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The first sociological perspective that I will use to try to explain the Bertram family scenario is the functionalist perspective. The functionalist perspective evolved from the work of Emile Durkheim (1858-1917), though it was shaped by Harvard sociologist Talcott Parsons during the mid-20th century. Functionalism can be summed up simply: ‘the world is a system of interrelated parts, and each part makes a necessary contribution to the vitality of the system’ (Bohm, 1997: 82). Functionalism examines society through a functional framework which stresses that everything, no matter how seemingly strange, out of place, or harmful, serves a purpose. A useful analogy to use would be all the different parts of the body and how they function to keep the human body alive. All organs in the human body depend on each other and each is vital, performing an overall ‘function’. Social systems work in much the same way as an organic system. Societies have established structures within which are established beliefs and practices. All members of society are expected to conform and behave acceptably. The institutional arrangements, for example, political or religious arrangements, exist in society not by choice of its citizens but because they perform a specific ‘function’ for the social structure as a whole. People within these social structures know and agree on how to behave, ‘living their lives in the right ways – from which society benefits’ (Jones 2003:39). Functionalism holds that everyone and everything in society, no matter how strange it may seem, serves a purpose. Crime, for example, is viewed almost universally as a nuisance. Functionalists, however, point out that crime serves several purposes. Durkheim concluded that crime and deviance serve three major functions for society: deviance clarifies or reaffirms societal norms, it promotes social unity, and it challenges the status quo. Deviance can bring into question the status quo, forcing society to rethink previously held norms. For example, acts perceived as criminal or deviant were critical in shaping the rights movements for African Americans, women, and homosexuals in the United States. Without questioning the traditional way of treating disadvantaged groups, the norms of discrimination and prejudice could not be broken. Criticisms of functionalism focus on its acceptance and rationalization of social inequality and societal evils. Since functionalism holds that all aspects of society are necessary, human rights issues like poverty, hunger, slavery, and genocide must be accounted for. Critics suggest that functionalism can be used as a rationalization of such issues. The perspective is also criticized for its lack of testability, which is critical for upholding any social science theory. Several questions stand against its reliability. Still, it has its strong points, such as its ability to explain crime and deviance. Functionalism essentially serves as the most traditionalist of the sociological schools of thought.

As with all the other different parts of society family has a role to play in the functioning of society and each family member has a role to play. Mrs Bertram is no longer able to perform the social roles that society expects of her (for example, mother and wife). In the scenario of the Bertram family, Mrs Bertram could be seen to have taken on the ‘sick role’. The functionalist perspective of illness is that it disrupts society; it too is a form of ‘deviance’. A functionalist perspective would suggest that social services would need to control the deviance by either putting Mrs Bertram into residential care or by providing services for her at home, in order to bring her back in line with society’s expectation of her. Similarly the social worker would also expect Mr Bertram’s deviant behaviour to be dealt with. The fact that he is leaving his wife alone for extended periods of time and is generally not caring for her as would be expected of a husband could be viewed as deviant behaviour. The Bertrams are from a generation where gender roles were very specific and Mr Bertram is probably struggling with the role reversal, so would need support with this. Mr Bertram’s possible alcoholism could also be viewed as a form of deviance that would need to be brought under control by perhaps providing him with support to overcome it.

Feminist theory became established in the 1960s. What defines feminism is the view that ‘women’s relative subordination must be questioned and challenged’ (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005:16). The feministic view is that women are oppressed and their freedom to act and express themselves is limited by the relative power of men, as they tend to possess more economic, cultural and social resources than women. There is a wide range of feminist views due to the failure to agree on ways to explain subordination of women or how women can be liberated or what actually constitutes oppression (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005). As a result there are many varying feminist perspectives drawing on a wide range of disciplines. According to Abbott Wallace and Tyler (2005) early feminists have focussed on issues relating to questions of power, knowledge and subjectivity. Liberal feminism ‘sees gender prejudice as a matter of individual ignorance’ (Jones 2003:91). Liberal feminists believe inequalities can be eradicated by putting in place anti-discrimination laws and by promoting non-sexist attitudes. Marxist feminists believe that ‘women’s subordination serves the needs of capitalism’ (Jones 2003:92). Marxist feminists argue that subordination of women in capitalist societies is best explained by understanding the economic disadvantages that they face. Radical feminism sometimes referred to as gynocentrism affirms that ‘patriarchy is the key to understanding social structures and patriarchal relations are universal and elemental’ (Jones, 2003:94). The term patriarch is used widely to refer to ‘a society based on universal male supremacy and female subordination’ (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005:33). This perspective is concerned with women’s rights rather than gender equality and it emphasises the difference between men and women. Within radical feminism the family is seen as a key instrument of women’s oppression through sexual and maternal obligation. Feminists who adopt this perspective are concerned with the way women perpetuate men’s control when they become so oppressed by patriarchal ideologies. Feminist theories of social work have been criticised recently for treating women generically and displaying insufficient sensitivity to the complex ways in which other social divisions such as race, age, disability, etc impact on gender relations. (Dominelli 2002)

Mrs Bertram could be seen by feminists to be suffering at the hands of a patriarchal society. She has been lured into dependency by Mr Bertram’s ‘charming’ ways. It could be argued that Mrs Bertram found the prospect of marrying into a higher social class rather appealing. Radical feminists argue that ‘all relationships between men and women are institutionalised relationships of power’ (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005:35). Mrs Bertram does not appear to be an equal in the marriage and her illness has further exacerbated her powerlessness. Mr Bertram has all control of the finances and probably all major decisions affecting Mrs Bertram, especially as she now lacks capacity, further reinforcing her subordination. It is unclear whether Mrs Bertram has ever worked, if she has not Marxist feminists would argue that this was to the benefit of a capitalist society as she provided, when she was able, free domestic services to sustain her husband. Mrs Bertram’s reasons for wanting to stay with her husband may be due to her ideological view of marriage. Feminists argue that married women do not have an identity separate to their husbands (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005) and she may be trying to hold on to what little she has left of her identity as she is slowly losing her faculties due to the Alzheimer’s. Her ideological view masks the real subordination she faces at the hands of her husband. This is further reinforced by his neglect of her needs and failure to care for his wife as a husband would be expected to.

The psychodynamic theory was pioneered by Freud and later developed by a number of writers. Freud argued that there were various levels of conscious and unconscious thought. The ‘id’ which is the source of basic urges and the drive to survive. The superego is the conscious, ‘public’ expression that seeks to convey that we are doing what is acceptable to society. The ego is the part of the unconscious that attempts to mediate between the id and superego. Individuals may not be aware of the interactions within themselves and engage in behaviours that are expressions of their deep unconscious, seeking to rationalise them through the ego and superego. ‘The psychodynamic approach includes all the theories in psychology that see human functioning as based upon the interaction of drives and forces within the person, particularly unconscious conflict between the different structures of the personality’ (Baker, 2003:39). The psychodynamic approach attempts to explain the motivation of behaviour. The basic assumptions of the psychodynamic theory are that behaviour is motivated by conscious and unconscious mental processes, and that behaviour reflects current motivation and past experience (Glassman and Hadad, 2009). The approach claims that early negative experiences may become buried in the unconscious and manifest themselves in how an individual behaves in relationships with people later in life. Bion (1962) cited in Maclean and Harrison (2009) believes that the quality of childhood relationships in early life shapes the development of personality and character. According to Freud various defence mechanisms are developed by people to cope with difficult emotional situations. These defences include denial, repression, projection and displacement. Freud was of the opinion that people could overcome their problems by making conscious those thoughts and motivations hidden in the unconscious. He used several methods to gain access to the unconscious, such as free association which involved allowing the individual to say whatever came into their mind and if the client became ‘blocked’ talking about something this signified something deeper was occurring in their unconscious. Freud also use dream analysis as he believed that unconscious thoughts were revealed in dreams and could be interpreted. Transference was another method used as clients projected and displaced their own thoughts and feelings onto their therapist. The psychodynamic approach is criticised for its subjectivity and gender, cultural and historical bias (Barker, 2003).

The psychodynamic approach could be used to better understand Mr Bertram. Problems that are identifiable in the case scenario are his poor management of money, his neglect of his wife and his suspected alcoholism. His behaviour could possibly be a result of what is happening in his unconscious mind due to a negative experience in early childhood. The amount of time he spends at the golf club away from his wife could be explained as him using denial as a defence mechanism against painful emotions. He may have experienced painful losses in the past and this may have affected his unconscious mind. It is possibly too painful for him to accept his wife’s illness and his coping strategy is to refuse to accept what is happening. His suspected alcoholism may be due to him regressing to an earlier stage of development where he felt safe or comfortable, possibly the oral stage when developing children focus on oral pleasures such as feeding. It is possible that the stress of his wife’s illness has triggered the regression and he may not even be aware of how his unconscious is leading him to use alcohol to cope. His use of alcoholism could also be explained as fixated behaviour, if Mr Bertram experienced trauma when he was at the oral stage (stage where according to Freud child gains satisfaction from sucking, eating, etc) in his development it is possible that he then became confined to this particular stage. His conscious choice to drink alcohol ‘has its origins in the repressed depths of the unconscious mind’ (Ingleby 2006:8). His use of alcohol as a way of managing a difficult situation is inappropriate behaviour and generating its own set of problems as he is neglecting his wife and the home is in an awful state. A social worker using this approach would have to proceed with caution as behaviours may not be the result of unconscious assumptions.

Behaviourism rose in prominence in the early 20th century through the ideas of thinkers such as Pavlov and Watson. The behaviourist approach lays emphasis on the role of environmental stimuli in determining the way that we act. A key idea in behaviourism is that all individuals enter the world as a ‘clean slate’ (Ingleby, 2006:5). Social factors are then responsible for shaping the individual. The basic assumption is that humans learn behaviour by learned relationships between stimulus (excites the sense organs) and a response (reaction to stimulus). The main behaviourist theories of learning are classical conditioning and operant conditioning. ‘Classical conditioning occurs when we make an association between a neutral stimulus that reliably produces a response, so that the neutral stimulus comes to produce the same response’ (Baker, 2003:43). It is most well known through Pavlov’s experiment where dogs were given food at the same time as a bell was rung. The result was that the dogs would salivate when the bell was rung even if no food was presented. Pairing of an unconditioned stimulus led to an unconditioned response and when the unconditioned response was paired with another stimulus, the stimulus eventually produced a response on its own. Operant conditioning has had a considerable influence on psychology and is used regularly in social care (Maclean and Harrison, 2009). Operant conditioning recognises that the environment effects behaviour. Much behaviour occurs randomly and whether we repeat it or not depends on the response we get. For example, if a person says they want to kill themselves, they may not know how or fully understand what they are saying but whether or not they say it again may depend on the response of those around them. The behaviourist approach is criticised for be oversimplified as it ignores mental processes and limited as not everything can be accounted for by simple learning (Barker, 2003).

It is possible that Mr Bertram has learned behaviours over the years due to the responses he has received. As he is from a white upper class background he has led a fairly privileged life. Even though his financial status is now in question he has learned over the years that his ‘exceedingly charming manners’ are able to get him what he wants. He was able to use his ‘charm to sweep Mrs Bertram off her feet and so far has managed to use this same charm offensive to keep the landlord and social services at bay. If we apply the principle of operant conditioning to the situation we can see that Mr Bertram’s behaviour has been shaped by the way that those he has come into contact with have responded by conceding to his charming ways. The consequence has been that he continually uses this behaviour to mask the problems he and his wife are experiencing.

I was born and raised in Zimbabwe just before independence and I am the second child of a nurse and a self-made business man. Education was very important in my family and although it went unsaid there was always an expectation that we would be successful in life. The culture I was raised in had a very patriarchal framework and this extended to state policies and procedures. For example, in order for me to obtain a passport or national identity card I had to either go to government offices with my father or a male relative with the same surname or produce my father’s identification documents. My mother’s presence or her documents would not have been acceptable. If I view this from a feminist perspective, women in my culture were placed in a position of subordination because of economic dependency and because generally they were ‘constructed as socially inferior’ (Abbott, Wallace and Tyler, 2005: 28). Despite the fact that my mother worked all financial decisions were made by my father. Marxist feminist would argue that subordination of women in Zimbabwe served and continues to serve to enhance capitalist interests. My mother tended to my father’s every need so that he could go out and be productive at work. Education was a very important part of my life. Emphasis was always placed on the fact that I needed a good education in order to succeed in life. I remember getting very good reports at school while my sister got the opposite. My parents would sit her down every time her report card came home. If I apply the behaviourist principle of operant conditioning to my situation I learned that if I came home with a good report card my parents’ response would be a positive one. I therefore endeavoured to always have a good report so that that positive response from my parents would be repeated.

My background will provide me with insight on how women can feel oppressed even in environments that they are supposed to feel safe, so that I can effectively challenge oppressive practices. My background also helps me understand how responses I may have as a social worker will shape future behaviours of service users to other social workers or professionals. It is clearly important to have an understanding of sociological and psychological perspectives in social work as both make a significant contribution to understanding different service user needs.

The institution of religion can be evaluated by varies sociological theories because the institution of religion has been part of every society. With society it possible to find some sort of religion. Among these theories functionalism, conflict and interactions will be use to assess the impact each theory has on the religion institution. “Sociologist tends to be interested in the social impact of religion on individuals and the institution.” (Schaefer, 2009, p.323) They are not attempting to authenticate to the truth of the religion institutions merely probing how institution such as religions influences on individuals in society. Religion has been part of society foundation since the beginning of human existence. It has been the central part of other institution as well and have had a profound impact on the choices taken by other institutions. It is clear that Religion influence has extended widely through society.

However, one must ask what religion is. Emile Durkheim defines “religion as a unified system of beliefs and practice relative to sacred things.” (Schaefer, 2009, p. 323) Sociological theorists also have differing views about how religion serves society. Some view it from a functionalist perspective while other sociologist take the conflict outlook and other the interactions view. The Functionalism Perspective is a sociological approach that highlights the process which society is organized to ensure stability.

When looking at religion, one might attempt to discover how religion contribute to the stability of a societies Emile Durkheim, “recognized the importance of religion in human societies.” (Schaefer, 2009, p.323)

He believed that religion brought about stability in society. Durkheim believed religion to be an influential force in society. Durkheim sought to answer a puzzling question, “How can human societies be held together when they are usually composed of individuals and social groups with diverse interests and aspirations.” (Schaefer, 2009, p. 327) Durkheim believe this was possible through what is called the “societal glue,” that is religion is source to keep society together and meaning and purpose in people in life. (p.327)

In a functionalist point of view, the institution religion gives humanity a moral compass and a place to belong and reinforces social norms. Places of worship have become more than worship site it is also a place to socialize or fellowship. Furthermore, religion give different groups a certain sense of connection to others they might be of different faith they still find themselves bound to others who have a similar belief system. Institutions such as education and families are essential in relaying morals as the social norm, but religion may well be the institution that holds all of those to a higher standard.

Religion provides support during some of life struggle and changes by applying morals in the early in a child life. Changes can be overwhelming, however with a strong religious tradition one can find meaning and direction in all of life’s tough times.

Conflict Theory

In the process of talking about religion the focus is mainly on the positive aspects however one can also find negative aspects in religion institution as well. Religions from the beginning of has been the reason behind many conflict in the world. Even today society conflict occur due to religion. For example in the United States religion is used as a weapon by social conservatives. They use religion to push their social agenda such as the issue of abortion, same sex marriage, and stem cell research. Religion has also been the source of conflicts between different types of religion such as Christian and Muslims. While in other countries the dysfunction of religion has made citizens turn on their fellow citizens. For example, in Iraqi the Sunnis and the Shiites have fought civil wars because of religion. In Europe the protestants and catholic have battled for years over different ideology.

“The conflict theorists believes that religion is a potential obstacle to a structural social change but also can be a source for cultural change through liberation theology” (Schaefer, 2009, p.330) Dysfunction of religion is common ground for the functionalist and conflict theorists. The dysfunction of religion proves many theories with the conflict theory itself. Conflict theorist would say that religion provides tension between different groups, and societies.

The conflict perspective can simply explained “as a sociological approach that assumes that social behavior is best understood on terms of tension between groups over power, or the allocation of resources, including housing, money, access to services, and political representation” (Schaefer, 2009, p. 14-15). “Conflict theorists examine the relationship of religion to social inequalities, especially how religion reinforces a society’s stratification system.

Karl Marx stated “religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world It is the opium of the people.” Instead of increasing social solidarity, Marx believed, religion is used to control the working class, to persuade them to accept their lot in life. Far from being a positive force religion provides people the illusory hope that things will get better in the next life and prevents them from seeking a political answer in this”( Marx, K. & Engels, F. 1843).

It has also been said, “Religion legitimizes, reinforces and perpetuates the rule of the ruling class and their interests” (Marx, K. & Engels, F., 1843). Conflict theorists believe that religion itself is used as a means to keep the lower classes working with little or no regard for their status.

The theory provides that religion gives the masses hope when there is none, and therefore keeps them content with their current condition, essentially religion is used as tool for the rich, or dominate classes to subdue the masses. An example of this can be found through the interpretation of a verse in the Bible, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. While this single verse was intended to portray the difficulty of a wealthy person giving up his fortune in order to follow Christ, it also provides a settling truth to the poor; by saying it is easy for the poor or afflicted to enter heaven because they have less to give up.

Additionally, conflict theorist find more evidence to support their ideas within the dominate structure of a society. For example, kings and queens once ruled and were believed to be chosen or directed by God, while other rulers were simply considered gods themselves. This plays directing into the ideology behind the conflict theory, by demonstrating how a ruler can impose his or her rule over a vast amount of people, solely based in the idea that the ruler is somehow empowered by a higher being. Thus underlying classes within the society would follow or work blindly to support the ruler(s), again with little regard to their personal status, or condition. Therefore religion itself can stifle social change, and movement, by controlling the people and impeding change through an organized and overwhelming regime of rituals and beliefs. The last sociological theory that must be discussed is the Interactionist perspective, this theory or perspective notes the generalizations about every day forms of social interaction; in order to explain society as a whole. It primarily focuses on the micro-sociology of a society. In a sense, interactionist look to the little things of society, for example, how people within the society interact with each other in regards to specific institutions such as religion. Such can be seen in ones belief systems, and how the assists us to make sense of the things we experience in our daily lives. Within this theory it has been stated that “religion is seen as a reference group, for many people, religion serves as a reference group to help them define themselves. Religious symbols, for example, have a meaning to large bodies of people (e.g., the Star of David for Jews; the crescent moon and star for Muslims; and the cross for Christians), (Nelson Education, chapter 17). This is where the functionalist and interactionist theory find common ground; both perspectives see religion as a positive force, which provide a stabilizing factor within a society. Both also agree that religion can enrich an individual’s life and enhances an individual’s to deal with some of the difficulties in life. Regardless it is clear through the research of both perspectives that religion brings people within society, together; therefore adding a harmonizing and supportive structure with the society and or culture.

Religion 9

While the three sociological perspectives have differing views on the institution of religion, they also all see religion as a force within society that can motivate and facilitate social change and movement within a society. In example of this is the civil rights movement of the 1960’s. “The U.S. civil rights movement is perhaps the best example of a social movement drawing on religious resources to accomplish its goals. Both religious leaders and laity were active in the civil rights movement. Congregations provided material resources necessary for large-scale political action, acted as conduits for frame dissemination and provided an ideal setting for the micro mobilization process to occur. (Loveland, M. T., Walls, E. N., Myers, D. J. and Sikkink, D., 2003). Another example of religion’s affect on social movements can be found in the debate over abortion. The issue of abortion has strong ties to the institution of religion within the United States. Almost every religious faction found in the U.S. has strong beliefs on whether abortion is immoral or not. “Another notable sociologist Max Weber saw religion as a primary source of social change. He analyzed how Protestantism gave rise to the Protestant ethic, which stimulated what he called the spirit of capitalism. The result was capitalism, which transformed society”. (Henslin J. ch 13)

In closing one can clearly see the differences in the three sociological perspectives in regards to religion. The institution of religion has a profound affect on the society, in which it dwells, adding both positive and possibly negative attributes that add to the stability of that society. Regards a society that uses religion as a cornerstone, will ultimately find that it provides a settling sense over that society. In addition religion will assist in the establishment and maintenance of the social norms and expectation within that culture.

A complete state of ones physical, mental and emotional well being can be defined as health. A healthy environment or society is a factor that determines the healthy of an individual. From a sociological point of view, a functioning society comprises of healthy people and individuals who are able to control diseases (Durkheim, 1982). In view of murder and suicide, this research paper looks into sociological theories and sociological perspective on murder and suicide.

Introduction

There are various sociological perspectives that define how society views different actions taken by an individual. The various sociological perspectives are as a result of either macro sociology or micro sociology. The macro sociology examines and individual behavior; in this note, an individual behavior can thus be as a result of the society he/she has lived in. on the other had, micro sociology defines the way one looks at things. Sociologists have defined suicide as an act done in private and lacking approval from the society. According to the study conducted by Durkheim the level at which individuals may involve themselves with suicide acts is not determined by their level of insanity. In his study, he found out that men were more likely to get into suicide acts than were female. The rates of suicide acts were also in the increase when compared to wealthy and unmarried people. This in other words is to mean that some people are more prone to committing suicide than others. The above noted level of differences in committing suicide corresponds to an individual level of social integration. In simpler terms, individuals with greater social commitment have are less inclined to committing suicide than individuals who had little or no any commitment in the society (Durkheim, 1982).

The sociological perspective: Social factors

Emile Durkheim postulated “that suicide occurs as a result of the kind of “fit” that an individual experiences in his or her society” (Stillion & McDowell, 1996, p. 65). Durckheim (1982) uses integration theory to show how an individual suicide acts relates to his/her involvement in the society. In his elaboration of social integration theory, the author has used two variables, that is, social integration and social regulation. In view to social integration, individuals are susceptible to egoistic suicide.

Social integration variable measures the level of an individual acceptance to the shared beliefs in the society. In this case, there are those individuals who have accepted and those who have not accepted the set social beliefs. The author has distinguished this in terms of altruistic suicide and egoistic suicide. In this case, individuals who have accepted the laid down social beliefs are susceptible to altruistic suicide. Such individuals have a strong bond with the society or are deeply integrated into the society. An individual who happens to be over-integrated into the societal norms may have an ingrained tendency to kill themselves in an effort to abide to the set social imperatives.[1] On the contrary, those individuals who lack a bond between them and the society become distanced from the social life and eventually become a victim of excess individualism leading to egoistic suicide (Stillion & McDowell, 1996). In his explanation of these social factors, Durkheim argued that,

“The suicide rates of his time were higher among Protestants than among Catholics; his explanation was that Catholics received more support from their church while Protestants were left more to their individual devices. At the same time, more single people committed suicide than married people and fewer married women with children committed suicide than unmarried women. Durkheim believed that the incidence of egoistic suicide is inversely related to family density” (Stillion & McDowell, 1996, p. 65).

Social regulation variable “refers to the degree of social control imposed by society on the individual’s motives and feelings” (Cutter, 1998, para. 4). In his explanations, the author has argued that those individuals who have a strong belief in social regulation are prone to fatalistic suicide while those on the contrary are susceptible to anomic suicides. Fatalistic suicide usually comes about when an individual is over-regulated and is oppressed by the society. In most cases, such oppression may be directed to a certain group of people in the society.[2] Individuals who commit anomic suicides usually lack society regulation.[3] The author has also observed that individuals who are at the middle of these two variables or who are neither in the two categories are less prone to suicide. In other words, such individuals tend to die from other causes apart from suicidal mode.

Cutter (1998) in support of social regulation have argued that when the external societal restraints are not accepted or are weak, individual aggression may be directed towards self and as a result, individuals may result into suicidal behaviors/acts. In his explanation, the author quotes the work of Gibbs and Martin (1964) arguing that the rate of suicide “of a population varies with the stability and durability of social relations within that population” (Cutter, 1998, para. 5).

According to Stillion and McDowell (1996), a “suicidal behavior cannot be viewed outside of the context in which it occurs” (Stillion & McDowell, 1996, p. 64). In his explain, the authors point out that individuals in their varying cultures have their unique psychological problems at varying times. An augmented increase in the understanding of how the body functions in relation to the prevailing literature on psychoanalytic literature have resulted to a decreased value in the number of individuals with this artificial physiological problem.

Sociological perspective on murder

Criminological theories may either be classified in the social structure or in social process theory. The social structure theory assumes that some individuals are more susceptible to delinquency and criminality as a result of their status in the society or on the community.[4] According to the social process theory, criminal behavior results from social learning and socialization process. The society in which an individual lives in or has been brought up affects greatly his social understandings or groupings. For instance exposing a child to violent acts in the society may serve as a valuable input to later violence behaviors. In support of this insight, Ronald Holmes and Stephen Holmes argues that “the basic development of the person in society is predicted in no small part on the unique experiences that each person is exposed to in the course of living a normal life” (Holmes & Holmes, 2009, p. 65).

Conclusion

It’s of great value if suicide is viewed from a sociological perspective. This will enable individuals to look at suicide deaths from different cultural environments at varying times in history. Such factors may help the suicidal students to understand their risks and thus offer the necessary advice. One may also observe that the society in which we live in clearly defines our behaviors or the expected behavioral acts in our life.

References

Cutter, F. (1998). “Review of the 20th century theories.” Retrieved on February 23, 2010 from: http://suicidepreventtriangle.org/Suichap3.htm

Durkheim, E.(1982). The Rules of the Sociological Method, (Ed. by Steven Lukes; trans. by W.D. Halls). New York, NY: Free Press, pp. 50-59.

Holmes, R. & Holmes, S. (2009). Serial Murder: the sociological perspective. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Stillion, M. & McDowell, E. (1996). Suicide across the life span: premature exits. New York, NY: Taylor and Francis.

Diet is increasingly being viewed as a key component of health, and food and related topics have become of great interest to health professionals and sociologists.Sociological Imagination

What C. Wright Mills called the ‘sociological imagination’ is the recognition that what happens in an individual’s life and may appear purely personal has social consequences that actually reflect much wider public issues. Human behaviour and biography shapes society, and vise-versa and one cannot be properly understood without the other. If a sociologist was trying to understand two friends having coffee for example then they would examine it as social interaction, as acceptable drug taking, and as part of a complex mix of social and economic processes. They might also assess the fact that coffee is produced by the poor but drunk mainly by the better off, they would examine the history of coffee drinking. (Giddens, 2001).

This paper will examine why it may be the case that diet is increasingly being viewed as a key component of health, and food and related topics have become of great interest to health professionals and sociologists. It will begin with a brief explanation of sociology’s interests and will then examine why diet, food and related topics have generated such interest. Finally, the paper will investigate this question through the use of the sociological imagination.

The study of society became an important feature of academic life in the nineteenth century. It is generally acknowledged that the founding fathers of sociology are Marx, Durkheim, and Weber. Auguste Comte was also an important figure and actually coined the term ‘sociology’ Sociologists study people’s lives and try to understand the nature of reality through people.

One of the reasons that diet has become of increasing significance within social science discourse is due to the fact that sociologists regard the ways in which people eat, and also what they eat, as a social practice. Giddens (2001) argues that in all societies eating and drinking are most often accompanied by social interaction, celebrations and rituals and this makes them of interest to sociologists. Recognisable changes in eating habits are also of interest to sociologists because these changes signify other changes in the social structure. Choosing to eat a particular food can play a part in shaping the market for that kind of food. This then affects the lives of those who produce it, some of whom may live on the other side of the world.

Sociologists have long argued that the medical establishment operates on a bio-medical model of health which holds that disease is located in the person and health can be restored through appropriate medical treatment. Sociologists, on the other hand, argue that health and illness are socially and culturally defined and they, along with many health professionals, believe that human beings make choices which affect their health and well-being. Improvements in health during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were the result of higher standards of public hygiene. Clean drinking water and the effective disposal of sewage helped reduce the number of deaths from infectious diseases, the infant mortality rate also dropped (Bilton et al, 1996).

The gap between rich and poor, or the connections between social class and other factors such as health have been of sociological concern since Marx’s work on capitalism. Those people who belong to higher social classes tend to have better life chances, be more healthy, and live longer than those lower down the social scale. The better off people are, the more inclined they are to eat well and healthily (Giddens, 2001). In the Third World, vaccination programmes are not as effective as they should be because people do not have enough to eat. Being well fed is the best way of preventing disease that there is and this is one reason why diet is of concern to health professionals and sociologists. Increasingly it has also become a factor in government policy making. The Black Report of 1980 was commissioned by the Conservative Government to investigate class inequalities in health (Townsend et al 1988).. Margaret Thatcher was unhappy with the findings which carried an enormous cost factor for the government (Giddens, 2001). Her Government introduced marketisation into the health service thus producing a model of providers and purchasers of care. During the past twenty years there have been significant changes in policy making because of concerns over the costs of public health. Governments have tended to focus on public health campaigns such as healthy eating programmes in an attempt to get people to take more responsibility for their health and to save public money. Thus some of the focus that health practitioners and sociologists place on diet and food is as a result of, or in response to, changing Government policies and the production of Government White Papers such as the 1992 Health of the Nation paper.

In the nineteenth century a large number of deaths were a result of what has been called ‘the disease of poverty’ (Browne, 1998:443) because most of those who died were poor and badly nourished. In the twentieth century the diseases of poverty have been replaced by what have been called the diseases of affluence, where people eat too much of the wrong things, for example foods that are high in fat and cholesterol, and smoke and drink too much (Browne, 1998). It is linked to over-consumption in other areas because as people earn more money they are able to afford more but these consumption patterns are not only detrimental to individuals but also to our environment. More than two thirds of the world are starving and have a shortfall in their crop supplies and an increasing population. Yet in the Western world where population growth is much slower there are often huge surpluses of grain (Giddens, 2001). Some large companies have seen a market here for genetically modified foods. They say that the introduction of gm foods could transform the world’s food supplies.

Lifestyle choices like exercise and diet are regarded as a key factor in whether a person is ill or healthy. In modern industrialised societies the problem is not caused by too little food, but too much food that is not good for us. So we have new forms of illness such as obesity, stomach ulcers, diabetes and heart disease where more people suffer from chronic illness than they may have done in the past. These diseases are largely preventable but in recent years there has been increased public concern over the food supply. Scares such as CJD and BSE in beef along with a number of outbreaks of food poisoning have caused considerable concern and some health professionals have blamed asthma on poor diet. Cancer has also been linked in a government report (1997) to the type of food that people eat. The branding and marketing of ‘junk’ food has been highly successful. Huge multi-national companies such as MacDonalds are not just selling fast food, they are selling a life-style that is attractive to many young people. Sociologically it’s interesting if only for the resulting standardisation, the recognisable brand. You can find a MacDonalds in almost every country in the world and know, at least to some extent, what you are going to get. In Britain we eat a much more processed diet where food often has colourings flavourings and preservatives that are harmful to health, and produce what has beome a medicalised condition of hyperactivity in children. Although some health professionals recommend a change in diet the medical establishment has tried to ‘cure’ it with a drug called Ritalin rather than drawing attention to the social causes (Giddens, 2001).

Why do we eat unhealthy foods? The foods that are good for us, such as organic fruit and vegetables and wholemeal bread are more expensive than mass produced processed food. Multi-national firms control the food market and they are more concerned with making a profit than anything else. Healthy foods are also a money spinners and the health food industry makes a huge profit on vitamins and food supplements. As Browne (1998) argues health itself has become big business, companies sell it and at the same time they continue to produce the types of food that contribute to health problems, disease, and death.

Conclusion

Through the use of the sociological imagination this paper has investigated why sociologists and health professionals have taken such an interest in diet as a key component of health and in food and related subjects. There appear to be a number of explanations, not least the increasing inequalities in healthcare provision and the continuing differences in life chances between rich and poor. The marketisation of health has also generated a number of government policies that focus on personal responsibility, personal choice, and healthy eating programmes. Sociologists have always been interested in the power differentials at work in society. Bilton et al (1996) contend that the medical profession have had considerable power in controlling definitions of health and illness. Public concern with health, diet, and debates about food will continue to be of interest to sociologists because they argue that these things are socially and culturally produced and it is becoming increasingly more evident that these discourses are closely allied with major economic and political interests.

The social facts surround us everywhere and affect our lives. To begin with, the social fact is a single, socially significant event or a set of homogeneous events that are typical for some areas of social life, or specific to certain social processes. The main attributes of the social facts are their independence, objective existence, and their coercive nature, i.e. an ability to exert the external pressure on the individual. It is a collective representation of the facts or a collective consciousness. The social facts are a course of actions, ways of thinking and feeling that exist outside the individual (i.e. objectively). These factors possess the normative coercive power in relation to him/her. Into the acknowledgement of the above stated information about social facts it is necessary to add that according to Faraganis (2000), “by a social fact, Durkheim (as a person who defined the social fact in sociology) is referring to facts, concepts, expectations that come not from individual responses and preferences, but that come from the social community which socializes each of its members. Although we might embrace the normative community behavior and share its values, we are constrained by its very existence.”

The main purpose of this work is to reveal a sociological explanation about a social fact. Among different social facts, it is possible to emphasize the pathological social fact associated with the social problems, which is called suicide. The term suicide is related to the social fact because it is a single public event, typically for one or another sphere of real life. The suicide rate is one of the most important sociological exponents of the society’s well-being. Global science has been already established that the act of suicide accumulated a number of the factors: social, economic, political, philosophical, psychological, and religious.

The rate of suicide in Canada is historically similar to or slightly higher than in the USA. Around 3800 suicides occur in Canada each year.

Suicide is a deliberate act of removal from life under the influence of acute traumatic situations in which life itself loses its meaning for humans. Suicidal can be called any external or internal activity, sent by a desire to take his/her own life. People who commit suicide usually suffer from a severe mental pain or are under stress and a sense of inability to cope with their problems. They often suffer from mental illness, especially major depression, and look ahead without any hope.

Suicidal behavior is the suicidal activity’s manifestation that includes the suicide attacks, attempts and manifestations.

Thus, a situation when death is caused by people who may not be aware of their actions or control them, and as a result of a person’s negligence are not related to suicide, but to the accidents.

There are three main types of suicidal behavior: true suicide, demonstrative suicide and hidden suicide.

The true suicide is never spontaneous, though sometimes it looks quite unexpected. Such a suicide is always preceded by depressed mood, depression, or just thinking about leaving this life. Sometimes, even the closest people do not notice this person’s condition (especially if you frankly do not want it). It is obvious that in many cases true suicide is a result of prolonged depression. And any depression is characterized by a focus on past, not the future. The man on the verge of true suicide somehow appeals to the past, clinging to it, but cannot find the picture of own future. Therefore, the “risk group” for suicides includes teenagers and old people.

The main part of the suicides is nothing but an attempt to engage in dialogue: only, of course, that’s so unique and totally unsuitable for this method. Most suicides usually do not want to die, but they kill themselves only in order to reach out to someone, pay attention to their problems, to call for help. The psychiatrists often call this phenomenon “demonstrative suicide.” Researchers stated that propensity to demonstrative suicide sometimes seen as a specific way of manipulation.

The hidden suicide is the destiny of those who understand that suicide is not the most dignified way to solve the problem, but nevertheless other way again cannot be found. These people do not choose an open withdrawal from life on their own, but they choose so-called “due to suicidal behavior.” For example, this is risky driving behaviors, exercises in extreme sports or dangerous business, and volunteer trips to hot spots, and even drug addiction.

Among the major problems of modern Suicidology, the most relevant problems are the features of suicidal behavior associated with alcohol and drugs, the role of family and loneliness factors in the genesis of suicidal behavior and the problem of mental disease and suicide. In any suicide situation, there are usually two operating entities: the person who is thinking about suicide and his/her surroundings, or a specific person with whom he or she somehow tries to establish a dialogue. The increased suicide risk factors can be divided into extra-and intrapersonal. Extra personal suicide risk factors include: psychosis and borderline mental disorders; suicidal statements, repeated suicidal acts; post suicide; adolescence; extreme, especially so-called marginal living conditions; loss of prestige; conflict traumatic situation; drunkenness, drug use. Intrapersonal suicide risk factors can be identified: idiosyncrasies; reduced tolerance to emotional stress and frustrating factors; inadequacy of communication systems; inadequate (overstated, understated or unstable) self-esteem; lack or loss of targets or values underlying the basis of life, etc.

There are the features of suicide, which include: the desire to be alone is natural and normal for every person. But beware, when closed, the isolation become deep and long, when a person withdraws into himself, eschews the former friends and allies. Each of us is naughty from time to time. This condition can be caused by weather, well-being, fatigue, office or family problems, etc. But when a person’s mood almost every day varies between the excitation and decay, there is cause for alarm. There are strong evidences that these emotional fluctuations are the harbingers of death. Depression is a deep emotional decline, which is showed in everyone differently. Some people become isolated, but at the same time, they disguise their feelings so well that it is impossible to notice the changes in their behavior. The only way in such cases is a direct and open conversation with a man. This is a proven fact that a lot of acts of suicide are caused by anger, rage, and cruelty to others. An absence or, conversely, abnormally increased appetite are closely linked to self-destruction thoughts and should always be considered to be a criterion for the potential hazards. In addition to the above-mentioned information, it is necessary to add that “aˆ¦ alcohol and drug use disorders have been found to be strongly related to suicide risk” (Ilgen, et. al, 2011).

People, who plan their suicide, hand out their own things to family, friends, or relatives. As experience shows, this sinister campaign is a direct forerunner of a coming disaster. In each case, it is recommended to have a serious and frank conversation with that person in order to clarify the intentions of potential suicides.

The reasons for suicide are complex and numerous. The reasons can be sought in biological, genetic, psychological and social spheres of a person. Despite the fact that people usually commit suicide in extreme situations, such as divorce, loss of work or study, most experts suggest that it is rather a reason to commit suicide than its cause.

Most people who kill themselves suffer from depression, which often goes undiagnosed and untreated. Since depression often underlies suicide, the study of the causes of depression can help scientists to understand the causes of suicide. “About 90% of suicides occur in persons with a clinically diagnosable psychiatric disorder” (Tondo, et. al., 2011).

Despite the fact that some studies suggest that suicides of famous people can play an exemplary role model, especially among teenagers, this point of view is not fully proven. However, there is some evidence that the famous people’s suicides can be a powerful incentive to others’ suicides, especially among those in the range of 13 to 19 years. In addition, the causes of teen suicides are poverty, family relationships and with their peers, alcohol and drugs, unrequited love, experienced in childhood abuse, social isolation, mental disorders, including depression, schizophrenia, and so on. The number of suicides among young people has increased over the last decade. It is not superfluous to mention that early marriages do not save young people (aged 15-19) from the risk of suicide. This is primarily due to the fact that “young” marriages are more likely an attempt, not always successful, to solve some other, unrelated to marriage problems, for example, get rid of the unbearable situation in family.

Taking everything into account, it is possible to conclude that suicide is the result of the personality’s social – psychological disadaptation in modern society. Psychological crises arise as a result of the intimate, family and personal, social and creative conflicts. In order to avoid the manifestation of suicidal behavior, it is necessary to provide people, especially teenagers with social support by including family, school, friends, etc. It is useful to carry out socio-psychological training issues, provide individual and group lessons to raise self-esteem, development of an adequate relationship to self, empathy, to increase self-control, replacement of “significant others”, to develop the motivation in order to achieve success. It can be based on the behavioral skills’ trainings.

In this assignment I will look at the different sociological perspectives on health and ill health as well as the different definitions of it.

Defining health is really difficult as there are many different views. There have been many criticisms of the defining of health. The definition of health has changed over the years. For example

In Mauritania; a small country in N.W. Africa, obesity is considered a sign of beauty. Girls are ‘force-fed’ so that they grow up with that obesity look.

In the western country obesity is seen as ill health, unattractive and associated with negative stereotypes.

Obesity is still seen as a sign of wealth and well-being in many parts of Africa.

Functionalist Approach

The functionalist approach on health and ill health derives from Talcott Pearson. Talcott saw ill health as a threat to society and believed that good health was essential in order for society to be still functioning. He said that ill health affects our ability to work and perform our roles in society. For that reason he said that for a person to be considered sick there are several expectation to be met. He called the expectations the ‘sick role’ which indicated how people are supposed to be like when they are ill and how they should be thinking. The sick role divides into two groups; the rights and the obligations.

Rights;

The sick person is free from any social roles. For example work, or school, they should be allowed to take the day off in order to get back to normal

The sick person is not responsible for their condition

Obligations;

The person should seek for medical assistance. For example going to the doctors to get checked up and get treatment

The person should not like being sick. For example the person should not fake being sick just because they get attention as well as getting a day off their normal duties.

However the sick role backfires sometimes as people tend to lose patience with the sick person or deny that they are sick for reasons such as liking the role. For example family, they may show sympathy at the beginning but after a while they lose patience with the sick person and assume he/she is seeking attention or is a hypochondriac.

Marxist & Feminist Approach

Marxist approach believes that the health and social care service care services are provided just to help the bourgeoisies gain profit. The Marxist believe that the health and social care of the service users should be maintained in order for them to quickly get back to work so that they can make profit for the bourgeoisies. In order to maintain the social hierarchy the government purposely ignores the selling of products which can harm one’s body for example, cigarettes, tobacco etc. In the modern world I believe the hierarchy is shaped into a pyramid with a few elite at the top controlling and manipulating those below which allows the rich to always be the rich and the poor to be the poor giving no chance for movement in the hierarchy.

Feminist writers believe that the medical profession and pharmaceutical industries have given a low priority to developing male contraceptive pills which have fewer harmful side effects compared to contraceptives used by women. This shows that society is exploiting women and increase anxiety and stress for women there by suppressing their abilities and making life outside of family harder so that women resume their position as a housewife. For example a women experiencing depression or nausea at her workplace will perform badly therefore in comparison to males who are performing better and getting better result she will seem inferior .This clearly shows how society and its medications are purposely full of side effects to marginalise women, so that the males will be more dominant.

While Marxist and Socialist Feminist argue that women are not receiving the same medications as males. Women have two roles, also known as ‘double day’ which signifies two roles women have to undertake. First of all as a housewife, taking care of her domestic duties, and the other as a worker/employer. Sociologist Doyal suggests that it is the fact that women have two roles in society, that they getting sick. Personally I believe it is due to the medication we receive as women, which could otherwise be given to men with far less side effects. It is the due to the lack of consideration and its need for male dominance that women are sick.

Even now in this modern day the definition of health is not clear. There are two opposing theories one being that health means the ‘absence of disease’ the other being ‘not only an absence of disease but also a state of physical, mental, spiritual and social well-being’. The negative concept is the ‘absence of disease’ which would mean that the person needs to be diagnose with a disease in order to be unhealthy. However the positive definition which is provided by the ‘World Health Organization (WHO)’in 1974;not merely an absence of disease but also a state of physical, mental, spiritual and social well-being’ means that you don’t have to be diagnosed with a disease you could be mentally ill ,physically, spiritually ,socially, emotionally, or intellectually. So therefore the health and social care sectors usually take a holistic assessment in order to address the needs of the ‘whole’ person rather than single issues. (Btec level 3 health and social care book 3).

Sociologist Mildred Blaxter carried a large survey and then identified three definitions to health and well-being;

One positive definition; ‘regarding health as being fit’

Two being a negative definition; ‘Regarding health as being free from pain or discomfort

And lastly a functional definition; ‘regarding health in terms of being able to perform certain, day-to-day tasks

Concepts of ill health
Clinical Iceberg

One concept of health is Clinical Iceberg this is a term used to describe unreported illness. The statistics produced by the government and the doctors have a 94% off unreported illness missing from the statistics. For example Lyme Disease is one of the highest unreported illnesses that is unreported. “A survey last month for the Everyman Male Cancer Campaign suggested that nearly twice as many men as women had not visited their GP in the past year.” (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8154200.stm last accessed 22/10/12 18:02) & (http://www.anh-usa.org/lymedisease/ last accessed 27/12/12 )So therefore this could be one of the reason why there are so many unreported illness because men do need see a doctor because the try and live up to the saying of ‘men don’t cry and they are tough’ so this leads them to think that if they do go to the doctors that they are weak.

Impairment

Impairment is the restrictions to our day-to-day activities caused by physical or mental dysfunctions for example Down syndrome; a learning difficultly.

Disability

Disability is seen by Tom Shakespeare as restrictions that arise for a person with impairments because society does not take into account the needs of people with impairment for example someone in a wheel chair not having ramps in buildings or someone deaf not having hearing aids available. However some people may refer this to ‘disabling environment’ which suggests an environment where facilities for the impairments are not available for people to take full part in social life.

CONTENTS

Introduction————————————————————————1

Section 1

Definition of health and illness————————————————-2
Evaluate Sociological and biological constructs of health——————3

Section 2

Structural patterns in inequality in modern Britain————————-4
Evaluation of unequal distribution of illness——————————–5

Section 3

Factors that reduce the freedom of health care —————————-6
Structures of healthcare service that might affect individuals———–7

Section 4

Conclusion———————————————————————8

Section 5

Reference———————————————————————-9

Introduction

This report aims to understand and analyse the different definitions of health and illness in different perspectives, evaluate them and identify structural patterns in inequality in Modern Britain.

It also evaluates unequal distribution of illness from different perspectives among different groups. It identifies problems that might occur in accessing health care among different groups in modern Britain.

Finally it evaluates changes in healthcare services and the structures, and how this might affect different groups in the society.

DIFINING HEALTH AND ILLNESS

The speech “Beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder,” can be used to define my own version of health and illness as to what our views are about health and illness. For example I view health as been strong and healthy enough to carry out my daily chores, on the contrary inability to achieve it will be blamed on my physical health. So how do people view health and illness?

World health organisation (1946) defines health as the mental and physical wellbeing. On the other hand illness will be the defined as lack of mental and physical wellbeing.

The biopsychosocial model view health and illness as the interaction between biomedical, social and psychological factors. Biomedical refers to genetic factors such as inherited conditions and physiological changes of individuals, psychologically how we manifest our feelings and thought and socially how we socialise and communicate with persons and group of persons in the society as a whole. The interaction with all of these factors, coupled with cultural differences among different groups of people in Britain will influence the way we view health and illnesses.

Holistic model view health and illness by taking into account the whole person, which includes the person’s body, spirit and mind. This mode is much more individualised to the person involved and rarely take into account wider picture and the social and environmental factors that might possibly influence health and illness across various cultures.

Biomedical models defines health and illness by using scientific measure to determine if a person is ill or not, as they believe that illness is caused by physical factors, such as physiological changes in the body and inherited genes, in case of mental health causes might be referred to neurotransmitters defect, biochemistry which might be linked to high increase of dopamine to the frontal cortex of the brain and so on. As such blood test, analysis and series of test are carried out to identify the causes and this may enable them to classify the illness and provide appropriate treatment through the use of drugs to control or cure the condition. Biomedical model view human body as a machine, in real sense machines do develop a mechanical fault and will require fixing up. This is how biomedical model view the body, at a point it might break down and require fixing up through surgery or drugs.

Sociological model believes that health and illness are caused by factors outside of the physiological changes in the body. This model attributes causes of ill health to poverty and inequality, socio standard of behaviour and communication in the society. Sociological model view health to be socially constructed in the society to control people. They also believe that different factors such as psychological, political, social, economic, biological, and culture and environment influenced the way people view health in the society.

Health is not an easy term to define. For some it encompasses mental health, for others physical and mental health are compartmentalized.

A perception of health or mental health is not only defined within the medical context, but it is also defined by the patient within a sociocultural context that includes family and social network as well as a wide selection of potential providers. Such definitions may vary from one culture to another, Warwick-Boot (2012).

Biomedical models does have some advantages as it enable the medical team to carry out series of medical test to find out any physiological changes. However, scientifically, there has been no expansion of drug innovation, old drugs have been manufactured under different names doing the same thing as previous drugs. This raise concern if these drug manufacturers are neutral to the medical teams. Areas with major health concerns and needs are been neglected and drugs budget have been dramatically reduced due to the poverty conditions of these groups for the fact that they might not make a lot of profit, this refers to the medical professionals as iatrogenesis meaning they are the cause of health problems.

The benefit of Sociological model is that it takes into account the factors outside of the physiological changes in the body such as psychological, political, social, economic, biological, culture and environment when viewing health and illness. The down side to it is that way cultures and different groups view health and illness changes over time. For example once homosexuality was viewed as illness and now it is normal in a society.

Section 2

Ethnicity

According to M. Senior, B Viveash (1998) refers to ethnicity as a way of life, behaviour that one acts on to make a sense of their cultural identity in a particular group in the society as a whole. Movement in and out of Britain have made Britain into more diversified cultural society today, to those who preserved it. Though several ethnic minorities are small, but in some cases there are larger ones in some demographic region like Brent in London. This makes it more obvious for a particular health need to be cared for in an area where ethnic groups are concentrated in.

The biological model often refers to the features which makes up the physical look of a person such as their skin colour to classify them into a group. Why the sociologists distinguishes people according to their ethnic groups.

The artefact explanations strongly believe that there are specific health and illnesses associated within different ethnic groups.

The sociologists have great concern in understanding why some certain health and illnesses are associated with different ethnic groups. Such as Afro-Caribbean linked with high rate of sickle cell anaemia an inherited blood disorder, why the White European have a high rate of haemophilia a disorder that prevents the clotting of blood and might cause someone to bleed to death if quick medical emergency intervention is not carried out on time. Also Asians are associated with high rate of heart diseases and so forth.

It is important to examine the way ethnic groups have distributed themselves in the demographic regions of Britain to enable us to account for their numbers in a particular area, whether they are minor or large such as ethnic group in Brent in London, understand some health related issues associated with these specific groups and outline the health care needs of the majority of the local people in the society.

Health inequalities exist among different groups. In this case among ethnic groups.

Ethnicity and Culture

According to Public Health Action Support (2011) there is evidence of documentation within ethnic inequalities in health outcomes in the UK. There are difficulties with the approach and measurement of ethnicity as to what the causes might be as outlined below.

Ethnicity is regarded as a fluid concept, because it entails different meanings within different contexts. For example, an individual from Pakistan might consider himself as a Pakistani when filling out a form in the UK surveys, when filling out a form in the US might consider himself Asian. The definition of ethnicity is influenced by historical value and the current social and political context (Bradby, 2003).
As definitions of ethnicity changes classifications such as race, skin colour, language, religion, nationality, country of origin, and culture do not change. These have limitations and implications in accessing health. Often reason for research are not clearly stated. Bhopal (1997) claims that ethnicity is a euphemism for race. Review of the literature, Comstock and colleagues (2004) found that researchers failed to differentiate between the concepts of race and ethnicity.
Reliability and validity of measurements of ethnicity are huge concern to the society as a whole. Assigned ethnic identities may not match individual identities which threatens the validity of the research. Comparisons over time cannot reflect mixed ethnic identities. Finally classifying people as black, white, or Asian may mask differences associated between different groups of people. Ellison (2005).

For the fact Ethnicity is not written on UK death certificates, and mortality data uses country of birth as a proxy, this systems fail to recognise ethnic minorities that are born in the UK.

Findings on ethnic inequalities in mortality (Kelly & Nazroo, 2008):

Caribbean’s born in the UK have high rates of mortality from stroke. Men born in the Caribbean have low rates of mortality from coronary heart disease.

Born in West/South Africa you may have high mortality rates from stroke, but low mortality rates from coronary heart disease.

If born in South Asia you may have high mortality rates form coronary heart disease and stroke.

Non-white individuals may have low mortality rates from respiratory disease and lung cancer, but high mortality rates of diabetes.

Table 1: Analyses the rates of mortality by country of origin, England and Wales, 1989-1992.

Cause of death

All

Coronary heart disease

Lung cancer

Breast cancer

Men

Women

Men

Women

Men

Women

Women

AlAll

100

100

100

100

100

100

100

ScScotland

132

136

120

130

149

169

114

IrIIreland

139

120

124

120

151

147

92

A South Africa

110

103

131

105

42

17

84

West Africa

113

126

56

62

62

51

125

C Caribbean

77

91

46

71

49

31

75

So South Asia

106

100

146

151

45

33

59

Source: Wild and McKeigue (1997:705) in Bartly (2004)

Explanations for ethnic inequalities in health include:

Biased results of statistical artefact.
Illness are blamed on migrationprocess (change of environment).
Genetic and biological differencesbetween ethnic groups may be a factor.
It is associated with different culture and health behaviours.
Poverty
Experiences of various forms of racial abuse leads to health problems.
Unequal treatment by the health care system in Britain.

Ethnic inequalities in health care access still persist in NHS. The inverse care law, first described by Julian Tudor Hart in 1971, states: The availability of good medical care tends to vary inversely with the need for it in the population

served.

Goddard and Smith (2001) outline reasons for variations in access to health care:

Availability:Some health care services may not be available to some population groups, or clinicians may have different propensities to offer treatment to patients from different population groups, even where they have

identical needs.

Quality: The quality of services offered to patients may vary between population groups.

Costs:The health care services may impose costs (financial or otherwise) which vary between population groups.

Information:The health care organisations may fail to ensure that all population groups are equally aware of the services available.

The sociological perspectives to illness varies. The functionalism expects a large population to have division of labour as no one is self -sufficient to ensure that the society functions in an orderly manner. They also encourage people to seek and comply with medical advice for speedy recovery so as to return back to work. They understands people have to work, and people do not claim to be ill deliberately and as such should not be punished. This perspective do aim to protect workers from been abused or punished by their employer due to ill health, however they do overstate the importance of the doctors who have the power to make or break a patient which leads to lots of medical errors referred to as iatrogenesis. There could also be dependency on drugs to force people back to work.

Marxism examine the economic systems of the capitalist society that shapes the society as a whole. As such the society is divided into two social groups which are the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. Bourgeoisie the private property owners and those that owns the means of production and create bogus profit are believed to have greater influences in the rules of the society. Why the proletariat (labourers), those who work for the bourgeoisie are been manipulated to believe that they are in a fair system. Marxism ideology encourages us to question the motives of the doctors as they intend to serve the rich people of the society. Due to the need to access healthcare and it is made available to the proletariat they have been made to believe that illness is a personal issue rather than socially constructed. Marxism does not acknowledge the the interaction between doctors patient and also they ignore the sickness and employment benefit offered by the capitalist states.

Feminism views thinks men dominate the medical professions and make decisions about a woman’s body which affects women. They also feel that lack of understanding of a natural process of childbirth have been labelled to be a medical condition. Exhaustion from a new role as a mum, have also been labelled as depression. They also think why are women contraception over emphasized? And men left out. This explains the inequality and the patriarchy world we are in today.

The interactionist views are that individuals attaches meaning to their own behaviour as well as others they also feel illness differ from person one person to person, even when they are diagnosed with the same condition. They are not always in compliance with the medical team that is why a dialogue is needed for mutual agreement between the doctor and the patient. Sometimes the doctors do not come to terms with a patient if they complain of a particular illness, and sometimes doctors label people with illness which affect the psyche of people’s mind and then making them psychosomatic by acting out those symptoms.

If we look at post natal depression as an illness diagnosed by a medical team from all of this prospective we can see that the functionist view conforms to this by giving the medical team the power to label this individual, which results to administration of drugs that eventually will become tranquillizers which leads to dependency with much more side effects. From the Marxism point of view people will be brainwashed to accept the fact that they are suffering from this illness due to their personal physiological changes rather than socially constructed issues of the society as a whole. The feminist does not see post natal depression as an illness, rather they feel it is a natural process for a woman to become sore after the birth of a baby as they may have had episiotomy, sore breast, sleepless nights for caring for a new born, instead of labelling it and interrupting a natural process by medication, they feel the patriarchy medical team should understand things better from a woman’s point of view. Finally post natal depression may be viewed as labelling an individual which into may utter their psyche and may begin to manifest the symptoms, they feel labelling someone may actually make them worse off.

Can you think of human behaviours or conditions that have recently been mediatised?

Think about what makes a person disabled? Write down some physical symptoms and then discuss how these can be ‘enabled’ in our society

Section 3

Definitions of Health, Illness and Sickness

http://nccc.georgetown.edu/body_mind_spirit/definitions_health_sickness.html

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Warwick

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Michael Senior with Bruce V

Health Knowledge

Inequalities in the distribution of health and health care

http://www.healthknowledge.org.uk/public-health-textbook/medical-sociology-policy-economics/4c-equality-equity-policy/inequalities-distribution. Public Health Action Support 2011

The Full Monty is a movie based on a group of men who have been made redundant due to effects of economic change and political misfortune. This leads to a shift in social organisation, when taking into consideration in conventional social order men are anticipated to be the primary breadwinners. As a final way out, the group decide to put on an amateur strip production for the ladies in the local workingmen’s club as a way to make money. For the purposes of this sociological analysis of the film, The Full Monty, two sociological theories will be consulted namely from Raewyn Connell regarding hegemonic masculinities and social order and Emile Durkheim concerning egoistic and anomic suicide.

2. Key Theorists

Raewyn Connell, is an Australian sociologist acknowledged for her work in the fields of sociology, education, gender studies, political science and history (University of Sydney, 2010) She is currently a Professor at the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Education and Social Work .Connell’s work deals critically with social structures, inequalities and social justice, gender relations and gender identity politics in the context of hegemony, especially hegemonic masculinity. She is for the most part recognised for her widely-cited book, Masculinities (University of Sydney, 2010).

David Emile Durkheim (April 15, 1858 – November 15, 1917) was a French positivist sociologist. Durkheim developed the sociological positivism of Auguste Comte in greater detail, hence developing a rigorous methodology combining sociological theory with empirical social research.[2] Also influential in anthropology, Durkheim was a structural functionalist and an early proponent of solidarism.[3]HYPERLINK “#cite_note-3?[4] During his lifetime, Durkheim gave many lectures, and published numerous sociological studies on subjects such as education, crime, religion, suicide, and many other aspects of society.

3. Hegemonic Masculinity and Social Order

The Full Monty is set in Sheffield, North England after Thatcher’s era (1979-1990) (Tamba, 2002). After the fall of the steel industry in Sheffield, men’s roles in society were compromised, they were no longer able to be the breadwinners of the household and as such the women became the providers and started impeding on the hegemonic masculinity of these men. Official figures show that the number of men of working age with jobs has fallen from 92 per cent in 1971 to 75 per cent. The number of women who are employed has risen from 56 per cent to 69 per cent, narrowing the gap between women and men to 6 per cent (Watt, 2010). This gives women more financial independence and often leads to them wearing the trousers in a relationship, further contributing to the man’s loss of masculinity. The men in the film feel inadequate and hopeless with being unemployed. “With women increasingly becoming the breadwinners and traditionally roles being reversed by their newfound economic independence, men were forced to re-examine their relationships and deeply held beliefs about gender roles” (Tamba, 2002)

The group in this film come up with this strip act which is directed at getting money as they are all struggling financially. However, a number of social issues and perceptions arise on the lead up to the act. Social order is challenged when certain traits are defined as either being specifically feminine or masculine. When the men are together in Gerald’s house taking off their clothes, they start comparing themselves to the “Chippendales”, who were the strip group that gave Gaz the idea to do it themselves. They show their insecurities about their bodies and as such their masculinity. Dave, one of the members of the group, finds himself dealing with a weight complex. He views himself as overweight, unappealing and repulsive. As he discusses this with the rest of the men, one of them, Gerald states that “fat David is a feminist issue”. This perception is generalised, meaning that it is only women who should have to conform to the models of attractiveness that are set by men. However, Dave challenges this notion with this concern about his weight and appearance. In the beginning of the movie whilst they were taking auditions for the group, the presence of Horse, a black man, sets about a succession of wild whispers and accusations about how black men have good bodies and bigger sexual organs. The film yet again contradicts this theory as Horse, upon hearing they were going to do the full Monty is seen buying a penis enlargement product.

5. Durkheim’s Suicide

Durkheim (1897) stated that there are four types of suicide, these are based on the degrees of imbalance of two social forces: social integration and moral regulation. In the film, a young man, Lomper, was a security guard at Harrison’s, the steel mill where Dave and Gaz once worked. After Lomper finally loses his job long after the mill shut down, he tries to commit suicide by asphyxiating himself in his car by carbon monoxide poisoning. By coincidence Dave and Gaz are out jogging and pass Lomper trying to start his car. Dave, who stops to help, tries to have a conversation with Lomper however cuts off the contact after getting no response. After a few seconds, whilst walking away, Dave realises that Lomper was trying to asphyxiate himself and runs back to save Lomper’s life.

The subsequent scene shows Dave, Gaz and Lomper sitting on a hill, talking about different ways of committing suicide. Dave suggests “getting a mate to run you down right fast (with a car)”, to which Lomper says he “hasn’t got any mates”. Gaz rebuts telling him they just saved his life, “so don’t tell us were not your mates”. Lomper’s inclusion in the group gave him a newly-optimistic attitude on life.

Lomper’s attempted suicide can be attributed to two of Durkheim’s types of suicide. The first is Egoistic suicide. This form of suicide is the result of a weakening of the bonds that normally integrate individual into the collectivity. Durkheim refers to this type of suicide as the result of “excessive individualisation”, meaning that the individual becomes increasingly dethatched from other members of the community. He went on to discover that particularly males who were unmarried, with less to bind and connect them to stable social norms and goals, committed suicide at higher rates. Lomper who says he has no friends is an example of this type of suicide. He is not sufficiently bound to a social group and left with little social support or guidance, therefore his attempted suicide into this category of an Egoistic suicide.

The second type of Durkheim’s suicide that Lomper’s attempt subscribes to is Anomic suicide. Durkheim says that anomic suicide ‘occurs in times of social upheaval and moral disorder in which people do not know where they fit in within their societies’ (Germov & Poole, 2008: 28). The male characters in the film were once proud workers in the heavy steel industry who suddenly found themselves without a job, without hope and without a proper role in society. During the economic downturn of the industrial business in Sheffield a lot of the men lost their jobs, including Lomper. According to the British Medical Journal (1999) between 1980 to 1991 the suicide rates for males aged between 25-65 was double compared to the under 25 age group. This could show that these higher age groups were more greatly affected by the social defragmentation as they were the ones most likely in the now devastated steel industry. Consequently Lomper was not sure where he fit into society once he lost his job and he had no friends to converse with, making him a person with an increased risk of suicide according to Durkheim (1897).

The most sophisticated theories of modernization emphasize the role of a wide variety of social and institutional variables and carry out a mainly sociological analysis of the transition (Larrain 1989:87) Discuss.

Modernization is the process of making something modern. It is linked with newness and the idea of society and the economy evolving. Modernization theory became prominent in the 1950’s and 1960’s. The theory is concerned with both then economic and social factors in which encourage development and growth. Modernization theories often explain a series of growth stages that a society will progress through towards modernization. This essay will focus on the social variables and theories that are important in explaining modernization. However, modernization theories have received much debate and other theories and critics, will too, be examined.

Modernization theory was a great importance after World War II, and the differences between the first world and second and third world were important to the theory. Many policies were made for development of the third world which were focused around the modernization of economies and societies. The theories of modernization have also always focused on the ideas of two types of society, the traditional structures and the modern society. These two social structures are historically connected through an evolutionary process which followed certain general laws (Gwynne, 2008). Modernization involves a mixture of development factors such as technological change, changing values and attitudes, and capital accumulation. However, highest priority is often given to social changes such as values, norms and beliefs that would prompt related change in the spheres of development.

It could be argued as in Larrian’s words, that the most sophisticated theories of modernization do emphasize the role of a wide variety of social and institutional variables and carry out a mainly sociological analysis of the transition. Economic theories are plentiful and of great importance, but the incorporation of new ideas brought up sociological theories of modernization. Bohman (1996) says;

‘Modernization theory claimed a high correlation existed in the Third World societies between the degrees of modernization and the diffusion of Western-style cultural and attitudinal traits.’

The sociological theory explains the need for removing all social and cultural barriers which are slowing modernization. Brohman (1996) states that

‘The interlinking of changes in both economic and non-economic factors (e.g.; in attitudes toward work, wealth, savings, and risk taking) could then take place in a mutually reinforcing manner to support development.’

Social barriers can be seen in many social theories, such as those by Weber and Parson’s.

The sociological view on modernization can be seen through many theories. Modernization can, at large, be seen as created by social and cultural factors and many sociologists have argued this theory of modernization. There is a long historical tradition within social sciences of the transition from traditional to modern societies.

Firstly, Post World War II Max Weber wrote on modernization and suggests that a society can be constructed by deep routed traditions and beliefs, in which effect everyday life, and thus society. Weber focuses on a religious aspect to the modernization of society. According to Weber it is important that a society is organised once capitalism has emerged, and that religious ideas were crucial in the development of capitalism in the world. Weber sought to explain that factors especially those concerned with industrialization were responsible for making modern western societies different from others. Brohman (1996);

‘He stressed the appearance of rationalization; actual process that he believed was peculiar to western society’.

The theories suggested by Weber include social and institutional variables such as religion, culture and work ethics which will hinder or favour development and the modernization of a country. Cultural differences can be seen between modern western countries and less developed ones.

Talcott Parsons continues Weber’s ideas with his theory of modernization. His theory views social values, norms and institutions as playing a crucial role in determining the potential for development of various societies. Brohman (1996)

‘Development involved much more than simply initiating economic changes; new values, norms, institutions, and organizations had to be introduced to transform the old social order’

Therefore if a society were to modernize, elements of traditional societies that were restricting modernization needed to be replace (Brohman). Parsons uses the idea of the modern ‘ideal’ of social values in order for capitalisation to occur. A set of variables were suggested that were thought to differentiate traditional from modern values.

The first variable is concerned with status by achievement or ascriptive criteria. A modern society is stratified by qualifications and experiences, whereas traditional society gains status through it being ascribed or through ethnicity. The second looks at the governance of patterns of interaction by universalilism versus particularism. A modern organization will have rules and regulations in which apply to everyone and lead to systematic efficiency. On the other hand, traditional society organisations may favour or discriminate certain individuals. The third variable focuses on role expectations. Gwynne (2008);

‘The roles which the individual within the society expect one another to

perform’

A social value system is linked to role expectations within a society which are encouraged by rewards and punishment. In modernized countries the expected or normal behaviour is one which is necessary for capitalism, such as risk taking, profit motivation and non-familial organisations. Larrain (2000) says;

‘The entrepreneur is the agent of development because of being hard working, rational, willing to take risks, etc.’

Studies on Modernization can be applied to Parsons variables. Lipset (1967) uses Latin America as a case study. Lipset suggests that the behaviour characteristics of Latin American societies are preventing it from modernization. These behavioural characteristics were those of weak achievement motivation and weak work ethic. As they do not have the role expectations of a modern society, then modernization can therefore be stunted.

A further view on modernization, rather different than Parson, from a sociological view point is that of Gino Germani. This saw that social change was occuring at different speeds to that of economic growth. One stage of social change may occur in different stages of modernization. Therefore, traditional society can live along side a modernizing capital. His thesis was threefold, and gave a similar contrast in the societies of modern and traditional cities. For example, in a traditional society, change is not the norm, whereas in industrial society change it is quite normal. This therefore emphasises that the type of stage a society is in, and the role expectations they will have, will influence modernization. Germani also points out institutional variations between the traditional and the modern world. The traditional world will not have structure and institution, whereas, the modern world will have structure and institutions with specialised functions.

Germani’s theory progresses with the idea that knowledge must be present for the change of the modernization process to occur. Knowledge included science and technology, and knowledge must be guided by philosophy and theology. His theory also links to the social norms and behaviours of society. He focuses on the way people are socially stratified and suggests that a society shall move from traditional norms to modern norms, and then the social stratification must change. For example, a stratification bases on inheritance must change to achievement, therefore, social mobility must be changed for modernization to occur.

The social analysis of modernization was adopted post second world war in Latin America. As modernization occurred else where in the world, ideas from other countries effected theories of development in Latin America. A change can be seen as cultural identities were being changed, and therefore theories started to shift towards the social sciences. There was thus great interest in the structure of Latin American societies.

Sociologists in the 1940’s and 50’s were suggesting a transition from traditional society to modern society in Latin America and advanced industrial societies were the ‘ideal’. Germani published work on Latin America and it can be seen from this work how the process of social change in Latin America are asynchronous. Larrain (2000);

‘For Germani, therefore, culture becomes the ‘value system’ of society and this structural-functional aid is applied to Latin America as an abstract scheme whereby the transition is supposed to mean the progressive abandonment of religious values and old rural traditions and their replacement by the values of reason, freedom, progress and tolerance’.

These theories of changing society all evolve to modernisation. Social evolution theories have been used when explaining modernization. Brohman (1996);

‘comte, theorized social evolution as a series of stages of human development beginning with a traditional society and culminating in a modern society’.

Such theories of social evolution can therefore be combined with the traditional to modern society idea to explain a theory of social change in which development occurs leading to industrial capitalism (larrain, 2000).

Sociological analysis of modernization is therefore important. However, it can be criticised by the economic theories. This suggests that sociological needs are not the most sophisticated or most focused on. From this angle, development is a process of capital formation, determined by levels of savings. Once these savings have been made they can be reinvested back into industry and thus, growth is sustained. Growth is a linear process which will increase once momentum is gained. This idea of gaining momentum is similar to the work of Rostow. The economic theories look at areas where little growth has occurred and have found that at first it is hard to start to develop, but once development has started in is easier to sustain. This is best described by Lewis (1950:36)

‘once the snowball starts to move downhill, it will move of its own momentum, and will get bigger and bigger as it goes along… You have, as it were, to begin by rolling your snowball up the mountain. Once you get it there, the rest is easy, but, you cannot get it there without first making an initial effort.’

Rostow is a key theorist in economic theories of modernization. He suggests that there are a series of sequences from the traditional world to modern capitalism based on mass consumption. This too, looks at the difficulty of the first ‘take off’ stage when growth first begins. Rostow’s five stages starts with the traditional society in which agriculture and low productivity is the dominating economy. The second stage is concerned with achieving preconditions for ‘take off’. Rostow suggest that in western European countries, Britain with its natural resources, trading possibilities and social structure meant it was the first to develop fully the preconditions for take off (Roberts, 2000). Stage 3 was take off; this is seen as the most problematic stage. The resistance to steady growth are finally overcome and growth becomes its normal condition. The rate of effective investment and savings may rise from 5% of national income to 10% (Roberts, 2000). New industries expand rapidly, yielding profits in this stage. The fourth stage is the road to maturity, which is a long historical period of the economy. It normally occurs about 60 years after take off. The economic growth is sustained and outputs are regular which, thus, increases population. The economy is modernized with improved technology. The fifth and final stage is the age of high mass consumption, in which the leading sector shifts toward consumer goods and services and an emergence of a welfare sate exists at this stage.

In contrast, Alexander Gerschenkron suggests his theory of economic modernization could be important if it is linked to backwardness. This means that as one country modernizes and the backwardness in a country deepens then the underprivileged society will become increasingly sensitive to the contrast between itself and the successfully modernizing state (Gwynne, 2008). With ideologies and modernizing elites, a society can move toward industrialization and accelerated growth. If a society adopts advanced scientific and industrial techniques then they will be able to industrialise. If a society was lacking important elements for growth then new institutions will not be able to develop.

Further theories include Alber O. Hinchman, whose theories focus on patterns of unbalanced growth. Hirnchman suggests that if development efforts are concentrated on the key industries in underdeveloped regions, then this may encourage development. His work can link with Gerschenkrons ideas. Geography plays an important part in his theories, as he argues that the growth must be geographically unbalanced and the growth must be centred on ‘master industries’ which can then make linkages around the country. This creates concentrated regions of growth in the country, and once this growth is established it disperses throughout the country. The state was also predicted by Hirnchman to intervene if there was an area of national crisis.

A less optimistic approach is that of Mydral, who believes there are spatial implications of economic modernization. He describes the ‘process of cumulative causation’ where economic activities become concentrated in certain areas which has a negative impact on other spaces which will lead to the movement of people, capital and goods. This would mean that the movement of surplus will not spread around the country. One way of spreading the capital can be seen in Myrdal’s work on Venezuela. The oil resources were funnelled into the growth of Civdad Guayana which was being built on the basis of steel and aluminium in the country’s underdeveloped east. This was a way of reducing the centralization of the economy in Caracas.

Therefore, sociological theories of modernization may not be the key theories. Another important factor is the idea of Eurocentrism, which means, as started by Cloke et al (1999)

‘the characteristic of believing that the western European experience is the only correct was to progress’.

Therfore, can theories really be applied to the whole world. This also triggers the idea of European superiority, which might lead to increased sensitivity between the west and the third world, causing greater backwardness. The model of economic growth still remains firmly rooted in western economies and may use economic theories as a basis to development research.

A further implication to sociological analysis is that it ignores some political analysis of modernization. This focuses on the idea of class systems. The middle and upper classes are crucial to the development process. As the middle class expands their population, they provide a stabilising force for the modernization transition (Brohman, 1996). As the middle class is expanded, upward mobility becomes easier, based on mass consumption and for liberal democratization. Western states use education as a critical tool for modernization. Good education leads to entrepreneurship and innovation. Once this spreads to the third world, modernization will start. Political modernization also links to the stability of institutions. Brohman (1996);

‘Huntington adopted the position that maintenance of stability rather than promotion of democratic institutions should be the primary goal of political modernization’.

Overall it can be agreed that the most sophisticated theories of modernization emphasize the role of a wide variety of social and institutional variables and carry out a mainly sociological analysis of the transition. Post war theories have been critical to explaining a sociological view on modernization. Many theorists such as Parson’s and Weber have had very influence theories, and do carry out a sociological analysis on modernization. This shows that there are greater depths of analysis of modernization than just economic, thus, a sociological analysis looks slightly deep and could be argued to be more sophisticated. On the other hand, economic theories are deeply rooted in modernization theories and will be used in development research. These to have come up with highly sophisticated analysis of the transition. Therefore it could be argued that sociological analysis is the main or the widest theory used. It must be taken into account that all these theories are affected by the fact that they are written from a western viewpoint and may suffer from eurocentrism. With all these ideas taken into account, it could be concluded that there a wide range of modernization theories, some will emphasize the role of economy and politics, and some will emphasize social values and will be of a mainly sociological viewpoint.

Select and present an article from a current newspaper or magazine in your country, (the UK), that offers an assessment of some social problem. Assess the data in the article in terms of a social scientist’s perspective. What is your conclusion regarding the article.?
Introduction

Relationships between the West and the Muslim world have been of considerable interest both to politicians and to the general public, especially sociologists. Since the events of 9/11 in America the world has been confronted with the fact that there is a faction within Islam that will do anything to make its voice heard and to further its concerns in the West. This paper therefore has selected a newspaper article concerned with the publication of some cartoons involving the Prophet Mohammed. This has caused considerable upset in the Muslim world and is given a different presentation in different publications. The article selected for analysis here is taken from the Daily Mirror, Saturday 4^th February. This paper will assess the data in the article from the perspective of a social scientist and will then give some conclusions regarding the article. Sociological analysis of documents is usually described as content analysis and there are a number of ways in which this type of analysis may be undertaken. Some sociologists use formal content analysis where a number of different texts on a given subject are used. This also sometimes involves the use of statistics (Giddens, 2001). Content analysis may also involve thematic and textual analysis. This paper will use a thematic and textual analysis (as described by Bryman, 2004) to analyse the chosen article. Scott (1990) maintains that great care should be taken when analysing documents, particularly media documents. The person undertaking the analysis needs to be aware of their own position and prejudices at the outset and how this might impact on their reading and understanding of the text. There are, therefore, problems of reliability with this kind of analysis.

Language and Ideology

The article that I have chosen to analyse is entitled “Muslims Day of Rage: Muslim cartoon Protest rock the world and Britain” by Victoria Ward and Stephen White. The article concerns the protests and violent reactions to the publication by a Danish newspaper of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed as a terrorist. The first thing that was noted was the title. Muslim’s Day of Rage, this is the kind of phrase that is likely to add to the Islamaphobia that has been growing in the West since the events of 9/11 and the London terrorist bombings last July. The wording implies that all Muslims were not only upset and insulted by the cartoons, bearing in mind that all forms of representation not only of the prophet, but of human beings are forbidden in Islam, but that most of them are engaging in violent protest. This analysis of the title is confirmed by the opening lines of the article:

FURIOUS Muslims warned Europe it would pay with blood yesterday for publishing a cartoon of the prophet Mohammed as a terrorist (Daily Mirror, 4/2/06-no page number given).

Again the article does not differentiate between groups of Muslim protestors and the Muslim community at large. It tends to suggest that the vast majority of Muslims take the view that Europe should be made to pay in blood for the insult. This kind of wording is likely to incite religious and racial hatred. Looking at the article as a whole it might be said that the ideology underlying this article relates to Islamaphobia and is perhaps connected to the writers’ own fears of terrorist attacks. This theme of Muslim violence can be detected throughout the article. What is most problematic about this is that the article does not clearly differentiate between those Muslims engaging in demonstrations and violent protest, and those Muslims who are not. The language is used in such a way that it appears to apply to all Muslims and represents them as an angry and violent group.

Representation

The title and opening lines of the article I would suggest, tend to represent Muslim people as a homogenous group who want to see the West pay for the outrageous insult to the Prophet. The writers go on to speak of demonstrations that were charged with hatred in London where the Danish flag was burned and some protestors were claiming that ‘another 7/7 is on its way’ (referring to the tube and bus bombings in London last year). The article refers only briefly to the cartoon itself:

The offending cartoon, which first appeared in a small Danish newspaper, showed the prophet Mohammed wearing a bomb-shaped turban. Islamic tradition bars any depiction of the prophet to prevent idolatry (Daily Mirror, 4/2/06)

No criticism is made of the paper that printed the cartoon, of the cartoonist that produced it, or even of the fact that to Muslims such a cartoon would be viewed as blasphemous. While not wishing to endorse violent protests or to take sides it would seem that the article treats the subject with a very uneven handed approach. Clearly the writers, although this is not mentioned, hold to the idea of free speech and the freedom of the press. The question is why should this unheralded endorsement of free speech be contrasted with the representation of ‘furious’ and ‘angry’ Muslims. The ways in which the information is presented arguably gives a distorted picture of the whole issue. The cartoon is given much less space and attention than the acts of groups of Muslim protestors and tends to minimalise the offence that even the majority of non-demonstrating/protesting Muslims must have felt.

Passive and Active Language

The sentence relating to the cartoon is written in the passive voice, it says that the cartoon ‘first appeared’ as though it was not the work of human hands. By contrast all the recorded incidents concerning the protestors and the demonstrators are presented in the active mode as the following two extracts show.

In Jakarta, Indonesia, more than 150 Muslims stormed a building housing the Danish Embassy and tore down and burned the country’s white and red flag (Daily Mirror, 4/2/06).

Thousands of Palestinian refugees marched through the streets of their camps in Lebanon, burning flags and urging Osama bin Laden to avenge Mohammad (Daily Mirror, 4/2/06).

No information is given as to the accuracy of the number of Palestinian refugees, the authors cite demonstrations from across the world and so some of those represented must have come from secondary sources, live news bulletins or other papers but it is not stated where such information came from or how the numbers given in the article for example the article states that more than 10,000 Palestinians were burning Danish cheese. The ways in which these numbers are presented and the fact that the newspaper makes consistent use of verbs to describe the protests and demonstrations gives what might be said to be an inflated view of what has been going on. The reader could be forgiven for believing that many thousands of Muslims across the globe have been involved in demonstrations and violent protests. Clearly this does not make violent action and threats of violence right but perhaps journalistic ethics were not hugely in evidence judging by the way in which this information was presented. Towards the end of the article Jack Straw condemned the cartoon, but again, not the cartoonist who produced it not the editor that published it. His comes as a voice of calm reason at the end of a litany of violent protest and threats of violence, adding to the overall picture of Muslims as enraged and violent rather than groups of Muslim protestors. At the end of the article the writers point to the fact that the secretary general of the Muslim Council of Great Britain urged Muslims not to be provoked by the extreme actions of those elements who were out to exploit the situation. It would seem that this might be a clearer picture of events than that which the writers of the article have presented us with.

Conclusion

In this paper I have attempted to analyse, from the point of view of a social scientist, a newspaper article that is concerned with protests and demonstrations by some groups of Muslims over their upset at the publication of a cartoon which present the Prophet Mohammed as a terrorist. I have used a textual and thematic analysis in reading this article and have tried to cover most of its aspects. In undertaking this analysis I was acutely aware that the way in which the article was written annoyed me because I felt that it did not give an accurate picture of Muslims as a whole. It seemed that some of the language used by the writers was used not just to persuade, but to inflame and that this could lead to counter-protest on behalf of those people who see Islam and its people as a threat to Western civilisation.

Bibliography

Bryman, A 2^nd ed. 2004 Social Research Methods Oxford, Oxford University Press

Giddens, A. 2001 4^th ed. Sociology, Cambridge, Polity Press

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/tm_objectid=16665334%26method=full%26siteid=94762-name_page.html Daily Mirror, “Muslims Day of Rage: Muslim cartoon Protest rock the world and Britain” by Victoria Ward and Stephen White. 4^th February 2006

www.polity.co.uk/giddens