Do You Believe in Your Community?

On March 20, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Sally Raskoff, Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change, Social Psychology, Theory1 Comment

By Sally Raskoff

How many people do you know in your community? Beyond your friends and family, how many people can you name or at least recognize? We may see some people repeatedly if we visit the same places regularly. Though we might recognize them, we may not know their names or think to introduce ourselves, even if we see them every week.

In my neighborhood, because people walk their dogs regularly, we know most of our neighbors by sight as they walk by our windows: the guy with the Great Dane, the gal with the lab, the guy with the two schnauzers. I may not know all of the names of these neighbors, but their presence helps make my neighborhood a community rather than just a place to live. I like to think that we’d all come together if something were to threaten the community.

If you haven’t yet seen Be Kind Rewind, see it as an example of how neighbors can rally together for their community. This movie has many levels of complexity that make it perfect for sociological analysis. If you haven’t seen the ads or the movie, the main story involves two neighbors, Mike (Mos Def) and Jerry (Jack Black), who ruin Mr. Fletcher’s (Danny Glover) video rental business by accidentally erasing all the tapes. Mr. Fletcher’s character is away on a journey to see if he should revive his business or give it up since his building is about to be demolished. Mike and Jerry attempt to save themselves and the store by re-taping their own short versions of the movies that people want to rent.

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Although I’ll try not to give everything away, if you want to keep the rest as a surprise, read no further until you’ve seen it.

Before the clerks erased the tapes, Fletcher’s video store was not doing well; his crumbling building and business are a symbol of the dysfunctional community. The few people who do come in for videos here (rather than go to the larger chain video store some distance away) are angry, rude, or not entirely functional, which is another reflection of the disintegrating community life.

Mike, Jerry, and Alma (Melonie Diaz, a neighbor who joins their adventure) discover that their film process, which they call “sweding,” takes off after Miss Falewicz’s (Mia Farrow) nephew and his friends find the new versions entertaining. When Fletcher returns and decides to close the store, the whole neighborhood is in line to rent the sweded movies.

The building itself is a central character in the film, as the supposed birthplace of jazz pianist Fats Waller. Mike proposes that developers make the building an historic landmark because of the Waller connection. But Mr. Fletcher tells Mike that he had just made that up years ago to help him feel better; not deterred, the neighborhood comes together to make a sweded movie about their history as Fats Waller’s birthplace.

There are many other movies that use a crumbling community as a backdrop for a storyline, and the community is saved by 2some action of the lead characters. For example, in Two Weeks Notice, Sandra Bullock and Hugh Grant bicker but eventually save her parents’ neighborhood center. In Life Stinks, Mel Brooks’ slumlord experiences homelessness and brings the community together.

In those two movies, the main characters purposefully organize the solution to saving their communities. However, in Be Kind Rewind, the entire community knowingly fabricates the “fact” that their building/neighborhood/community is the birthplace of Fats Waller. This is an example of self-fulfilling prophecy and the social construction of reality.

Robert K. Merton defines a self-fulfilling prophecy as a false belief that is acted upon and becomes real in its consequences. When we believe something is real and we act accordingly, we make that thing real because “it” changes our behavior. If we didn’t act as if it were real, it wouldn’t exist as more than a thought.

The social construction of reality is a theory that members of a society create (or construct) for that society, and then forget that they do so. Society then seems like it has a reality outside the people, and the society then perpetuates itself by creating (socializing) more members. The members and the society are busy creating or maintaining each other, although the members are not conscious of their part in the process.

The concept of self-fulfilling prophecy is typically applied at the micro level, focusing on people’s behavior, while the social construction of reality is a macro theory focusing on entire societies and their overall structure. However, both of these are apparent at the community level in Be Kind Rewind.

The community decides to believe that Fats Waller was born there. They pursue historic status and once they do so, it appears that it becomes “true.” The once distant and demoralized community rallies around that idea and becomes a vibrant community once again (at least for the closing scenes).

Racism in Toyland

On March 18, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Karen Sternheimer, Popular Culture and Consumption, Race and Ethnicity12 Comments

By Karen Sternheimer

You have probably heard critics of Barbie decry the unrealistic beauty image the toy reflects. I’m guessing you may have already thought about the way that children’s toys promote somewhat rigid gender identities. But have you ever thought about how toys reflect racial inequality?

During the holiday shopping season, a friend of mine went to buy a doll for her daughter. She had a coupon for a specific doll from the newspaper circular, and she was excited because she knew that particular doll also came in a black version. Since her daughter is multiracial, she likes her to have dolls of many hues to play with.

But when she went to check out, she was told that the coupon was only valid on the white doll.

Now there might be marketing reasons that the coupon could only work with the white doll; the UPC code might have been different on the black doll. Maybe they had an abundance of white dolls that the store was looking to move off of the shelves. Since the manufacturer probably produces so many more white versions of the doll and the retailer also probably buys a whole lot more of the white ones, it makes sense from a business perspective that one version would be cheaper to clear inventory. Ultimately, the store manager refused to honor the coupon (which did not say was for white dolls only).

But from a sociological standpoint, the price difference is a surcharge for black dolls which could work to deter customers from buying one. According to the U.S. Census, the median household income for African Americans is approximately 61% of white, non-Hispanic households. This income disparity makes it even more of a burden to pay more for essentially the same doll.

Since the middle of the last century, toy manufacturers have come a long way. Dora the Explorer is an extremely popular Latina television character (with requisite doll and other toys). Fisher Price’s Little People toys also feature children clearly from multiple ethnic groups. American Girl dolls are mostly white, but their Mexican American, Native American and African American dolls aren’t segregated on their homepage, as they are on www.toysrus.com. If you visit this site and click on dolls, they have many categories to choose from, including "ethnic dolls". Even many of those dolls appear to be white or very light skinned.

This separate category literally segregates dolls of color…except most of these dolls at best look like white people with deep tans. Of those slightly darker in color, they often have Caucasian-like hair and even blue eyes.

There’s another curious thing about the “ethnic” category: it presumes that “ethnic” only refers to people who are not white in appearance. The other dolls are just dolls.

This designation reflects the way in which people classified as “white” today are often viewed as “non-ethnic,” when by definition everyone has an ethnicity. As Janis Prince Inniss previously blogged about, ethnicity refers to cultural practices, custom, language, and ancestry. It is not insignificant that some groups become seen as “normal” and others “ethnic”. And it is not insignificant that dolls reflect this inequality.

You might be familiar with a famous experiment from 1954, where a psychologist found that black girls chose white dolls more often than black dolls. This study influenced the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision that same year, as the high court interpreted this experiment to mean that these children had internalized racism, and that segregation’s psychological effects needed to be reversed.

A high school student replicated this experiment with 21 girls in New York in 2005 and found similar results, which received national attention.

Certainly self-esteem issues are important. But we often overlook the role the toy industry plays in shaping which dolls seem “better” to children of all racial/ethnic backgrounds. It is obviously not enough just to have “ethnic” dolls available (albeit this is a major step forward from the 1954 experiment when likely very few were widely available).

When dolls are segregated in the stores or are simply colored-in versions of other dolls, it sends a message that they are less desirable. In one store my friend visited, she saw no non-white dolls and asked whether they carried any. The clerk told her that they had black Cabbage Patch dolls, but they were in the storeroom and that she would gladly go to get her one.

While it would be illegal to require a black person to eat their lunch only in a restaurant’s kitchen or sit on the back of the bus today, it isn’t illegal to segregate dolls. But it does communicate their inferior status.

Sociologist Christine L. Williams conducted ethnographic research in toy stores, which she describes in her book Inside Toyland: Working, Shopping, and Social Inequality. Williams worked as a clerk and was able to interact with both shoppers and store management.

She notes that in the big box store where she worked, black children (and often their families) were frequently considered shoplifters, particularly if staff members (of all races) thought they appeared to be low-income. When they entered toy stores, they were clearly less-than welcome. In contrast, rules were often bent for white middle class female shoppers and clerks were expected to provide them with a significant level of service.

Williams noticed that African American shoppers were given less attention than white shoppers. If they got angry they were not appeased by staff, as their white counterparts often were, but instead might be told to leave the store. In some cases the police were even called.

Toys are social manifestations of many things: they represent collective (although contested) ideas of how children should play; their presentation and marketing reflects notions of value, and their purchase reflects and reinforces inequality.

Celebrating St. Patrick’s Day: Symbolic Ethnicity

On March 14, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Janis Prince Inniss, Popular Culture and Consumption, Race and Ethnicity39 Comments

By Janis Prince Inniss

I’m seeing green! St. Patrick’s green, that is. Everywhere. At the grocery store. At Wal-Mart. At the mall. At my gym. Surely you’ve seen the decorations and a variety of green products such as carnations, bagels, greeting cards, frosted cupcakes, and in Chicago the even the Chicago River!

My introduction to St. Paddy’s day came when I lived in New York City; fitting because New York is home to the first of these parades anywhere, and hosts the largest Irish parade with up to 3 million onlookers. Irish soldiers began the parade in New York in 1762 and it has grown to include more than 150,000 people from a variety of Irish organizations. It is the largest parade in New York, even bigger than the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.

Is there a parade in your city? Chicago, Boston, and Savannah, along with a variety of other cities around the world have St. Patrick’s Day parades. In the U.S. St. Patrick’s Day is a religious holiday celebrated for centuries by the Irish on March 17^thduring Lent. Although the details about his early life differ, Patrick is said
to have died on March 17, 460 A.D., and most scholars agree that he introduced Christianity to Ireland. Traditionally, Irish families’ St. Patrick Day’s celebration involved attending church in the morning and then—with the restriction against eating meat lifted for the occasion—feast on bacon and cabbage in the evening. The focus on St. Patrick’s Day as a religious holiday in Ireland has remained that way until recently; it was only in the 1970s that pubs were allowed to remain open on this day.

Why do Irish Americans celebrate St. Patrick’s Day? This celebration is an example of symbolic ethnicity, characterized by a need to hold on to the culture of the immigrant generation, coupled with a pragmatic desire not to let this culture interfere with everyday life. The “old” culture is converted into ethnic symbols that must be simple enough to be shared by many people and easily understood. Many whites in the U.S. who maintain ethnic identities only do so in symbolic ways that take little time and minimally affect their everyday lives. Ethnicity, then, becomes highly individualized and expressive, although it has little or no impact on day-to-day living. Their ethnicity is tied to voluntary and arguably superficial events such as dishes cooked and holidays celebrated; for many, St. Patrick’s Day can be understood in this context.

Sociologist Mary Waters theorizes that the element of choice available to white ethnics makes symbolic ethnicity appealing. Although their ethnicity does not impact their lives in any crucial ways, Waters argues that it is important to white ethnics because ethnicity combines two important aspects of life. First, ethnicity connotes individuality—a feeling of being special that sets one apart from others. Second, it provides a sense of community, albeit a loosely knit one. This sense of community does not infringe on or restrict personal lives. Attending a St. Patrick’s Day parade, for example, allows Irish Americans to feel a part of the Irish American community but when the parade is over there's no stipulation that their lives have to be guided by Irish tradition or culture.

The traditional Irish focus on the religious aspects of St. Patrick’s Day stands in sharp contrast to the festive American counterpart. Right now, we have a unique opportunity to notice the tensions between the religious and the celebratory aspects of St. Patrick’s Day: This year, Holy Week—the week before Easter that includes Palm Sunday and Good Friday, which memorializes the last week of Jesus’ life—begins on Sunday, March 16^th. This means that St. Patrick’s Day falls on Holy Monday. Many church officials in the U.S. have been asking St. Patrick's Day parade organizers not to hold their parade on this day,in deference to Holy Monday. Some cities such as Philadelphia and Milwaukee are having early parades, but the biggest one of them all, the New York parade, and many others will continue as always on March 17—Holy Monday.

Interestingly, St. Patrick’s is celebrated by many Americans who are not Irish. (Almost three quarters (71.8 %) of Americans 18-24 years old will celebrate the day, and although 34.5 million Americans claim to have Irish ancestry, this number clearly does not account for all of those taking party in the celebrations.) This leads to a staggering amount of money spent on the festivities–$3.6 billion according to the National Retail Foundation.

Why do you think so many people with no Irish heritage celebrate St. Patrick’s Day? Clearly, the symbols (partying and wearing green) are simple enough to be shared by many people

How Effective Is Diversity Training?

On March 11, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Immigration, Population, Aging, and Demography, Race and Ethnicity41 Comments

By C.N. Le

The conventional thinking among sociologists and, I would guess, many corporations is that diversity training is ultimately beneficial for their company or organization — that it results in greater workplace harmony, more opportunities for advancement for women and racial/ethnic minorities, and more productivity for all their workers.

However, as the Washington Post reports, a new study by Alexandra Kalev, a sociologist at the University of Arizona, shows that when attendance at diversity training is mandatory, rather than voluntary, it is likely to lead to counterproductive results:

A comprehensive review of 31 years of data from 830 mid-size to large U.S. workplaces found that the kind of diversity training exercises offered at most firms were followed by a 7.5 percent drop in the number of women in management.

The number of black, female managers fell by 10 percent, and the number of black men in top positions fell by 12 percent. Similar effects were seen for Latinos and Asians.

The analysis did not find that all diversity training is useless. Rather, it showed that mandatory programs — often undertaken mainly with an eye to avoiding liability in discrimination lawsuits — were the problem. When diversity training is voluntary and undertaken to advance a company’s business goals, it was associated with increased diversity in management.

Several experts offered two reasons for this: The first is that businesses are responding rationally to the legal environment, since several Supreme Court rulings have held that companies with mandatory diversity training are in a stronger position if they face a discrimination lawsuit.

Second, many companies — with the implicit cooperation of diversity trainers — find it easier to offer exercises that serve public relations goals, rather than to embrace real change.

I am disappointed but not completely surprised to hear that most diversity training programs are actually counterproductive. In fact, one might be tempted to say that this finding reinforces the argument that greater diversity actually leads to less trust and civic cooperation among Americans, which I blogged about earlier.

Nonetheless, it’s important to understand that the main reason diversity training doesn’t seem to produce many benefits in corporations is not because of the increase of diversity itself, but because the underlying motivation and support for increased diversity in the workplace is fundamentally superficial and weak to begin with.

In other words, when diversity training in corporations fails, it is almost always because the company in question is motivated by fear of lawsuits rather than by a genuine desire for greater diversity. They are often just going through the motions and putting on a public relations show that has very little true commitment to the underlying principles involved in diversity training.

In contrast, other scholars’ research reinforces the notion that greater diversity can and often does lead to benefits for an organization or society in general. For example, I have blogged about how a mediating institution such as religion can be used as the "social glue" to bring diverse groups of people together.

In fact, Prof. Kalev’s research on corporate diversity training compliments the work of Scott E. Page, a professor of complex systems, political science, and economics at the University of Michigan, who wrote The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools and Societies. In this book he argues that programs which increase diversity in any organizational setting are ultimately beneficial for society:

Diverse groups of people bring to organizations more and different ways of seeing a problem and, thus, faster/better ways of solving it.

People from different backgrounds have varying ways of looking at problems, what I call “tools.” The sum of these tools is far more powerful in organizations with diversity than in ones where everyone has gone to the same schools, been trained in the same mold and thinks in almost identical ways.

The problems we face in the world are very complicated. Any one of us can get stuck. If we’re in an organization where everyone thinks in the same way, everyone will get stuck in the same place. . . . [Affirmative action is] a flat-out good because, as I said earlier, it makes everything we do more powerful.

Prof. Page’s argument is that diversity and heterogeneity in any organization, facilitated through programs such as affirmative action, leads to innovation and ultimately benefits the entire organization. He also argues that diversity can come in many different forms, not just simple racial/ethnic identity.

Prof. Page’s arguments for diversity through programs such as affirmative action support the ideas expressed in Prof. Kalev’s research. In order for diversity training programs to be successful in corporations, there needs to be a fundamental commitment to and embrace of its core principles.

The take home message here is that the goal of diversity (and therefore diversity training) is fundamentally sound. It’s just that in order for such goals to be realized, organizations need to accept and internalize them as part of their mission rather than just use the training to satisfy legal requirements.

Where to Sit: Doing Qualitative Research

On March 7, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Social Psychology, Statistics and Methods2 Comments

By Bradley Wright

One of the fun things to do in sociology is to make empirical generalizations. Sometimes in research we start with an idea or a theory, make a hypothesis, and then collect data to test if our idea is correct. This is deductive research, going from large (abstract idea) to small (collecting data about specific people or situations). Deductive research can be very interesting, because we learn if our ideas hold up in the real world, but I don’t think that it’s as fun as inductive research (and as I am aging—about a year annually—I am placing more weight on research being fun).

Sometimes when we enter a situation, even if we don’t know anything about it, we start noticing things. We notice if there are patterns to peoples’ behavior. From these patterns, we create larger explanations about how the social world works. This is inductive because we start with the smaller observation, and from it we build explanations about the larger social world.

Here’s a simple example of how to create empirical generalizations. In my social research methods class, I asked my students why they sat where they did. It was a reasonable question because the class itself has about 100 chairs, but there are only 50 students, so they had some choice in where they sat.

After talking for about it for about 10 minutes, we came up with the following ways that students decided where to sit.

1) Look for a friend. When you walk into the classroom, first look for someone that you know reasonably well and feel positively toward and sit next to them if there’s an available seat nearby. Or, if you’re really close, see if they’ll move so that you can sit next to them. Don’t sit next to them if you know them well but feel negatively toward them (e.g., an enemy). Also, don’t sit next to them, at least too conspicuously, if you feel positively but don’t know them (e.g., you’re attracted to a stranger).

2) Figure out how close to the front of the room you like to be. If you’re right up front, you catch everything that is going on, but it does make it difficult to sleep, text message, or talk with your friends. If you want to goof around a bit, maybe sit in the back.

3) Find a comfortable seat. Classroom seating is usually pretty tight, with the seats being crammed together—just like economy seating on an airplane. The best seats are those on the aisle. Once class starts, students in the aisle seats can stretch out their legs more than those in the interior seats. The first students to arrive in the class tend to take the aisle seats, and as a result the students arriving later have to step past them to get to the middle seats.

4) Keep an empty seat between you and others (unless you know them). When at all possible, pick a seat that has empty seats on both sides. Seating directly next to someone invades their personal space, and it gives you less room as well.

5) Sit in same area each time. Once you find a suitable seat, try to sit in it, or near it, every class period. This way you get the best seat for you each time, and you don’t really have to think about it. Of course, you may have to change if someone is sitting too close to that seat.

We came up with some other factors that might be incorporated, such as left-handed desks for left-handed students and not sitting directly behind people, especially if they are tall, but the five criteria listed above represented the main decisions made by the students.

Because students follow these criteria, when I as a professor look out on a classroom, I see alternate seating with only friends sitting next to each other. The aisle seats are always taken. Also, since students tend to sit in the same area each time, I learn to recognize them in

part by where they sit. In fact, on test days, when I assign random seating, I have trouble recognizing all of my students.

These seating rules are strong enough that they represent social norms, and it can be considered deviant to violate them. For example, if you have friends in a class, but you go sit by yourself, they would probably be upset. Likewise, if there are plenty of empty seats, but you pick one right next to someone, they may take offense.

Obviously where to sit in classrooms is a relatively minor issue in the grand scheme of things. Still, it represents a highly structured social interaction, demonstrating the reach of social norms into every aspect of our lives.

No Exit: Sociology Meets Air Travel

On March 4, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Karen Sternheimer, Social Psychology27 Comments

By Karen Sternheimer

When I was in high school I was really into existentialism. Not a surprise, considering that teens are often trying to figure out the meaning of their lives (even though existentialists consider life to be without inherent meaning…but I digress).

One of my favorites was the Jean-Paul Sartre play, No Exit. If memory serves, the play is about a group of people, each seriously flawed in their own way, who had to spend eternity together. To paraphrase Sartre’s point, “hell is other people.”

For some reason this idea really struck a chord with me when we read it in my 12^th grade world literature class. Other people can really help create friction that otherwise might not exist. (The irony that I would become a sociologist is not lost on me, by the way).

This thought occurred to me on a recent flight. As in Sartre’s play, I was placed in close quarters with a selection of strangers, each with their own unique set of characteristics. Although I thankfully will not spend eternity with them, for the four hours of the flight’s duration we had to learn to negotiate relationships with one another and manage our emotions in the process.

Our challenge began immediately upon boarding. There was someone sitting in my aisle seat, so I had to ask her to move. She did, reluctantly leaving her eleven-year-old son sitting in the middle seat. As I was getting settled in, the woman asked him repeatedly if he was okay from her middle seat across the aisle.

Each time he answered that he was, but within minutes she asked if I wouldn’t mind sitting in her middle seat just for take off, that I could move back for the flight, and then we could switch again when the plane descended. I said we should just switch, that I didn’t want to move back and forth. I admit I was less than gracious about exchanging seats, until I saw a rather attractive man who had the window seat now next to me, which seemed like a just reward.

So I fully admit to being part of the friction, which increased when I asked the flight attendant if I could use the bathroom in first class before the flight left, since it was much closer than walking to the back of the plane as people were getting seated. She was clearly annoyed but agreed.

This type of social situation produces all sorts of opportunities to breach norms and challenge what we think are agreed upon social rules. I gave up a highly valued aisle seat for the least valued middle seat. I also crossed “class” lines by using the bathroom in the wrong cabin.

Other social rules get tested while flying too. The young woman in front of me chatted quite loudly with her seat mate for a good part of the flight. It was obvious from the conversation that they did not know each other, as they talked about where they lived and the weather in their respective homes.

Nothing is unusual about this, except that the loud conversation was continually peppered with profanity. I had the sense that the man next to me was annoyed too, but neither of us said anything to each other or to her.

I thought about this for a few minutes—what would I say? Do I ask the flight attendant to remind her of the unwritten social rule to watch your language? She might have thought that since only adults were immediately next to her and behind her it was totally acceptable to use the f-word as her favorite adjective. Or maybe she was trying to bond with her similarly-aged seat mate by using words she thought might connote familiarity.

The other people surrounding me carried on conversations too: where they grew up, where they live now, favorite restaurants in their destination city, places to shop, and so forth. This type of conversation seems quite acceptable under the circumstances, yet for those trying to sleep (as I was) any talk was disturbing.

In fairness, I’m sure sitting next to me was not so great either. I had a raging cold and spent the entire flight blowing my nose and sucking on cough drops. Because of the absence of personal space, there is a good chance that these unsuspecting strangers left the flight with my germs.

When the plane landed, I couldn’t wait to get out of there and leave my temporary intimates forever. I learned more about them that I wanted to (the lady next to me had ten children, the man next to me played fantasy soccer league on his Mac, even after the flight attendant asked us to turn off all electronic devices).

But with the critical distance of walking through the airport terminal, I realized the absurdity of my irritation. After all, I safely traveled more than 2,000 miles in four hours. The flight was smooth, landed and departed on time. They even served a hot meal in coach (yes, Continental still does that!), and the only challenge was in negotiating being so close to other people.

This experience reminded me that unspoken rules often contradict each other; while some people might prefer that one rule be followed, others might be following another. Is hell other people? I wouldn’t go that far, but we do present challenges to each other when we are in close quarters with no exit.

Asian American Voters: Does Race Matter?

On March 1, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Race and EthnicityLeave a comment

By C.N. Le

I assume that many people are following the Presidential primaries, especially the race between the Democratic candidates, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. As I write this Obama has more pledged delegates and has won more states, but Clinton has more “super delegates.” Clearly the race is still very tight.

Since my expertise is in studying racial/ethnic minorities, particularly Asian Americans, and to follow up with my last post on racial attitudes between racial/ethnic minorities, I’d like to discuss what the Super Tuesday results in California a few weeks ago say about Asian American voters in the largest state in the union and the one that contains the largest population of Asian Americans.

According to an MSNBC report, in California Asian Americans voted for Clinton by a surprisingly large margin of 3-to-1. These results have led many to ask to what extent racial prejudice against African Americans (and therefore, against Obama) played in the decisions of Asian American voters in California to overwhelmingly support Clinton.

In Does Obama Have an Asian Problem? Time magazine writes,

[Asian Americans] are the one ethnic group that has voted most consistently — and overwhelmingly — for his rival, Hillary Clinton. . . . [CSU Long Beach Sociology professor] Wang also suspects that race lurks among the possible reasons behind Asian immigrants’ reticence to back Obama. "The images of African-Americans that get exported to other cultures is not often positive," says Wang, who teaches about pop culture and race. "It’s not unusual to find new immigrants who have never had a meaningful, personal encounter with an African-American. So there’s a very uninformed bias," says Wang.

It’s certainly true that there has been a history of tension and even conflict between some African Americans and some Asian Americans. Some obvious examples of this tension include the murder of Latasha Harlans by a Korean store owner during the 1990s in Los Angeles; public boycotts against Korean store owners in Crown Heights, Brooklyn; and perhaps most famously, the destruction of dozens of Korean American-owned small businesses during the Los Angeles Riot in 1992. While many scholars argue that the media has exaggerated and sensationalized such tensions, others note that cultural misunderstandings have contributed them.

To what extent do such tensions between African Americans and Asian Americans still exist some 15 years later after the incidents I mentioned above? Are they still intense enough to cause three-quarters of Asian American voters in California to vote for Clinton rather than Obama?

Others have argued convincingly that there are most likely factors other than racial prejudice that can account for why Asian Americans in California voted in large numbers for Clinton.

Specifically, Asian American voters may be more familiar and comfortable with "establishment" candidates who are more associated with being powerful and influential. In that respect, based on her close association with her husband and former President Bill Clinton, Hillary personifies being part of the "establishment" more than Obama does.

For example, another Asian American political blogger Jeff Chang writes:

Clinton’s main advantage is that she has the access to power and the party structures that deliver promises to officials and operatives. Obama doesn’t. Emergent politics favors individuals seeking power. Think of it this way: Hillary, the woman candidate, is bringing Latino and Asian American leaders into the old-boy’s network.

These leaders, in turn, deliver votes via their community’s structures of power: business groups, labor unions, voter groups, community organizations. Those groups tend to deliver an older voter who is already "in the game", who can directly benefit from the opening of the old-boy’s network. "Experience" really is a cover for "access."

Also, as the Time magazine article cited above also notes,

Like other new immigrants, Asian-Americans are more conservative in their choices for leaders, and therefore likely to go with the known entity — which in this race, thanks to her husband and her time in the White House, is Clinton. Many Asians are business owners who prospered under Bill Clinton. . . . Perhaps most significantly, the Clinton campaign had long ago locked up support from local politicians, who hold unusual sway over their ethnic communities. . . .

What’s more, there’s the gender factor. Many Asian cultures are patriarchal, and Clinton is the only female candidate in the field. But despite their cultures, many immigrants from those countries may in fact be more familiar than Americans with a female leader: Indira Gandhi in India, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in the Philippines, Benazir Bhutto in Pakistan. And many of those leaders, like Clinton, were married to or descended from former leaders.

Confirming my own read of the Democratic landscape, Jeff goes on to note that since Obama’s strength seems to lie more with younger and U.S.-born voters rather than older ones, it’s likely that he did much better with younger Asian American voters in California as well, while less successful with their parents, or with first-generation Asian immigrants.

For now, what we do know is that Obama and his campaign have some work to do to win over Asian American (and Latino American) voters. While Obama appeals to younger members of both groups’ distrust of the establishment (particularly among young Latino and Asian American bloggers who disproportionately support him), that message does not play as well with older members or first-generation immigrants.

As the Asian American community continues to become younger, Obama’s appeal is only likely to increase among Asian American voters. This demographic shift probably won’t occur in time for him to win the Democratic nomination, but if he does get the nomination it will be interesting to see how much support he receives from the Asian American community in the general election.

Are Children’s Psychotropic Medicines Green?

On February 27, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Janis Prince Inniss, Social Problems, Politics, and Social ChangeLeave a comment

By Janis Prince Inniss

The number of children taking psychotropic medications has sky-rocketed in recent years. This increase is not evident across all categories of medications, but primarily due to the exploding numbers of children given atypicals– a new class of antipsychotic drugs.

What is driving the increase? If the stigma associated with seeking and treating mental health has diminished, this is great news. If more children who need treatment for mental illness are receiving benefits from medications, that is more good news. There are, however, indications that this spike is less a response to the needs of children, than drug companies and physicians profiting from a lucrative—and until recently, mostly untapped—market.

The rise in medication being prescribed to children is taking place at a time when Medicaid and insurance companies have become increasingly less likely to pay for psychotherapy. Psychotropic medications, on the other hand, are reimbursable. This means that for financial reasons, parents seeking help for their children see talk therapy as less of an option than drug therapy.

In order to understand these issues, it is useful to consider the role of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (F.D.A.)—the governmental agency charged with regulating drugs. The F.D.A. approved the use of atypicals to treat bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in adults, but the drugs have become popular in the treatment of children. The FDA oversees marketing by drug companies, but not prescriptions by physicians. Therefore, in a practice known as “off-label” use, physicians are free to prescribe FDA approved medications for populations and conditions not approved by the FDA. Because many of the psychotropic medications that are prescribed to children have not been studied for children’s use, there are many unanswered questions about their effectiveness and side effects. Because children are continuing to develop, they can be particularly vulnerable to the sometimes very serious side effects of medications.

Another issue is the over diagnoses and misdiagnoses of mental illnesses in children. For example, despite a tremendous rise in the number of children being diagnosed as bipolar, many mental health practitioners question the existence of this disorder in children. (Chapter Four of Frontline’s “The Medicated Child” offers video of a five year old diagnosed with bipolar disorder; viewing it may give some sense of the desperation parents may feel about the behavior of their children and why they would be willing to try drugs despite their side effects.)

Adding to the suspicion that financial concerns may motivate some diagnoses is The New York Times analysis of drug company financial relationships with psychiatrists in Minnesota (the only state that makes it mandatory to report such relationships). The analysis revealed that between 2000 and 2005drug company payments to doctors increased six-fold, to $1.6 million, while prescriptions for antipsychotics to children receiving Medicaid increased nine-fold. The doctors who received the most money from drug companies are the same ones who were most inclined to prescribe medications to children. Psychiatrists are not the only physicians who receive payments from drug companies, and some high prescribers receive no money from the companies. But the Times analysis found that between 2000 and 2005, psychiatrists received more money from drug companies than doctors of other specialties. For example, payments to psychiatrists in Minnesota ranged from $51 to $689,000, with a median of $1,750.

The relationship between drug companies and physicians is further complicated by the fact that drug companies finance research on their medications. In some cases the companies retain control over the data, leaving room for doubt about the truthfulness of their reports.

It’s also important to consider the drug company budgets devoted to advertising psychotropic medications to the public. In 2000, money spent on such advertising skyrocketed to $1.5 billion—a six-fold increase from 1996. Television and other advertisements have armed parents with the names of medications for any number of disorders and some physicians bow to pressure from parents to provide a medication they have seen marketed. Much of the prescriptions for psychotropic medications are written by pediatricians who lack the expertise needed to treat and monitor children on these drugs.

It is hard to escape the profit motive in medicating children; these drugs are not cheap and their manufactures earn billions. Figures of what Medicaid spent in only two states illustrate the kind of money at stake: In 2006, Medicaid spent $27.5 million for atypicals for children in Florida, while Minnesota spent $7.1 million in 2005.

Drug companies reap billions of dollars with “off-label“ prescribing, so there is little incentive for the companies to learn more about the impact of their medications on children. And how much of this increase in medication, is an unwillingness of some parents and teachers to accept what is in fact normal—if highly challenging—childhood behavior? There does not have to be an either/or choice—psychotherapy or medication—in responding to the mental health needs of children; research conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health indicates that a combination of psychotherapy and medication is best for some mental health issues faced by children.

Social Movements and Your Attention Span

On February 24, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Social Problems, Politics, and Social Change, Theory51 Comments

By Bradley Wright

There are countless social movements in society, and they want you to pay attention.

In a social movement, a group of ordinary people come together to advance a social cause, and there are countless movements in society. In the early twentieth century, women activists banded together to promote women’s suffrage —the right to vote. In the 1960s, the civil rights movement promoted justice for African-Americans. The anti-nuclear movement protests the development of nuclear energy. Mothers against Drunk Drivers advocate tougher laws against drunk driving.

A common goal of most social movements, whatever their focus, is to get the public’s attention. Sociologists understand this via resource mobilization theory– how being in the public’s eye helps movements accomplish their goals. It brings in workers for the cause, it helps collect money, and it might result in changed laws. In fact, more than a few social movements have as their explicit goal raising public awareness about their cause. For example, the National Children’s Cancer Society (NCCS—a worthy cause if ever there was one) explicitly states the importance of raising public awareness. They write:

“Take action against a disease that has been ignored for too long. Raising awareness in your community about childhood cancer and the survivorship issues surrounding it is critical to our mutual mission. Awareness can inform and change minds. It can change public policy and raise more funds for crucial patient services. Awareness of the programs of the N.C.C.S. can give hope to families facing the chaos of a diagnosis of childhood cancer.”

As a result, social movements work hard at having distinctive approaches. The movement for breast cancer awareness has the ubiquitous pink ribbons. Not to be outdone, other movements have adopted their own ribbon colors. For example, white ribbons are for lung cancer and violence against women. Yellow ribbons are for deployed soldiers and suicide awareness. Blue ribbons are for child abuse and Hurricane Katrina. Purple is for lupus and showing religious tolerance. Green is for environmental awareness and Lyme disease. Puzzle-piece ribbons are for autism. Ribbons with the words “publish me” are for untenured faculty–okay, I made up that last one.

(As an aside, some have criticized ribbons and wristbands as “slacktivism”—doing things that make us feel good about helping others without actually spending any of our time or money in doing so).

In addition to distributing ribbons, social movements do lots of other things. They can hold demonstrations. The million-man march in 1995 brought hundreds of thousands of demonstrators to Washington D.C. to promote unity and political participation among black men. They also get celebrity endorsements. For example, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) regularly features actors and actresses in their commercials, sometimes taking off their clothes (a time-honored method of getting attention). Sometimes they just advertise on television and in print, similar to a business seeking customers.

There’s a problem, however—there is only so much public attention to go around, and there are a lot more movements wanting attention than there is attention to give. As such, movements compete with each other for the public’s attention. In this sense, groups like the National Children’s Cancer Society are fighting against not only the disease but also against other disease-related groups. If, for example, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation does a particularly good job of raising awareness, then there may be less to give the NCCS.

This puts social movements in a bind. On one hand, they are probably sympathetic to the causes behind their competing social movements. I suspect that members of the NCCS are also against juvenile diabetes. On the other hand, these other groups are their competitors, taking resources from them.

It’s in this context that we can understand the following commercial. Pandarescue.org is group dedicated to saving

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wild pandas and their habitat. It’s a small group—I’ve never heard of them before this commercial, and so I imagine that they struggled with how to get their message out. They came up with this commercial that explicitly recognizes the resource mobilization model described above. As implied in this commercial, the problem for panda bears is not just deforestation and poaching, but also the public support for whales. Yes, Greenpeace and others portray whales as beautiful, noble creatures, but this video shows the shocking truth! (My guess is that baby harp seals and cute little kittens are also harmful for pandas. Hopefully future commercials will get at that as well).

Well, what did you think? In a way, I appreciate its honesty because I imagine that a lot of social movements think that they are more important than other movements. Still, it is so, so tacky. It certainly does exemplify the social mobilization theory of social movements.

Off Track & On Display

On February 21, 2008October 9, 2025 By econnellIn Behind the Headlines, Popular Culture and Consumption, Sally RaskoffLeave a comment

By Sally Raskoff

What do Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Britney Spears, Tara Reid, Lindsay Lohan, Courtney Love, Whitney Houston, Drew Barrymore, Winona Ryder, Kelly Osbourne, Michelle Rodriguez, Amy Winehouse, Fergie, Jessica Smith, Joanie “Chyna” Laurer, Carrie Fisher, Yasmine Bleeth, Brigitte Nielson, Mary Carey, Jessica Sierra, Angelina Jolie, Jaimee Foxworth, Melanie Griffiths, Wynonna Judd, Demi Moore, Tawney Kitaen, Kim Delaney, Samaire Armstrong, Tara Conner, Carnie Wilson, Kate Moss, Betty Ford, Mary Tyler Moore, Tatum O’Neal, Maureen McCormick, Ted Haggard, Tom Sizemore, Tom Arnold, Eric Clapton, Pete Doherty, Lou Gossett Jr., Macaulay Culkin, Mike Tyson, Charlie Sheen, Mel Gibson, Haley Joel Osment, Danny Bonaduce, Chris Rock, David Crosby, Ben Affleck, Robin Williams, David Bowie, Chris Penn, Jason Priestley, Mickey Rourke, Marc Jacobs, Leif Garrett, George Carlin, Elton John, Ozzy Osbourne, Robert Downey Jr., Ted Turner, Marshall “Eminem” Mathers, Michael Jackson, Dennis Quaid, Don Johnson, Martin Lawrence, James Gandolfini, Kiefer Sutherland, Vincent Margera, Brad Renfro, David Hasselhoff, Rush Limbaugh, Chad Lowe, Seth Binzer, Colin Farrell, Russell Crowe, Jeff Conaway, Daniel Baldwin, and Lil Wayne all have in common?

They are all celebrities and they have all had substance abuse problems that have put them into rehab or into jail.

(Please note that this is not a complete list of celebrities with such problems; I wanted some room to write the rest of my blog, so not all are included. I chose just a representative group to include here.)

What distinguishes the people on this list?

They represent acting, music, comedy, sports, modeling, politics, religion, and “personalities” (or whatever category to which Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, and their ilk belong).

How many of these people have gotten media attention for their substance use issues?

Now, how many of them have gotten constant attention for their ongoing battle with their problems? The list gets smaller here and is dominated by women with the coverage of Paris, Nicole, and Lindsay taking the lead. Notice that there are plenty of men and women who have similar problems, yet the media lavishes most of its attention on the young women.

Compare the recent jail releases of Paris Hilton and Kiefer Sutherland. Ms. Hilton served almost five days in jail for a 45-day sentence; a media frenzy ensued when she went in, while she was there, and when she was released to her home with a monitoring bracelet for 40 days (June 2006). Mr. Sutherland was released just after midnight (January 21 2008) after serving the entire 48-day sentence for a DUI and probation violation. Very little media were there to document it and while it did show up as news, it quickly disappeared.

Why might this be? Why would society’s interest be obsessed with famous young women who are in danger of hurting themselves and others?

One explanation involves gender stratification. We divide gender into two categories, men and women. We assign dominant and leadership qualities to men and subordinate and supportive qualities to women. Living in this patriarchal society in which men (as a group) have power over women (as a group), the deviance of men and women tends to be treated very differently.

The behavior of men, as members of the powerful group is usually only sanctioned when they deviate from their masculine role. Masculinity is defined by many characteristics, including aggressiveness and experimentation. Thus if men have substance abuse problems, these are to be dealt with quietly, as personal problems, since they do not violate standards of maleness.

The behavior of women, as members of the subordinate group, is sanctioned when they deviate from the feminine norms. Femininity includes nurturing and assistance of loved ones, thus when women (especially mothers) have substance abuse problems, they are not living up to their assigned qualities and roles in society; a person ruled by an addiction does not focus on others or their needs. Thus addicted women’s behaviors are more deviant than that of men who have identical problems!

Add to this a society obsessed with youth and we have two lenses focusing in on young women in trouble.

What do Gia, Paula Yates, Marilyn Monroe, Billie Holiday, Brigette Anderson, Anna Nicole Smith, Dana Plato, Donyale Luna, Judy Garland, Janis Joplin, Heath Ledger, Christian Brando, John Belushi, River Phoenix, Ike Turner, Chris Farley, John Candy, Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, Hillel Slovak, Ken Caminiti, Tim Hardin, Elvis Presley, John Kordic, Rick James, Kevin Dubrow, Kurt Cobain, Len Bias, John Bonham, Keith Moon, Chris Penn, and Sid Vicious all have in common?

They are all celebrities who died of drug-related causes. (Note that this is also not a complete list.)

There are men and women on this list, certainly. They represent some of the same categories as above: acting, music, comedy, sports, and modeling.

Is the same media attention pattern occurring here? Are the drug-related deaths of young women more public than those of men or other women? This is not entirely clear: how many of these names do you recognize and why do you recognize them? If you remember their names but you aren’t really a fan, the media is probably responsible for the recognition.

Count the number of men and women. Is there a preponderance of either men or women? Is there a difference in the number of women and men with whom you are familiar?

Oddly enough, when I tallied my lists of famous people who died from substance abuse, there were more men than women. How might we explain that?

There might be more deceased women or more men in the public eye than I have found. On the other hand, my original list is rather large and I’ve double-checked most of the entries. (Remember that I didn’t use the entire list here so that I could have some room to write my own comments!)

If the pattern reflects a real phenomenon, then using gender theory again can enlighten us.

The media attention to young women broadcasts images of their problems and behaviors. Men with the same problems (and women older than 29) also struggle, but usually do so out of the limelight.

If more men are dying from substance abuse than women, perhaps the men, in expressing (an extreme form of) their masculinity, are still conforming to their gendered expectations. They are still acting on their own initiative and taking charge, even if it is behavior that is harming them.

Perhaps because young women have that spotlight, they are more likely to enter rehab (eventually) and clean up while the men, struggling out there with much less attention, are more likely to push their bodies further and sometimes they perish from such “assertiveness”.

Furthermore, sometimes sympathetic people bend the rules for the young women offer them many second chances. In contrast, others (men and other women) are forced by the letter of the law to sober up or go to jail.

If you’ve ever seen the television shows Intervention or Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew , you’ve seen the challenges that people face when overcoming substance abuse and addiction. For famous people and the rest of us, it is the same difficult process of facing one’s life, choices, and outcomes and learning what you need to do better. However, celebrities have the amplified attention that fame brings.