Alyssa's Social Problems Blog

This blog will be discussing poverty, work, and the economy and how it all greatly impacts our society. Stratification  is a society's "ranking" of people into socioeconomic tiers based on factors like race, wealth, education, income, etc. The functionalism theory on poverty provides us with the idea that stratification is necessary and inevitable to induce people with knowledge, skills, etc. The conflict theory suggests that stratification results from the lack of opportunity and discrimination against the poor, women, and people of color. It also claims the opposite of the functionalism theory, that it is neither necessary or inevitable. The symbolic theory adds on that stratification affects people's beliefs, lifestyles, daily interaction, and conceptions of themselves.   Rising inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI) from the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, highlights how increases in the cost of goods and services can directly impact social prob...

This blog will be discussing the topic of children, families, and schools. All such a huge aspect of millions of people's lives daily! These three things affect social lives tremendously, in some ways we might not even realize. Looking at the functionalism perspective , this provides us with the simple idea that family, schools, and children all perform several essential functions to society. Whether it's socializing children or providing them with a "social identity". The conflict theory suggests that family contributes to social inequalities through economic inequality and by reinforcing patriarchy. Not only this, but often times we see family being a source of conflict in itself. This is infamously shown through physical violence, emotional trauma, financial cruelty, etc. The symbolic theory proposes that the interaction of family members and couples involves shared understandings of their situations. Furthermore, it goes on to suggest that husbands and wives ca...

This blog will be focused on crime and criminal justice. Crime can be defined as behavior prohibited by the criminal law because it is considered to be especially harmful or offensive. But how does crime tie into the sociological perspectives? There is different theories regarding crime for each of the perspectives. Looking at the functionalism perspective, there is social disorganization and anomie. Social disorganization suggests that certain social characteristics like poverty, population, dilapidation, etc. contribute to high crime rates. Anomie  proposes that crime by the poor results from a gap between the cultural emphasis on economic success and the inability to achieve such success. Conflict perspective theories include group conflict, radical, and feminist. These theories give the idea that crime can be the result of social groups, wealth, and gender. The symbolic theories provide the ideas of differential association, labeling, and social bonding. Looking at the NCVS Cri...