Key term
OCR A-Level Sociology H580
Introducing Socialisation, Culture and Identity
Topic overviewCulture, norms, values and cultural relativismSubculture, high culture and popular cultureGlobal and consumer culture, cultural diversity and hybridityPrimary and secondary socialisation, the family and peer groupMedia, religion, education and the workplace as agencies of socialisationLifelong socialisation and the nature/nurture debateSocial control, sanctions and formal agencies of controlInformal agencies and theories of social controlThe concept of identity, ethnicity and nationalityGender, class and sexual identityAge, disability, hybrid and intersecting identities
Families and RelationshipsComponent 01
Topic overviewFamily types and trends in marriage, divorce and cohabitationDemographic change, family diversity and newer family typesNuclear family ideology, functionalism and the New RightMarxist, feminist and postmodern views and the diversity debateConjugal roles and the domestic division of labourPower, the dark side of the family and theories of partner rolesThe child-centred family, views of childhood and its extensionParent-child power, grandparents in an ageing population and feminist views
Youth SubculturesComponent 01
Topic overviewFunctionalist and neo-Marxist views of youth cultureHebdige, feminist and postmodern views of youth subculturesClass, ethnic and hybrid subcultures and consensus versus conflictDelinquent, criminal, spectacular and anti-school subculturesGangs, newer deviant subcultures and patterns in youth offendingFunctionalist, New Right and Marxist explanations of youth devianceLabelling, identity, gender, ethnicity and moral panics in youth deviance
MediaComponent 01
Topic overviewRepresentations of ethnicity and nationality, symbolic annihilation and the male gazeRepresentations of gender, social class and young peopleRepresentations of older people and theories of media representationDirect and indirect media effects modelsActive audience models, deviance amplification and moral panics
Research Methods and Researching Social Inequalities
Topic overviewPositivism, quantitative data and interpretivismVerstehen, qualitative data and validityReliability, representativeness, generalisability and theoryResearch topics, aims, hypotheses and primary and secondary dataOperationalisation, pilot studies and respondent validationLongitudinal studies, interpreting data and social policySampling frames, sampling techniques and choosing a sampleAccess, gatekeepers and research ethicsQuestionnaires, structured interviews, statistics, content analysis and observationUnstructured interviews, ethnography and methodological pluralism
Understanding Social Inequalities
Globalisation and the Digital Social World
Crime and DevianceComponent 03
Topic overviewDefining crime and deviance, social control and relativitySocial construction of crime and police recorded crimeThe Crime Survey, victim surveys and self-report studiesCrime patterns by social class, gender and ageCrime patterns by ethnicity, crime trends and global organised crimeGlocal organised crime and green crimeFunctionalist, strain and subcultural theories of crimeMarxist, interactionist and left realist theories of crimeRight realism, New Right, feminism and explaining ethnic and age patternsLeft-wing crime reduction, social crime prevention and restorative justiceSituational crime prevention, zero tolerance and punitive justice
EducationComponent 03
Topic overviewFunctionalist, Marxist and liberal views of the role of educationSocial democratic, New Right and feminist views and vocational educationClass and ethnic patterns in educational attainmentGender patterns, global educational inequality and intersectionalityInside-school factors: labelling, setting, triage and institutional racismMaterial and cultural deprivation and cultural capitalExplaining gender and ethnic differences and theoretical views of achievementTypes of school and education policy since 1988Ideology, marketisation and equality of opportunity in education policy
Religion, Belief and FaithComponent 03
Topic overviewDefining religion, faith and belief, churches and denominationsSects, cults, new religious and new age movements and fundamentalismMeasuring religiosity and believing without belongingFunctionalist and Marxist views of the role of religionNeo-Marxist, Weberian, feminist, phenomenological and postmodern views of religionReligion, social change and whether religion is positive or negativeClass and gender patterns in religiosityWomen's changing religiosity and ethnic and age patternsAge cohorts, global religious trends and resurgenceDefining secularisation and evidence of religious declinePro- and anti-secularisation theoriesReligion and social policy, the golden age critique and global patterns
Youth Subcultures
Functionalist and neo-Marxist views of youth culture
- 3 things to know
- Component 01
Overview
Recall questions on the difference between youth culture and a youth subculture, Parsons's bridge and Eisenstadt's safety valve, functionalist views of subcultures and social order and their criticisms, and the neo-Marxist Birmingham CCCS account of resistance through rituals and Phil Cohen's magical solution.
What you need to know
Answer each one before you reveal it.
Your recallNot started
Key term
Which research centre produced the neo-Marxist account of youth subcultures?
Key term
Phil Cohen argued that mods and skinheads offered a magical solution. To what problem?
Questions from this subtopic
Each one with the model answer underneath.
- 1
What is the difference between youth culture and a youth subculture?
Model answer
Youth culture refers to the norms, values and lifestyle shared by young people in general, whereas a youth subculture is a smaller group within it that has its own distinctive style, values and identity marking it off from the mainstream.
- 2
Parsons described youth culture as a bridge. Between what two things?
Model answer
Between the family, where a child's status is ascribed and they are treated as an individual, and adult society, where status must be achieved and people are judged by impersonal, universal standards.
- 3
Eisenstadt and other functionalists call youth culture a safety valve. What do they mean?
Model answer
They mean this period of structured irresponsibility, in which young people are freed from full adult obligations, gives a contained outlet for the frustration of being neither child nor adult, so tension is released harmlessly and social order is preserved.
- 4
Explain how functionalists think youth subcultures contribute to social order and control.
Model answer
The peer group takes over part of the socialisation role as family control weakens, teaching shared norms and drawing the young into wider society, so subcultures reinforce value consensus and informal control rather than threatening order.
- 5
What are the main criticisms of the functionalist account of youth culture?
Model answer
It assumes one shared youth culture experienced by everyone, when in practice young people's experience is sharply divided by class, gender and ethnicity, and it plays down conflict and inequality.
- 6
Which research centre produced the neo-Marxist account of youth subcultures?
Model answer
The Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at Birmingham, usually referred to as the Birmingham School.
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