Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Caste hereditary
Class individual achievements
Historical Context of the Theory
Communism
1) Power
Ability to attain goals, control events, and maintain
influence over others
Usually attributed to people who have wealth and position
2) Prestige
Approval and respect received from other members of
society
Two kinds of prestige:
1) Esteem appreciation and respect a person wins in
his/her daily interpersonal relationships
2) Honor associated with specific statuses in society
3) Wealth total economic assets of the individual
4) Poverty condition in which people do not have enough money
1) Upward mobility
also called vertical mobility
movement of individuals/group from lower to
higher status
Factors affecting upward mobility
a. Policy & practice of immigration
b. Differential fertility of the social classes
c. Presence/absence of individual competition
d. Availability of opportunities to prepare ones self for
competitive process
e. Patterns of equality & inequality in a society
2) Compensation for Downward mobility
a. Cushioned by traditional conservatism of middle class
b. Modified by the fact that he needs to have little
contact w/his former associates of higher status
c. Can help sooth the ego
d. There is no significant status visibility
e. Belief that ones children may regain the social status
that one has himself lost
3) Horizontal Mobility change in status w/no corresponding
change in social class
- changing ones occupation, marrying
Movement of people from one geographical spot to another
Known to sociologists as physical mobility
1) Hard Work
2) Social structure
3) Societal values and norms
4) Level of Education
5) Marriage
6) Luck
Higher social status is the result of personal achievement.
Competence of an individual is tested in the social
groupings in which the individual participates