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Social status
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In sociology or anthropology, social status is the honor or prestige attached to one's position in society (one's social position). The stratification system, which is the system of distributing rewards to the members of society, determines social status. Social status, the position or rank of a person or group within the stratification system, can be determined two ways. One can earn their social status by their own achievements, which is known as achieved status, or one can be placed in the stratification system by their inherited position, which is called ascribed status.
Status in different societiesStatus refers to the relative rank that an individual holds; this includes attendant rights, duties, and lifestyle, in a social hierarchy based upon honor or prestige. Status has two different types that come along with it: achieved, and ascribed. The word status refers to social stratification on a vertical scale.
In modern societies, occupation is usually thought of as the main determinant of status, but other memberships or affiliations (such as ethnic group, religion, gender, voluntary associations, fandom, hobby) can have an influence. The importance of social status can be seen in the peer status hierarchy of geeks, athletes, cheerleaders, nerds, and weirdos in American high schools. Achieved status is when people are placed in the stratification structure based on their individual merits or achievements. This status can be achieved through education, occupation, and marital status. America most commonly uses this form of status with jobs. The higher up your are in rank the better off you are and the more control you have over your co-workers.
In pre-modern societies, status differentiation is widely varied. In some cases it can be quite rigid and class based, such as with the Indian caste system. In other cases, status exists without class and/or informally, as is true with some Hunter-Gatherer societies such as the Khoisan, and some Indigenous Australian societies. In these cases, status is limited to specific personal relationships. For example, a Khoisan man is expected to take his wife's mother quite seriously (a non-joking relationship), although the mother-in-law has no special "status" over anyone except her son-in-law--and only then in specific contexts. All societies have a form of social status.
Status is an important idea in social stratification. Max Weber distinguishes status from social class, though some contemporary empirical sociologists add the two ideas to create Socioeconomic status or SES, usually operationalised as a simple index of income, education and occupational prestige.
Income and statusStatus inconsistency is a situation when an individual's social positions have both positive and negative influences on their social status. For example, a teacher has a positive societal image (respect, prestige) which increases his status but may earn little money, which simultaneously decreases his status. In contrast, a drug dealer, may have low social position though have a high income. However, a drug dealer may have high status within his or her own reference group (e.g., inner city gangs) and may be indifferent to his "low status" within the larger society. For example, a wealthy drug dealer who flaunts the proceeds of his trade may have the highest social status on the "street." Thus, "status inconsistency" applies to situations where members of the in-group judge the status of members of an out-group and may not apply to cases of status attainment on all criteria within an in-group. Economic status occurs when one’s position in the stratification structure is based on their economic status in the world. This is based on income, education, and occupation. Also you must take into consideration inherited wealth, savings, occupational benefits, and ownerships of homes or vehicles.
Inborn & acquired statusStatuses based on inborn characteristics, such as gender, are called ascribed statuses, while statuses that individuals gained through their own efforts are called achieved statuses. Specific behaviors are associated with social stigmas which can affect status.
Ascribed Status is when one’s position is inherited through family, racially, ethnically, and religiously serve as basis for ascribed status. Monarchy is a widely-recognized use of this method, to keep the rulers in one family. This usually occurs at birth without any reference as to how that person may turn out to be a good or bad leader.
Social Mobility and Social StatusStatus can be changed through a process of Social Mobility. Social mobility is change of position within the stratification system. A move in status can be upward (upward mobility), or downward (downward mobility). Social mobility allows a person to move to another social status other than the one he or she was born in. Social mobility is more frequent in societies where achievement rather than ascription is the primary basis for social status.
Social mobility is especially prominent in the United States in recent years with an ever-increasing number of women entering into the workplace as well as a steady increase in the number of full-time college students. This increased education as well as the massive increase in multiple household incomes has greatly contributed to the rise in social mobility obtained by so many today. With this upward mobility; however, comes the philosophy of "Keeping up with the Joneses" that so many Americans obtain. Although this sounds good on the surface, it actually poses a problem because millions of Americans are in credit card debt due to conspicuous consumption and purchasing goods that they do not have the money to pay for.
Social StratificationSocial stratification describes the way in which people are placed with society. It is associated with the ability of individuals to live up to some set of ideals or principles regarded as important by the society or some social group within it. The members of a social group interact mainly within their own group and to a lesser degree with those of higher or lower status.
Groups:
- Wealth and Income (most common): Ties between persons with the same personal income
- Gender: Ties between persons of the same sex and sexuality
- Political Status: Ties between persons of the same political views/status
- Religion: Ties between persons of the same religion
- Ethnicity/Race: Ties between persons of the same ethnic/racial group
- Social Class: Ties between persons born into the same group
Max Weber's Three Dimensions of StratificationThe German sociologist Max Weber developed a theory proposing that stratification is based on three factors that have become known as “the three p’s of stratification”: property, prestige and power. He claimed that social stratification is a result of the interaction of wealth, prestige and power.
- Property refers to one’s material possessions and their life chances. If someone has control of property, that person has power over others and can use the property to his or her own benefit.
- Prestige is also a significant factor in determining one’s place in the stratification system. The ownership of property is not always going to assure power, but there are frequently people with prestige and little property.
- Power is the ability to get people to do what one wants, without having much property. This refers to two different types of power, which are possession of power and exercising power. For example, some people in charge of the government have an immense amount of power, and yet they do not make much money.
Max Weber developed various ways that societies are organized in hierarchical systems of power. These ways are social status, class power and political power.
- Social Status: If you view someone as a social superior, that person will have power over you because you believe that person has a higher status than you do.
- Class Power: This refers to unequal access to resources. If you have access to something that someone else needs, that can make you more powerful than the person in need. The person with the resource thus has bargaining power over the other.
- Political Power: Political power can influence the hierarchial system of power because those that can influence what laws are passed and how they are applied can exercise power over others.
Status Group
Max Weber also developed the idea of status groups. Status groups are communities that are based on ideas of proper lifestyles and the honor given to people by others. These groups only exist because of people's ideas of prestige or dishonor. Also, people in these communities are only supposed to associate with people of like status, and all other people are looked at as inferiors.
Social networks and the measure of statusCentrality measures such as betweenness can be used to measure the status of an actor in a social network based on his or her position in this social structure.
American sociologist Joel M. Podolny for example defines the status of an actor in a market as the centrality of this actor.
See also
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