Public Behavior in Private Spaces

On By econnellIn Crime and Deviance, Karen Sternheimer, Popular Culture and Consumption, Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change21 Comments

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By Karen Sternheimer

clip_image002Did you spend a lot of time at malls this holiday season? I did recently, although I didn’t go into very many stores to shop. Malls are great places to go when it’s cold and you want to get out of the house and get some exercise. While visiting my family this holiday season, nearly three feet of snow fell and local malls were just about the only place we could go to take a walk without freezing.

There’s a big difference between taking a walk outside and walking in a mall. Malls tend to be more crowded and walking space can be limited, so we often found ourselves walking in circles around some of the bigger department stores. Free samples in the food court can defeat the whole purpose of walking, too.

clip_image004The most significant difference between walking in a mall and walking outside is that malls are private spaces. Seemingly anyone can enter a mall, walk around and use the restroom if necessary. But unlike a truly public place, management has the right to ask people to leave for a variety of reasons that might seem vague and could be arbitrarily determined.

One upscale shopping center had its list of rules posted by the restroom, which I have posted below. (I decided to remove any identifying information, since as you can see in rule #4 any unauthorized photography is forbidden there).

Some of the “codes of conduct” seem like common sense rules that only the most disruptive of shoppers would violate: vandalism, drag racing, and fighting seem like good things to ban, and they are illegal anyway.

But take a look at some of the others—they might be open to a variety of interpretations. “All guests are to be treated as you would like to be treated….standing, walking or sitting in areas that might cause an inconvenience to others, is not permitted” according to rule #1. Wearing clothes not deemed to be “appropriate attire” violates rule #5. Sitting in your car for too long violates rule #7.

If you have ever been someplace where people violated these expectations, you know it can be uncomfortable when others are rude and disruptive. But my guess is that these rules might be bent for someone who drops a load of money at one of the pricey shops. Someone carrying a dog in their bag violates rule #9, yet I have seen exceptions made for people who appear to be wealthy and thus possibly good customers. As Sally Raskoff blogged about, here in Los Angeles dogs are most common in malls with upscale clientele. I’ve been barked at in dressing rooms on more than one occasion. IMG_1020

Several rules focus specifically on young people. “Minors must not continually congregate in groups larger than four” according to rule #2. Rule #3 follows: “To enforce the rules applicable to minors, we require all patrons on our property to carry appropriate identification with proof of age.” Finally, rule #8 states that, “All persons under the age of 18 are expected to be in school during school hours and may be asked to leave the property.”

Teens in public are routinely seen as potential problems, and yet for many teens the only “public” spaces they can visit are actually privately owned. Sociologist Christine L. Williams observed this while conducting ethnographic research in toy stores. In her book Inside Toyland: Working, Shopping, and Social Inequality, she notes that poor kids of color were routinely asked to leave stores even if they weren’t causing any trouble.

I spent a lot of time in malls before I earned my driver’s license; in fact, one of the malls I recently walked in was the local hangout for my peers. I had no proof of age until I was 16 (except a birth certificate, which my parents kept in a secure file at home), and by that time was mobile enough that hanging out at the mall didn’t appeal to me anymore. It wouldn’t have been unusual for me to be there during “school hours” either. Sometimes my friends and I went there for lunch, and my senior year I arranged my schedule to have the last period free so I could work in a store at the mall part time.

But since my friends and I contributed to the economic activity of the mall, no one ever asked us to leave, even if our group grew large or we were loud. If we clip_image008didn’t have spending money, our presence might have been considered more troubling. And consider that many retail stores tend to hire white, affluent teens, as 60 Minutes detailed in this story on Abercrombie and Fitch. This means that the mall rules can be applied disproportionately to lower income teens of color, who might have few other places to congregate.

The rule that might have the most important implication is rule #4. “Soliciting, picketing, rallying…distributing literature…soliciting signatures or personal information of any kind…is prohibited without the express written consent of the owner.” Essentially this rule outlaws any political activity in the mall, a rule that is common in shopping areas nationwide.

As historian Lizabeth Cohen points out in A Consumers' Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America, after World War II Americans’ gathering spaces became increasingly privatized, leaving fewer places for protests or political activity. Cohen concludes that during the second half of the twentieth century, Americans came to see themselves predominantly as consumers, not citizens. While the Internet has helped create a new space for organizing to some degree, with fewer public gathering places, it becomes more challenging for traditional organizing and creating community awareness of a particular issue.

Thinking of my recent walks in the malls I visited, I admit noisy protests or picket lines would have made me want to leave. And yet Cohen’s point isn’t that people should cause disturbances in malls and shopping areas, but rather that our public spaces have become commercialized–so much so that it might be difficult to think of public places that are truly public anymore. Especially in a snowstorm.

Tiger Woods and the Hyper-Sexualization of Black Men

On By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Crime and Deviance, Janis Prince Inniss, Race and Ethnicity, Relationships, Marriage and Family13 Comments

new janis By Janis Prince Inniss

The Wanda Sykes Show recently spoofed The Publisher’s Clearing House Sweepstakes. Sykes and the rest of the Prize Patrol pay women for denying that they have had sex with golfing legend, Tiger Woods with this offer: “(The Tiger Woods Cleaning House Damage Control) is giving away millions to girls who know how to zip it!” When the Prize Patrol tries to award a $10 million check to Kelly O’Brien, and a Black woman answers the door, Sykes says, “Clearly, we have the wrong house!”

With that line, Sykes and her show state what is obvious but not much commented on in the Woods sex scandal: All the women who claim to have had sex with Woods are white.

Tiger Woods has said his self identity is that of “Cablinasian”—a term he created to account for his Thai, African American, Chinese, Native American, and Caucasian racial and ethnic heritage. By describing himself this way, Woods set himself apart from other mixed race Americans who are usually identified as African American—both by themselves and by others in the society. (Click here to read more about racial classification in the U.S.) Regardless of our self-identity, however, others classify us based on their own ideas about race. No matter how Tiger Woods describes himself, most Americans probably think of him as African American.

Given the country’s racial legacy, what role does Woods’ race play in the news coverage of his extramarital affairs? There is no lab in which we can run an experiment to answer this question definitively and all comparisons to other famous people—whether athletes, politicians, or actors—will be have limitations revolving around at least two issues. First, as one of the most famous and most accomplished athletes today, Woods is very unique. Second, a perfect comparison would have to include enough people who are very similar on a number of variables. Without the ability to make such precise comparisons, this public conversation is still a platform from which we can reflect on issues of race that this story raises.

How is race relevant in this case? Elin Nordegren, Tiger Woods’ wife is white and so are all of the women he is alleged to have had affairs with. (Woods admits to infidelity but does not say with whom he has dallied.) How much of the frenzied chasing of this story is related to those two factors, when most see him as African American? And what of the steam coming out of reporters’ ears as they discuss the case? Do they seem even more revved up than usual? For example, Pat Lalama was Guest Host on CNN’s Nancy Grace Show and she made no objections to the following comments by Lou Palumbo, a private investigator

LALAMA: Lou Palumbo, private investigator, former Nassau County Police investigator. You`ve seen a lot of this kind of thing, how does this rank to you, this case?
PALUMBO: As low as you can go, quite frankly. I mean.
LALAMA: Really?
PALUMBO: Yes, he`s somewhat on himself here. It wasn`t an issue that he wasn`t finding comfort or rapport in his home with his wife and he sought comfort with someone else. This guy was a sociopath. I mean, he traveled through continents to do this. And it`s unconscionable and quite frankly his complete lack of regard first and foremost for his children is inexplicable.

And I really don`t think this guy cares, quite frankly, and I think he`s a coward. In fact, what he should do is come out of hiding and just confront this issue and try to make some sense of it with people which we know he cannot do but he needs to confront this issue. He`s just hiding.

Palumbo’s comments and demeanor have been common among television commentators who seem to feel no need to appear journalistic as they discuss the Woods saga. How much of this vitriol is really based on the old stereotypical threat of African American men pursuing white women and defiling them?

That old fear was at the root of many lynchings and other racially motivated crimes against blacks. In 1955, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old African American boy was beaten, shot, and then tied to a 70-pound cotton gin fan before being thrown into a river. His crime? Allegedly whistling at or maybe touching a white woman when he visited Mississippi from Chicago.

According to Jane Dailey, Till’s murder is seen by many historians as being directly tied to the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education. How so? The decision was seen as opening white women to the sexual advances of black men in school; Walter C. Givhan, an Alabama state senator said the real purpose of the decision was “to open the bedroom doors of our white women to Negro men."

The tone of some of the coverage of the Tiger Woods sex scandal is suggestive of those earlier days. To be sure, Tiger Woods is no Emmett Till. (And I’m no apologist for Woods and his wandering ways!) In some ways, the 34 years between their births might as well be 134 years: Woods is married to a white woman, is wealthy, and famous. He’s famous for being the best in the world in a sport that has been mainly played by rich whites. I am reminded, though, that in other ways 34 years is not very long. For example, although interracial marriages have increased since Till’s time, they are still relatively rare—they make-up about 7% of all U.S. marriages. Coverage of the Tiger Woods affairs tinged with a lens that says that he has ‘gone too far’ –first by marrying a white woman and worse by cheating on her with even more white women—underscores some of that recent history.

Speaking about Woods, celebrity judge Jeanine Pirro exclaimed, “Men are pigs!”, and although tamped down, there was intense coverage of a physician who treated Woods because the doctor was being tied to performance enhancement drugs. With all of the non-stop coverage of this story, I have seen none of the contempt for Woods directed at the ever-growing list of women who agreed to have sex with the married superstar athlete, a subject for another post.

Do you detect a racial subtext in the coverage of this story? How do you imagine the coverage of the story would be the same, or different, if Woods was married to a black woman? Or if he were white? What if the women alleging that he was their paramour were women of color? How does this story reinforce the stereotype of the hyper-sexualized black man?

Living in a McDonaldized World

On By econnellIn Popular Culture and Consumption, Theory, Todd Schoepflin18 Comments

todd_sBy Todd Schoepflin, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Niagara University

tas@niagara.edu www.niagara.edu/sociology

 

I first read George Ritzer’s book The McDonaldization of Society in 1996, my first year of graduate school. I loved the book right away. It described perfectly the world I lived in, and still does. What was true in 1996 for me is even truer today. I am surrounded by fast-food establishments and other businesses that follow the McDonald’s model.

Our culture continues to value efficiency, predictability and quantity. Workers and consumers are controlled more than ever by technology. I am careful not to be hypocritical when it comes to this subject; I definitely take advantage of some conveniences that come with living in a McDonaldized world.

As I write this in Buffalo, New York, it is twenty degrees outside, so you better believe that I occasionally make use of a drive thru in order to get my morning coffee. And once in a blue moon it even comes from McDonald’s. I also go to McDonaldized places when it’s time for an oil change. Although I’d prefer to leave my car with a mechanic for a day, the convenience of stopping at Jiffy Lube or some other specialized auto service business is too easy to pass up. There’s one  place I go for an oil change where you don’t even leave your car! What’s more efficient than staying in your car while you get an oil change in ten minutes? But I try to patronize Mom and Pop businesses as often as possible. I’m always on the lookout for establishments that are creative, unique and interesting. Places where size and speed are not equated with quality.

It’s getting harder to find places that don’t follow the McDonald’s way of doing business where I live. That’s why it’s so special to me to spend time at places Marottosthat aren’t McDonaldized. One of my favorite examples is a restaurant near my house named Marotto’s. I don’t go often, just on special occasions, and my father is always with me when I go because it’s his favorite restaurant. Despite the fact that we aren’t regulars, we get the royal treatment whenever we go. Owner Mark Marotto always stops by our table to chat with us. Not only is he the owner but also the head chef! Aside from making time to visit every table, he brightens everyone’s experience by playing the harmonica. When my family recently dined there for my father’s birthday, he came out of the  kitchen to play “Happy Birthday” on the harmonica.

Such unique treatment brings a huge smile to my face (as you can see from the picture during one of our visits to Marotto’s…I’m the one with the big nose, glasses and oversized grin). If you want to see Mark in action, look at the story that a local news station did about him that’s posted on the restaurant's website. I just love the genuine feel of Mark playing the harmonica to entertain his customers.

Compare this to what happens when you enter a place like Moe’s Southwest Grill, a McDonaldized establishment in which workers shout “Welcome to Moe’s!” in unison when you enter. It seems to me that the workers half-heartedly shout this phrase because they are merely following a corporate script. It doesn’t feel real or authentic. While writing this I looked at their website and I immediately saw a graphic that said “Welcome to Moe’s, where size matters.” This was unsurprising because in a McDonaldized world, bigger is a promise of better.

It’s important to remember that the McDonaldization theory does not only apply to restaurants. Think of Christmas trees as another example. Buying a fake Trees_for_saletree from Home Depot is an example of McDonaldization (especially if you use the technology there to purchase the tree without any help from an employee). A fake tree is efficient because no messy pine needles fall to the floor and there’s no problem getting the box through the front door. But it sure is bland compared to buying a tree from a local family farm. I recognize that not everyone lives near a tree farm, but if you’re within reasonable driving distance of one, I highly recommend the experience.

This year my wife and I took our two-year-old son to a tree farm located forty minutes from our house. When we arrived they gave us a saw to cut down our tree. We walked a few hundred feet and found a beautiful tree. It took me a while to saw through the tree, and I almost gave up, but I persisted and was thrilled when I finally got the job done. A worker helped me get the tree on top of our car, and sort of helped me tie it down.

I say “sort of” because that’s where the adventure began. We drove off and made our way back to the highway, driving 60 miles per hour and hoping the tree was properly fastened. It wasn’t long before two young guys in a car drove past us laughing and pointing at us. Our worst fear was confirmed—the tree was sliding off the top of our car. We pulled off to the side of the road and did our best to reposition the tree and secure it with a bungee cord. As my wife and I worked on the task with cars zooming by us, our son was crying his eyes out. Maybe it was the loud sound of cars flying by or maybe he was scared of seeing his parents climbing around the car, struggling to tie down a tree. Either McDonaldizationway, we finally got the tree where we wanted it and eventually made our way home. We  shared a good laugh about our morning and I suggested we go to the tree farm every other year.

I’m not sure I can handle a day like that every year! But I think that experience embodied the spirit of doing things in a way that aren’t McDonaldized. Sure it’s easier to buy a tree from a store but it’s more fun and unpredictable to cut down your own tree. A common sight this time of year where I live is Christmas trees in a parking lot. You can park, pick out your tree, pay for it and be home in a matter of minutes. So you can even get a real tree in a McDonaldized way. I took a picture of one of these parking lots near my house, and from where I took the picture I also took a shot of a common McDonaldized scene: a Dunkin’ Donuts, Baskin-Robbins and Valvoline all situated on a corner lot.

I guess it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. In other words, I don’t think one has to totally avoid a McDonaldized way of life. I think it’s about balance. Some encounters with McDonaldized places are inevitable in many of the places people live. My advice is to enjoy those places around you that offer something different. Sameness is comforting but it’s also boring. As the saying goes, “variety is the spice of life.” I think that saying holds true when we spend time in a way that isn’t McDonaldized.

Consuming Philanthropy

On By econnellIn Popular Culture and Consumption, Sally Raskoff, Theory4 Comments

new sally By Sally Raskoff

There are many motivations for giving one’s time and money. Altruism was once considered the primary rationale for giving. Our current societal context for giving assumes that the giver, whether a business or a person, gets something for their giving, so giving is not entirely selfless.

Pure altruism exists when people give with no benefit to themselves. That type of giving is not common in our society. Instead, people are encouraged to give and get at the same time; volunteering appears on one’s college applications, corporate philanthropy gives tax breaks and publicity.

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“Cause marketing” gives us the “Red” campaign of the Gap and Starbucks, events like “Shopping for the Cure” and many other partnerships between charities and corporations. I’ve long been concerned about such pairings as they link consumerism with charitable activities in ways that are impossible to separate.

A recent NPR story mentions the net benefit for society and the assumptions that once people give, they will see the intrinsic value of giving and thus continue even without an extrinsic reward. However, research doesn’t necessarily support that outcome. Are those people sentenced to community service able to see it as a non-punishment? Are students capable of seeing volunteering as a non-requirement?

In a study I co-authored several years ago, we found that many students define volunteering as an activity they no longer have to do once they have satisfied their graduation requirements, rather than realizing that such activity can enrich one’s life and community.

The original intent of mandated volunteering (an oxymoron if ever there was one) is to socialize people into giving to one’s community. However, when one exchanges the volunteering or monetary giving – in obvious and explicit ways – for some commodity or other benefit, the giving becomes a commodity as well.

For sustainable societies, education is not a commodity, schools are not businesses, giving time and money are not a commodity nor are the people that give of their personal time and funds corporate entities. However, we increasingly talk about education as though it is a service to be exchanged like other services in our economy. As a result, schools are pressured to run like businesses, and giving time and money are increasingly part of commodity and consumerist exchanges.

I bristle at those discussions on our campus where education is equated with business, where students are seen as customers, since education is a far bigger enterprise, potentially, than simple business. Education – and giving – are much greater than the sum of their “services.” Society benefits in large ways from their effective functioning. Students who learn how to think create a much more vibrant society than those who don’t learn to think or who those who only learn to take tests. People who volunteer or give see their communities enriched in ways far beyond the time or dollar amounts spent.

imageThat such activities are increasingly tied to commodity exchanges cheapens and demeans not only those activities but also leaves our society much less enriched since those behaviors are not seen as life-long pursuits.

How to explain all this with sociology? I’ve already begun this explanation with a Marxian analysis. Tying giving to consumerism and commodity exchanges enables us to see who profits and how the capitalist form of our economy is involved in the creation of “selfish giving”.

Capitalism, especially as it exhausts its profit sources, co-opts more and more of society’s institutions. This example of linking giving to consumer activity is a clear co-option of democracy by capitalism. Democracy depends on the service of its people to fulfill its ideals – one needs an informed and vigilant people to fully enact a democratic society.

If people’s vigilance in ensuring society functions well is weakened by tying services to consumer activities, people no longer participate in ensuring strong and vibrant communities. Instead, they buy things and are satisfied that their philanthropic duty is done. They give their time because their employer, judge, or school  have told them to and they are satisfied when their requirement is completed. While they may learn that they can feel good by doing good, they are not necessarily likely to do more – or to see how their community and the democracy in which they live depend on such behaviors.

So what can we do about this? Marx’s theory suggests that as capitalist crises continue to increase in frequency and scope, even as more and more institutions are co-opted into the capitalist enterprise, capitalism has indeed exhausted itself and its sources of profit. It follows that the structure of our economy is in dire need of revision. Yet whether we have the will to do so remains to be seen.

Infidelity, Tiger Woods, and Émile Durkheim

On By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Crime and Deviance, Karen Sternheimer, Relationships, Marriage and Family, Theory24 Comments

new karen 1

By Karen Sternheimer

By now you might be tired of hearing about Tiger Woods and his alleged mistresses. I know I am. And yet when high profile figures are thought to cheat on their spouses it becomes big news again and again, especially if a politician or celebrity is involved. Once Tiger’s story goes away there is sure to be another public figure whose behavior will enter the public fray for dissection.

There are many explanations for why people are interested—it’s salacious, it pervades the news at a time when ratings matter and news organizations’ budgets are being slashed, and in the Woods case it seems to be an opportunity for several people to get their fifteen minutes of fame. These are just a few of many explanations that have sparked a slew of conversations about why this is even news in the first place (including one I recently participated in on NPR). But how might the founder of sociology explain the attention celebrity infidelity receives if he were alive today?

clip_image002Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) is often regarded as the father of sociology, both for employing research methods to study sociological phenomena and for the theories he created about social life. While he lived before our hyper-mediated age, some of his ideas can add insight into why stories of infidelity seem to get the public’s attention.

Durkheim was very interested in how complex societies remain cohesive. He, and those that adopted his way of thinking, were very interested in how various aspects of society operate in concert in order to maintain the social order. Often called functionalism, this school of thought dominated sociological thinking for most of the twentieth century. One of functionalism’s central questions asks: What is the glue that holds increasingly diverse and sometimes divergent groups together?

Here’s where infidelity fits in. The collective disgust and outrage people express about high-profile cheaters serves to reaffirm a central societal value of fidelity. Functionalists emphasize the importance of shared values in creating bonds across society. News of infidelity is a chance for most of us to feel connected in agreeing that this behavior is wrong. While we might not agree on much else (witness the hotly debated health care reform legislation and other political melees), there aren’t too many people who are publicly pro-infidelity. Yes, it seems counterintuitive that something that could break up a marriage and family might provide social bonding. It may not do a family any good, but functionalists might argue that pillorying cheaters serves an important purpose for the rest of us.

Just as public hangings and stockades served to embarrass law breakers of the past and send a message to others of what would happen to them if they followed suit, media floggings serve a similar function today. Functionalists might argue that so much news focuses on undesirable behavior for the purpose of helping to maintain the social order; if we agree upon a set of norms and values we might feel a greater sense of who we as a group are and thus follow the rules. You might have noticed that when defining people as outsiders from our society we often focus on how their norms and values are different from ours.

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It doesn’t take bad behavior to help unify an otherwise diverse society. According to Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz, authors of Media Events: The Live Broadcasting of History, media events that galvanize the public’s attention serve the very important purpose of creating a shared culture and history in a complex society that can often feel fractured. Major media events can serve as common experiences to help us feel more connected.

Tiger Woods and other public figures involved in scandals enable the rest of us the chance to reaffirm a sense of shared values, but on the most basic level they provide a common topic we can all talk about, and therefore feel a greater connection to one another.

The functionalist perspective is not without its shortcomings. For one, we might argue that a complex society such as ours has a multitude of competing values, rather than a stable set of shared beliefs. It’s also important to note that people’s actual behavior falls short of the very values they may claim to hold. Proponents of conflict theory might argue that the focus on shared values and beliefs leaves out the issue of power: the power some have to define societal values and the power to evade punishment when said values are violated.

Sociological theories offer many perspectives that seek to explain social life. What other sociological concepts might help us understand the role that infidelity plays in public life?

The Sports Figure as Morality Teacher

On By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Crime and Deviance, Janis Prince Inniss, Relationships, Marriage and Family9 Comments

new janis By Janis Prince Inniss

Do you receive medical advice from your very smart mail carrier? Or dental advice from a sociologist? Do you look to your garbage collector to help you with career plans? No? Why not? Most of us recognize that people have differing areas of expertise and believe that particularly with regard to important issues such as our health, career, and finance we should seek the best advice and direction—from professionals in these areas.

Yet we often look to celebrities to be arbiters of good taste and expertise on everything including politics, fashion, music, and morality. For example, well after her heyday as a sitcom star, Susan Somers has found fame and fortune as fitness guru (she hawked the Thighmaster) and more recently as an “expert” on hormones, offering advice that many health officials hotly dispute. Legions of celebrities endorse politicians ; in 2008 we saw Oprah Winfrey and Robert DeNiro for Candidate Obama, and Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Clint Eastwood for Candidate McCain among many others. It is the man many consider to be the worlds’ greatest golfer—Tiger Woods—that brings this home though.

According to his website, Woods has won 93 golf tournaments including the 1997, 2001, 2002, and 2005 Masters Tournaments; 1999, 2000, 2006, and 2007 PGA Championships; 2000, 2002, and 2008 U.S. Open Championships, and 2000, 2005 and 2006 Open Championships. Along the way, Woods has amassed several historical firsts. Among them: first major championship winner who is of Asian or African race/ethnicity, the youngest Masters champ, widest victories of margin in the U.S. Open and Masters championships; the first person to hold all four professional major championships simultaneously in 2001.

Woods earned record winnings from the various tournaments and even larger sums as a spokesman for Nike, Tag Heuer, Cadillac, Gatorade, American Express, Gillette, AT&T and other products; the 34-year-old golfer is considered a billionaire from his earnings on and off the greens.

The golfer’s appeal has increased viewership of the sport on television and in person. His announcement of an “indefinite break” from the sport is considered “crippling” to ratings of the sport on the networks. Lest you think—as I did—that this is hysteria, consider that without Woods, television viewership of the Chevron World Challenge was down 54% this year, compared to last year. As a good sociologist, you know that this information does not tell us anything about causation, that is, the cause of the decrease in viewership. However, a study by Nielsen ratings giant confirms that without Tiger Woods, television viewership was almost cut in half last year. So, apparently Tiger Woods = golf!

Still, that’s golf! Not medicine, or technology or finance or even sociology. With word (more like a steady stream of words) about Woods’ extra-marital affairs we’ve had an onslaught of media attention with people expressing surprise. But what do we really know about Woods or any other celebrity?

In this case, we as the public “know” Woods as a golfer. This gives us no idea of who he is as a man. Or as husband. Or father or friend. Through interviews, we may come to know a celebrity somewhat. Or we may come to know what that person wants us to know or think of them based on a carefully crafted image. The golfer with the yacht aptly named Privacy, has granted few interviews despite his fame. Therefore, the public has had little access—real or apparent—to who he is as a person. I guess that means we could project whatever ideas we have about him because he said or did nothing to contradict our ideas of who he is.

Woods was frequently referred to as a “disciplined golfer” and apparently many people thought that this meant that he was disciplined in every aspect of his life. Again, he’s a golfer. Why do we think we know anything about his capacity to be disciplined anywhere but in the sports arena?

Who do we look to regarding ethics and morality? Where do we get our teachings about right and wrong? Where should we get such training? From our parents? Schools? Religion? Religious leaders? Celebrities/sports figures? Which of these answers seem most out of place in the line-up?

Why all the surprise at Woods’ acknowledged infidelity? I have no insider knowledge about Woods, but that’s just the point. Neither do many people who are/were surprised by this story. Perhaps one way to help explain this is found in this post about celebrities by Karen Sternheimer:

Everyone else knows who they are, but we might not really like them. In fact, we may enjoy finding out that they aren’t that perfect after all. In a large, heterogeneous society as our own, we tend to have fewer and fewer social networks in common with others–except for celebrities.

German sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies had a name for this condition: Gesellschaft. Celebrities can become a form of social glue that helps us bond by our admiration and (frequently) condemnation of high-profile people and reaffirm a sense of shared morality.

Perhaps we are less surprised than outraged. The story of Tiger Woods’ extramarital affairs is a colossal one around which we as observers can bond in our moral indignation. What sociological reasons do you think explains the public’s fascination with this story?

Green Occupational Status

On By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Sally Raskoff, Social Institutions: Work, Education, and Medicine, Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change, Theory1 Comment

new sally By Sally Raskoff

Occupational prestige is a concept we sociologists use to better understand our society. Occupational prestige is measured by a scale created from the aggregate opinions about the status and perceived worthiness of an occupation.

In American culture, we assign a high value to those occupations that use mind-work over body-work and that have high financial rewards. For example, a doctor has more social esteem and occupational prestige than the maintenance worker. If we work in an occupation that has low social esteem, we don’t announce it when we first meet people, especially if those new people inhabit occupations with higher prestige than our own.

A report from the New Economics Foundation (NEF) in the United Kingdom uses a new way of gauging the social value of occupations. The BBC recently reported that hospital cleaners have more value to society than bankers.

The NEF is a self-described “think and do tank” or advocacy organization focused on local and global ecological sustainability issues. Their study, titled A Bit Rich, has many important aspects, yet its newsworthiness is sociologically interesting.image

The NEF’s goals in writing and releasing the study is to point out the societal and economic impact of occupations which are often the opposite of the way we tend to think about occupational prestige.

Their case studies of the hospital worker, banker, advertising executive, tax accountant, childcare worker, and waste recycling worker use a modified Social Return on Investment (SROI) method and illustrate the cost and benefit to the UK of these different occupations. Thus, their findings indicate that bankers “destroy £7 of social value for every pound in value they generate” and with respect to hospital cleaners, “for every £1 they are paid, over £10 in social value is generated.”  

While their modification of the SROI methodology isn’t exactly mainstream, and they aren’t publishing their findings in a peer-reviewed journal, their findings are interesting. Even more interesting to me is their attempt to change the way the public thinks about the relative prestige of various occupations.

Will they be successful at reframing society’s perspective on occupations? Will their ultimate goals of reforming economic pay scales and societal values towards ecologically sustainable hierarchies be achieved?

I have no answer for that. This study was released at the same time as an international summit on global ecological issues: their timing is perfect and, I assume, calculated.

Will their study help people feel more kindly towards hospital and child care workers and less supportive of bankers and tax accountants? Not likely.

image Even in the wake of the recent economic meltdown, the capitalistic values that imbue our society with a focus on competition and “more is more” are still in place. We still value those occupations that make tons of money, even at our own expense, and ignore those occupations that involve physical labor (except for sports) and do the embodied dirty work of society.

Now that we assume we’ve moved through the worst of the global economic recession, the urge to restructure economic aspects of society is no longer deeply felt.

The NEF’s call to restructure society towards equal pay hierarchies is not new, nor are they alone in the call. I would imagine that Marx would be supportive of their goals as the current state of global economics aligns very well with his theory of the last stages of capitalism. What do you think Marx would say?

The Virtue of Not Buying

On By econnellIn Karen Sternheimer, Popular Culture and Consumption, Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change5 Comments

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By Karen Sternheimer

When I get the Sunday paper, the first thing I like to look at are the ad circulars. I love looking at the electronic items I might want someday and getting a sense of how much these things cost. I love a bargain and feeling like I got the best price, even if it means buying something that is last year’s hot item.

This being the holiday season, there are tons of circulars with gift ideas to help us decide what to buy for others. I can’t help but notice that lots of these items are pretty junky, and are presumably things we would never buy for ourselves. These cheap cologne sets, kitchy plant holders, and old DVDs are meant for other people, and the ads highlight how little they cost—typically between $5-$10, if not less.

I once knew someone who felt like she needed to get every last friend and acquaintance a gift. Each year, she would get me one of these bargain items, since her budget was pretty tight. It made me ponder the greater sociological meaning of these items (yes, we sociologists can think about the sociological implicationsclip_image002 of just about anything).

On a personal level, I had to feign excitement about an item I had no use for. I was grateful for the thought, but as a casual acquaintance she hadn’t made my gift list and I felt a bit guilty to receive something without giving.

I also had no idea what to do with the new object I had received. I could never regift the items, since that would simply pass the problem along to someone else, and I hated to throw stuff away. (I later donated the items to charity. My guess is they threw them away.)

This example may seem like a simple and frankly minor inconvenience that people face; after all, we should all be so burdened to make someone’s holiday gift list, right? Journalist Ellen Ruppel Shell, author of Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, argues that super-low prices have serious economic and environmental costs that we might not think about when buying throwaway gifts for people on the nether regions of our gift lists.

For one, these cheap goods are typically imported from developing nations where people work in sweatshop conditions for virtually no money. These goods are often made in countries that have the most lax labor and environmental laws, frequently keep workers in extreme poverty, all while polluting the area. The items then have to be shipped halfway around the world, with significant environmental costs. Because this process is inexpensive for manufacturers, American workers’ wages remain low or jobs could be shipped overseas, all so we can have really cheap goods. Shell argues that in the end this cheap stuff costs us quite a bit. (Click here to watch Ellen Ruppel Shell speak about Cheap).

University of Pennsylvania Economist Joel Waldfogel suggests the whole shopping process itself is a waste of time and money. In Scroogenomics: Why We Shouldn't Buy Presents for the Holidays, Waldfogel compares what buyers spend with the value that receivers attribute to a gift and estimates that the clip_image002[4]difference is upwards of $13 billion. (Click here to watch Joel Waldfogel talk about Scroogenomics). He notes that cash and gift cards can be a much more efficient transfer of wealth, and yet as he told the Wall Street Journal, “cash is in general a stigmatized gift.” When we give cash or a gift card, the recipient knows exactly how much—or how little we spent. Buying an item makes us feel like we can mask the dollar amount we spent.

I’m guessing that some of you are reading this and thinking, hey, I like getting and giving gifts! I have friends who love to shop, no matter why, when, and where, so the holidays are really fun for them especially. As I have previously blogged, consumption can be enjoyable and it is almost impossible to avoid being a consumer in our post-industrial society. But as Ellen Ruppel Shell concludes, we can become more conscious consumers. We might think about where the items we buy came from and the conditions under which they were produced. We can also think about our own financial situations and assess what we can truly afford to spend…and think about giving in ways other than just buying something.

Brushing Your Teeth Like a Professional

On By econnellIn Janis Prince Inniss, Social Institutions: Work, Education, and Medicine, Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change37 Comments

new janis By Janis Prince Inniss

clip_image002I remember going to the dentist with my father when I was about five or six years old. This is a happy memory; I felt proud of myself for being such a “big girl”. Given this auspicious beginning, I don’t know why it took more than a decade for me to return to the dentist. The second visit only occurred after my jaw became swollen because my wisdom tooth was impacted and the gum infected. At the time it seemed reasonable to me to avoid the dentist for as long as possible, even if it meant taking over the counter pain meds for a swollen, throbbing jaw.

I avoided the dentist for many more years with the bright idea that I would wait until all of my teeth fell out and then just get dentures made. However, after I became a step-parent I thought I should behave like an adult and start going to the dentist—particularly since my step-children did so without any fuss. I steeled myself and set off. I explained my fear and asked that the dentist and hygienist be gentle. I lived to talk about my triumphant return to the dentist and had to admit that the cleaning was quite tolerable, uneventful even, except for a few times when I had to sit up and take a few deep breaths. I graduated to a few dental procedures and was beginning to feel comfortable going to the dentist. That is, until I moved to Tampa and had to find a new one.

clip_image004After a few years of backsliding, I found a nearby dentist and was glad that I went. These digs were plush: I had my own flat screen television there. The ambiance and experience was more akin to that of a spa than the scary ideas I was carrying around. The next year—dare I say it—I almost looked forward to my cleaning. When I called to schedule my visit, I was deeply disappointed to learn that this office no longer took my insurance. This was just the excuse I needed to stop going to the dentist. After about a year, the cycle started again. I found another dentist, had a good experience, but by the next year that dentist no longer took my insurance. After another break, I found my current dentist in Tampa where I am going for some maintenance.

This post is not about the vagaries of dental insurance, although it is certainly relevant in our current public debate about health care (although note that dental care is not included in most health insurance plans). No, this post addresses what I’ve learned about knowledge, power, and professions by going to the dentist more regularly. Note that dentistry is hardly my area of expertise so apply my “findings” at your own risk:

1. clip_image006Manufacturers should halt the production of manual toothbrushes. Why are those even available for purchase given their poor design to clean our teeth? Do you ever floss after brushing your teeth with a manual tooth brush? Does that exercise make you wonder how much more dirty your teeth would be if you hadn’t bothered to brush?

2. Why don’t dentists make us sign a contract saying we will use an electric toothbrush rather than suggest we buy one? (This is not a suggestion I’m likely to take given the ridiculous prices for those on sale in dental offices.) There are now many varieties of battery operated toothbrushes that are quite reasonable priced and their results are impressive.

3. Back to flossing. Why don’t dentists make us sign contracts saying that we will floss daily? I confess my ignorance about flossing. I thought it was something to do occasionally…if I felt like it. I never had that attitude about brushing my teeth daily.

4. Why don’t we get an early, good education about the proper way to brush? I’ve pieced together information from asking lots of questions and think I’ve finally learned how to brush my teeth properly.

5. Why doesn’t the dentist recommend that people with less than stellar vision brush and floss with our glasses on and/or with the aid of a magnifying mirror? I’m at an age where like many of my friends, my eyesight is deteriorating. A few weeks ago I was stunned to see my teeth in the magnifying mirror of my hotel room. I didn’t know that I couldn’t see what I was doing until I could really see what I was supposed to be doing.

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6. Why don’t we have tools that more closely resemble those used by hygienists to clean our teeth? I asked this of my hygienist and her response was something like, “You’re not trained to do this.”

Although I these questions are tongue in cheek, I do wonder why most of us don’t have the correct tools and more information about how we can do a better job cleaning our teeth? Granted, we’re not dental experts with the relevant training but we are responsible for this task on a daily basis. Is one answer that teeth cleaning is a profession? Do you think these issues are an example of a profession that controls the information and goods “non-experts” have available? Is this an example of power through knowledge, in which dental professionals control the information we have?

Authority in 2012: Who’s in Charge?

On By econnellIn Popular Culture and Consumption, Sally Raskoff, Theory5 Comments

new sally By Sally Raskoff

Have you seen the movie 2012? It’s an action film in the tradition of The Day After, Waterworld, and Independence Day, yet it has some characters and plot lines that reminded me of Max Weber’s concept of authority. Spoiler alert: I will reveal details that may ruin the movie if you haven’t yet seen it.

In 2012, Dr. Helmsley, a geologist, informs White House Chief of Staff, Mr. Anheuser, about the impending doom for the planet. Things happen, including secretly building arks to ensure survival for important or wealthy patrons. Then geologic Armageddon happens, as well as the death of the President, Vice President, Speaker of the House, and most other elected officials.

As the ark boarding commences, Anheuser is in charge and assumes he will continue as leader of the neo-American contingent. There are many people who are barred from boarding as the flood approaches and Helmsley gives an impassioned speech to allow all humanity on board. The other leaders agree and most of the people board the arks with only seconds to spare.

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The movie ends with a budding romance between Helmsley and the deceased President’s daughter, Laura imageWilson, and the suggestion that Helmsley would be assuming leadership instead of Anheuser.

Weber’s theory of leadership and authority include three types of legitimacy: charismatic, rational-legal, and traditional. All three can be seen in this movie.

The elected officials all held office and had elements of rational-legal authority. Our bureaucratic governmental rules about office holding include how people are elected president, vice president, and to Congress. These are rational and legal processes that are well documented.

The order of succession when high office is vacated is clearly delineated. While the Chief of Staff isn’t on that list, it was assumed in the movie that most elected officials didn’t make it on board the ark. Anheuser assumed that he was next in line and he relished the thought.

Anheuser had a tenuous claim to be president based on tradition, since he was the one remaining member of the last elected administration. He did not have rational-legal legitimacy, since his position was not on the list of succession and he was not elected. While Oliver Platt, the actor playing Anheuser, has some degree of charisma, his character Anheuser does not.

It quickly became clear that Helmsley was a more viable candidate for leadership. As he warned of the geologic meltdown of the earth and tried to save those who remained, his charisma and passion impressed people who gave him more and more to do in higher and higher positions of authority. He also got Laura’s attention after his predictions came true and after his impassioned plea for saving as much of humanity as possible.

While Helmsley gained leadership through charismatic authority, he was assured of the position by his connection to Laura. With their partnership, his claim to traditional leadership was much stronger than Anheuser’s. Marrying the previous president’s daughter connected him with the family who had previously held power – ensuring a traditional base of legitimate authority.

The only type of authority Helmsley lacked was rational-legal, although the viewer could assume their first election would remedy that. If Helmsley and Anheuser ran against each other, one could surmise that Helmsley would win based on his multifaceted claims to legitimate authority.

What other movies or books have characters whose leadership experiences could be assessed with Weber’s ideal type of legitimate bases of authority? Perhaps Harry Potter’s Dumbledore? Gandalf in Lord of the Rings? Margaret Tate in The Proposal? What other examples can you think of?