allows individuals to move up within the social hierarchy
Which one is true? Is cultural capital within education reinforcing or mobilizing?
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Analyzing a claim
Claim: “Anyone can make it in America if they work hard”
Counterclaim:
1.) Social and cultural capital play important roles in educational and occupational success
How?
Language, information channels, cultural resources, etc. that are important for educational and occupational success
Even if all individuals work hard, those with greater social and cultural capital achieve greater outcomes, thus showing a flaw in the claim
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