This is a review of some of the major concepts we've covered so far this semester.  Try to be familiar with them and be able to connect them up to each other.

Tocqueville

     Self-interest rightly understood
     civil and political associations 
     feudalism vs. democracy
     liberty, equality, and fraternity
     despotism

Durkheim:

     social facts
     integration and regulation
     4 (ideal) types of suicide (and social structure)
     anomie and dissonance
     what drives the division of labor
     mechanical and organic solidarity
     problem of order

Ritzer:
Important processes and events (and modernization):
(Try to link to first two authors from the class - )

     Political Revolutions
     Industrial Revolutions
     Urbanization
     Socialism
     Changes in religion
     Enlightenment and science
     Breakup of feudalism
     Democracy

Charon, Chap. 1:

rational proof
proof, science, and sociology

Granovetter, "The Strength of Weak Ties"

strong ties
weak ties
bridge ties
importance of weak ties at micro, meso (group), and macro levels

Other Network stuff:

Milgram - small-world problem, his experiment
six degrees of separation - Lois Weisberg
search for an abortionist
Balance theory - transitive and intransitive triads for symmetric and asymmetric relations
balanced opposition
linear hierarchy
ranked cliques, statuses, or strata

Charon, Chap 4., "Why are people unequal in Society?"

Why does inequality emerge?
Why does inequality continue?
dimensions of stratification

Education and Inequality

status attainment models
micro, intermediate, and macro levels of analysis
Hurn:

radical and functional paradigms

Rist:

self-fulfilling prophecy
class-based reproduction of inequality

ethnocentrism
values vs. facts
assimilation vs. pluralism
reasons for ethnocentrism
 

Essay Questions
 
1) In our class so far, we have talked a good deal about social structures  - social networks, weak ties, strong ties, altruistic structures, egoistic structures, small worlds.  We have also discussed culture - middle class culture of teachers at schools, ethnocentrism and pluralism (multiple cultures), black and white culture.  How do these two relate to each other?

2) Briefly outline the functional and radical educational paradigms.  Which is closest to representing how schools in American society actually work?  Defend your choice.  Give a brief plan of how schools (and/or society) can reduce the reproduction of inequality.

3) We discussed in class the competing ideals of cultural assimilation and the maintenance of independent minority cultures.  Explain each of these ideals and choose one of these as your ideal (or is some middle ground better?) and defend it.  Feel free to use the Walnut reading or other details from readings or discussion to back up your ideal.  What are the barriers to implementing your ideal across the U.S.?

4) Was Durkheim's study of Suicide scientific?  Why or why not?  Be sure to include your standard of what science is, so I will know your "yardstick" of comparison.

5) What, according to Granovetter, is "The Strength of Weak Ties"?  Be sure to discuss at the micro, meso, and macro levels.  How might this concept be used to understand the development or reproduction of inequality in race or schools?
 
6) What is a self-fulfilling prophecy?  Explain its effects in Pygmalion in the Classroom and the Rist reading.  Expalin how self-fulfilling prophecy theory, in conjunction with reference group theory, might explain the reproduction of black inequality in schools?