SEEING CONNECTIONS

CYPA SOC Oct. 14 2014

Seeing how our actions in one part of life are the causes and consequences of what happens elsewhere

Sociological mindfulness is…

Awareness of Unintended Consequences

Example: Housekeeper/maid/ayi

“A person with money is entitled to have others to his/her dirty work”

“To use such an idea, if only implicitly, to justify hiring a housecleaner affirms the rightness of inequality”

Analyzing moral problems

Example: Abortion in US “Sociological mindfulness can help is see

more of what must be taken into account in seeking solutions to moral problems.” Connection between our beliefs and

actions, and their consequences

Reading Indexes

Indexes are sign in the social world that refer to or represent something else

We ask ourselves What does this condition, custom, or

event mean? What other realities does it point to? What does it say about the nature of

our society? Going back to ayis…apply these

questions

Nonobvious indexes

Example: military investment We see this as a “door” to other social

realities. “Once the door is opened, we can trace

out connections and talk about what else they might lead us to see.”

If we are sociologically mindful, we can see the absence of things too, and their meanings.

Example: School Rhetoric versus policy See list of indexes page 45

Social Organization as Index

Connections to the Past

Consider: To what past is China connected and how?

Sociological imagination Biography History

We should ask: How did this practice originate? What problems did it solve, for whom?

Deepening the Present

We can ask of any tradition, custom, or arrangement: Does it serve the same purpose today

as it did originally? Has it become dysfunctional in some

way? Why has this tradition been preserved? Who benefits from carrying on this

tradition? How has the tradition changes over the

years? Why?

Example: Columbus Day

Gender neutral pronouns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKEwL-10s7E