1. According to Seidman there is three types of styles of theorizing scientific social theory, philosophical approaches, and moral vision of social theory. The reason scientific social theory is important is because of the word scientific. Which is based on methods and principles of science. When you are trying to make, a theory using the scientific social theory you relay on science as the only way to achieve the collected body of knowledge. When using this method, you cannot use common sense, science is the only way to find out what is real. When using common sense to talk about social theory and behavior for a sociologist you become subjective and bias to other groups and cultures different from your own. For instance, in sociocultural …show more content…
According to Marx capitalism has a structured relationship between labor and capital which creates alienation. First the proletariat are alienated by repetitive work and assembly line like jobs. Many of these jobs do not require creativity or intelligence. The proletariat do not own what they produce so they do not take pride in their work. Capitalism promotes competition between collages which can promote alienation between themselves. I like to think of a skilled painter, it takes a lot of knowledge to paint a beautiful canvas. The artist knows his reputation is on this painting so he/she takes his/her time to make sure it is a work of art. Each painting they do will be unique in some way. Whatever they paint will be his/her property to sell or keep. 3. The two aspects of the Self according to Mead is the “me and “I”. The “me” is our social self and the “I” is our response to the “me”. The “me” is the interaction of the individual with other people and the “I” is the response of the individual to the community. The “I” subjective self and “me” is the organized self. The “I” is impulsive and subjective. The “me” is more objective, organized, gives direction and is less emotion. One example is that the “me” the individual may understand by watching significant others and teachers. That after high school in the US you usually go directly to college. The “I” might responded to maybe there is a better way, it might be better to travel or work for a year
Mead developed the theory of the social self which is based on the perspective that self emerges from social interactions. During Mead’s time, other philosophers and sociologist believed that the self was based off biological traits. Mead, however believed that you were not born with a self, but it is developed over time through social experiences and exposer to different environments. “According to Mead (1934), the self is ‘‘a certain sort of conduct, a certain type of social process which involves the interaction of different individuals and yet implies individuals engaged in some sort of co-operative activity’’. Mead expresses, the full development of self includes two stages. The first a\stage is the organization of society’s perspective of the individual. The second stage is the organization of perspective of a social network that the individual is a part of. Three activities are responsible for the development of the self: language, play, and games. Self is developed through language because individuals interact with each other and respond using words, symbols, and gestures. Language can display a person’s attitude and judgement. For example, it reveals emotions such as anger, happiness, nervous, and sadness. Self is also developed through play because individuals could take on new roles and express themselves in a new way. During role-play, individuals can internalize their audience’s perspective and acknowledge how others feel about themselves if they are currently in that role. The third activity responsible for the development of self is games.
George Mead theory of self is basically that the self emerges from interacting with others, that self is developed over time from social encounters and experiences self is developed by play.Later on games develops the self by allowing individuals to understand and follow rules, self becomes more stable and learns to view her/his self from other perspectives example the society's views, assume roles in the group. The generalized other is a generalized representation of the perspective of an entire group/ how the self thinks they are being viewed by the generalized other.Me mostly represents the learned behavior actions and attitudes and expectations of the “generalized other” , the me is considered a phase of self in the past. The I symbolizes the individual's identity in response to society or the generalized other. For example self will know how the generalized other wants them to act due to me but in I self can choose to follow or
Marx said that in the product of labor the worker is alienated from the object he produces because it is bought, owned and disposed of by someone else, the capitalist. In all societies people use their creative abilities to produce items which they use to exchange or sell. Marx believes that under capitalism this becomes an alienated activity because the worker can't use the things that he produces to engage in further productive activity. Marx argued that the
Marx’s theory of alienated labour is structured around a class-based system. It is vital to acknowledge that Marx’s evaluation of the capitalist system is based focused the Industrial Revolution a century and a half ago, and therefore must be kept somewhat in that context. Within Marx’s simplified capitalist society model, one class of people own and control the raw materials and their means of production. They are referred to as capital, bourgeoisie, or the owning class. The capitalist does not just own the means of production, but also all the items produced. By virtue of their ownership of production property they receive an income and earn a living from the operations of their factories and shops. The owning class owns the productive resources, though they do not usually operate the production means themselves.
Alienation occurred after the periods of slavery and serfdom arose a capitalist society, workers selling their labour skills in order to earn a living wage. In comparison to feudal societies where wealth was inherited, capitalist societies through the bourgeoisie was about owning the means of production enabling them to own private property and this being wealth. However, the cost price of the goods produced was significantly higher than the labourer’s wages resulting in a profit for the bourgeoisie, this being the method of attaining wealth. The capitalist mode of production generates its wealth through exploitation of the proletariat. Karl Marx (1970) stated ‘…the accumulation of wealth at one pole of society involves a simultaneous accumulation of poverty, labour torment, slavery,
Marx explains his views in The German Ideology as he states, “For as soon as division of labor comes into being, each man has a particular, exclusive sphere of activity, which is forced upon him and from which he cannot escape” (Marx: GI, 159) Here Marx is specifically describing how division of labor causes alienation among the worker and makes them estranged to the work that they are producing and society as whole. According to Marx, the worker suffers four types of alienation: alienation of the worker from other workers, from their product, from the overall production, and alienation of the worker from himself. (Marx; EL, 74 ). Alienation creates an inequality for the workers as humans we live in order of making work that pertains a value to the individual. Marx believes that labor is essential to human beings self-conception, labor is a form recreational growth however, through division of labor man becomes alienated from the experience of producing something personal that attains value to them and not just the
In Karl Marx’s Estranged Labour, capitalistic societies break down into two groups: the property owners and the propertyless workers. In this situation, the workers are at an extreme loss. Labor is a commodity that produces a commodity. The worker must put in loads of effort in order to create a product, yet owns little. Obviously working so hard, yet not having enough money for proper nutrition, can lead to starvation. Because of the strain caused by the repetitive and enduring nature of creating a product, the worker separates from the capitalistic world; making this estrangement to the product a worker creates the first type of alienation. His/her mind associates this alienation to the product itself, making the product seem hostile. A worker puts their life into a product yet doesn’t see the fruits of his/her labor, therefore becoming more alienated the more he/she produces. The products made contribute to a world outside of his/her own and the worker can feel himself or herself shrinking as these products outweigh his/her own items.
Karl Marx discusses four forms of alienation and two of the four are equally important in the ongoing production of capitalism: alienation from the process and product one makes. From the alienation of process, the proletariat or maker is just a producer of the product. He does not have any say as to how a product should be made or improved because he is not the owner of the facilities or tools used to make the product. This can be incorporated to a worker in a factory. He or she may be given specific instructions and must follow through with the creation of the product. The entrepreneur, who owns the amenities used to make the product, has power over the labor of the workers. Therefore, entrepreneurs have the say as how the product should be developed. As a result, any completed or incomplete product is left at the hands of the entrepreneur rather than the maker. This leads to another form of alienation known as estrangement.
In this essay I will be discussing how Marx refers to capitalism as alienating and exploitive by depriving workers the sense of self-worth and identity. Marx describes how the worker sees labour as a means of survival and gets no satisfaction from doing it because the produce does not belong to him. Instead they are sold for profit by the capitalist.
To Marx, capitalism is an economic system where the upper class exploits the lower, working class and conflict is inevitable. The alienation of the working class was caused by their labor. All they were to the upper class were just people who wanted to be fed that would work long hours and be separated from their families and each other to do so. The idea to de-alienate the working class from the upper
Mead’s “theory of self” is based on the perspective that the self emerges from social interactions, such as observing and interacting with others, responding to others' opinions about oneself, and internalizing external opinions and internal feelings about oneself. The social aspect of self is an important distinction. That’s because other sociologists and psychologists of Mead's time felt that the self was based on biological factors and inherited traits. This was the normal and conventional type of mindset from psychologists at the time. According to Mead, the self is not there from birth, but instead it is developed over time from social experiences and activities.
In his work of 1844, Marx explained alienation in the following way: In any capitalist society, the isolation of employed workers from their humanity is believed to occur because the only thing that a worker can express is labour (Tucker,72). This is a significant societal facet of particular eccentricity through a privatised system of industrial production where every employee is considered a thing but not a person. The following are the four types of alienation (Tucker, 74 to 77) that normally exist to a worker who is labouring under a capitalist form of industrial production:
In today’s industrialized world, the fact of the matter is that most individuals must work for those who are wealthy and are familiar with the luxury of owning property in order to survive. However, being a member of the working class in a Capitalist society makes it all too easy to begin to feel disconnected from the rest of the world. According to sociologist Karl Marx, this is known as Alienation, which can be experienced in four distinct stages: alienation from the product of one’s labor, from the labor process, from others, and from oneself. In their most basic forms, the stages of Alienation detail the loss of control over what one produces, the inability to control how they work to produce, the strains that form in relationships as a result of working too much, and the lack of self-development caused by
Mead then breaks down the self into two parts, the I and me. The I is the inner impulsive affinity of the individual which is similar to Freud’s Id. The me is society influence on the I, the generalized other, the organized set of definitions, the understandings and expectations with in the group the individual belongs, similar to Freud’s superego. Therefore, mead’s self would be the Freudian ego which is the part of the I which has been modified by the direct influence of the generalized other. While I can that Mead was taking a sociological view
In his work of 1844, Marx explained alienation in the following way: In any capitalist society, the isolation of employed workers from their humanity is believed to occur because the only thing that a worker can express is labour (Meszaros, pg 59). This is a significant societal facet of particular eccentricity through a privatised system of industrial production where every employee is considered a thing but not a person. The following are the four types of alienation that normally exist to a worker who is labouring under a capitalist form of industrial production: