The two concepts that I found the most interesting include the Conflict Perspective from Karl Marx and Symbolic Interactionist Perspective by George Simmel, Charles Cooley, George Herbert Mead, and Erving Goffman. Conflict perspective focuses on how society is composed of different groups that compete for resources and power. A recent example of this would be the democratic versus the republican party within the election. The Republican party is going to benefit much more from a Republican president than a Democrat will based on the beliefs of the republican elect. The reading also mentions the feminist movement and how we live in a society controlled by men. These two examples tie together well, considering the presidential candidates were man versus woman. According to page two of the Three Main Sociological Perspectives, symbolic interactionism “suggests that our identity or sense of self is shaped by social interaction.
We develop our self-concept by observing how others interact with us and label us.” An example of this can be seen in cliques throughout high schools and even cliques in the real world, Conflict Perspective is something that we see in the world every day in all aspects of our society. The idea of opposing forces throughout society goes all the way back to the time when there were the farmers/workers and the royalty or “bourgeoisie”. The bourgeoisie benefited from being higher up than the farm workers and used their wealth to create better lives for them. Even in today’s society we see this with celebrities versus the average human being.
Conflict perspective gives us the difference between an average person and a celebrity, Celebrities benefit from their wealth and the paths that life has given to them, They’re not different from the average person, but conflict perspective gives us that tunnel vision. Symbolic interactionist perspective is also something that has defined our society. Symbolic interactionist perspective is all about how you perceive yourself based on other people’s thoughts and opinions, We take into consideration the people we hang out with and compare us to the people who we don’t interact with. Labels have become a large part of our society because it helps people better understand other people due to this symbolic interactionist perspective. As mentioned previously, the largest example of conflict perspective that has recently come about is the battle between the republican party, and essentially everyone else in America and perhaps the world.
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In my lifetime, there has never been a president elect that has been a driving force of conflict perspective, I know of friends and family members who were in tears when the election results were revealed because they were genuinely afraid for their safety in this country. The stereotypical southern, white men are the main party that are going to benefit from this presidential candidate. Women, people of color, and LGBTQ individuals are going to be the party that struggles under this new power force and therefore, conflict will result. Already, we have seen riots and protests throughout the news and social media regarding this conflict between two parties. Another example, that ties into the presidential election, is the conflict between feminism and the idea that we live in a “man‘s world”. Our soon—to—be president is someone who strongly represents this patriarchal society.
This is an example of the never ending battle between men and women. The conflict between men and women is a perfect example of conflict perspective when put into the testosterone-driven society that we currently reside in. Feminism in a male-dominated society is the party that suffers, The people who believe men are all powerful in relation to women are the group that benefits within the conflict perspective theory. A theory we discussed that I believe ties in well with conflict perspective is commodity fetishism. Commodity fetishism is the worship of materialistic items and the idea that we just can’t live without them, Commodity fetishism and the benefiting party of a conflict perspective situation have a symbiotic relationship. In the discussion forum, I had talked about Kim Kardashian and how she lost her diamond earring in the ocean. She cried on television over an earring; showing the world that there was absolutely no way she could go on with her life without that earring.
In a more average situation, I used my phone as an example of commodity fetishism. This conflict perspective situation happens between the younger and older generations. The older generations struggle to understand the modern day technology and the younger generations benefit from their knowledge of this technology. I can buy train tickets, coffee, music, apps, etc all by using my phone. Older people who have a technologically savvy way of thinking benefit from their ability to use their phones in the way that the younger generation doest My mom had the indestructible Nokia phone from the early 2000‘s for a long time before she switched over to her smartphone. As texting became a larger communication method, it was difficult for my siblings and myself to contact her by text and she found it frustrating to text on a phone as old as the one she had.
When she switched over and my siblings and i helped her learn the basics of owning a smartphone, she suddenly switched from the struggling side of the conflict to the benefiting side of the conflict and became much happier as a result. The symbolic interactionist theory is burned into us at a very young age. When we first attend school, we try to get along with all the kids and play with everyone because we’re taught that it‘s not nice to leave people out. By the time we enter fifth grade or intermediate school, we’ve already formed friend groups based on common interests and put labels on people based on their interests Symbolic interactionism is strongly enforced by entertainment, media, and social media.
I remember watching television shows as a child and learning about the different social groups that form within these fictional high schools. We all became so obsessed in figuring out if we were the cool kid, the popular kid or the geeky kid Labeling is a big part of the symbolic interactionist theory. We grow up learning to label people to better understand each section of our society. It’s easier for us to put people into categories: jocks, popular girls, gay, straight, lesbian, male, female. The conflict perspective theory can be seen in two ways: controllable and uncontrollable. We see a controlled outcome from switching to the benefiting party in the case of my mother and her new smartphone.
In cases such as the presidential election, there’s an uncontrollable factor that hangs over the situation. If you were born a woman with strong feminist beliefs, a person of color or an LGBTQ individual who is in fear of their safety, there’s no control in which side of the conflict you end up our Individuals who were born as privileged men have no control over which side of the conflict they end up on. They were raised to think in a certain way and therefore chose which group they belonged based on that. Symbolic interactionism is branded into us at young ages and is only reversible when we make the conscious choice to end the use of labels for other people and try to label ourselves for society to understand us. Being yourself is all that should matter.
