Sociological Literature Research Articles

RELIGIOUS LIFE IN CHINUA ACHEBE’S NOVEL THINGS FALL APART

This research is aimed at reflecting how Chinua Achebe reveals the religious life of Igbo people before and after the coming of the missionaries as well as the invasion of British in the southeastern part of Nigeria during the late 19th century. Achebe reflects that various practices of social and religious life are thrilling, cruel and even inhumane. This research is considered significant and worthy since it is an exertion to understand historical knowledge and life lessons about religious life of the local people. This study is supported by the theory of literary sociology proposed by Laurenseon and Swingewood's to understand and evaluate literary works by considering social aspects and holistically conducted by descriptive qualitative method in which the data from the novel are analyzed to reveal the religious life of Igbo people before and after the coming of British people and the significant contributions as well as changes they have brought. The findings of this research designates that various inhumane religious and cultural practices, such as abandoning or throwing twins born into the evil forest, throwing people dying with diseases, mutilating babies who die at birth and considering ogbanje, not burying people who die by suicide, surely no longer happen in Igbo society. In short, the changes in religious life carried out by white people bring enlightenment and positive life changes for Igbo people.

Research priorities in the domain of disability - correlation between health and social characteristics. A Polish example.

In each society there functions a group of the disabled who need assistance. The number and character of dysfunctional consequences determine the types of support, characteristics of health, medical and social problems, where a part of them are interdependent. The interdependence of these needs determine the consistency of rehabilitation actions, which result in the improvement of quality of life of disabled persons in their living environment, especially among rural inhabitants. The scientific medical, and sociological literature, as well as binding legal Acts from 1978-2021 were reviewed. Materials from Polish and English databases were analysed. Key words related to disability, its definition, models of disability, disability discrimination, inequalities in medical and social care, health and social needs, maps of needs, satisfaction with medical and social care, and quality of life were used. Despite the fact that disability is a medical-social phenomenon, many reports concern only the treatment of the consequences of diseases, injuries, genetic/congenital or environmental defects. Disability is frequently identified with disease, which is inappropriate. Many researchers dealing with disability focus - quite rightly - on studies concerning social consequences, because they decide about the level of functioning of these persons in society and level of participation. Disability is not only a medical and social problem. Treatment does not end the essence of disability. Only interdisciplinary studies can change the life of these persons regarding great possibilities for their participation.

Different Time Frames, Different Futures: How Disadvantaged Youth Project Realistic and Idealistic Futures

ABSTRACT Existing sociological literature provides conflicting theoretical accounts of disadvantaged youth’s aspirations. While structuralists and rational choice theorists contend that disadvantaged young people tend to form low aspirations in the face of limited structural opportunities, cultural sociologists maintain that disadvantaged youth construct highly aspirational imagined futures to claim their moral self-worth in the present. I argue that incorporating time frames into the study of aspirations helps resolve the tension by enabling researchers to investigate when—in what time frame—one model works better than others. I demonstrate the value of this approach using qualitative interviews with 31 eighth-grade students in China’s rural Shanxi Province, where structural constraints of socioeconomic attainment undercut cultural ideals of social mobility. In this context, findings show that respondents focused on practical constraints from their academic performance and family economic strains when projecting their short-term futures (structural/rational choice model) while they constructed future selves distinctive from rural origins in their long-term futures (cultural model). I conclude by discussing this approach’s implications for studying aspirations, expectations, and their relationships to educational and career outcomes.

"En helt annan upplevelse"

“An Entirely Different Experience”: The Audiobook’s Bond to its Readers Audiobooks have in recent years become widely popular. The format accordingly impacts how many contemporary readers use and experience literature. The article examines this tendency, departing from Rita Felski’s theoretical conceptualizations of uses of literature (Felski 2008). Felski represents a new attention within literary studies toward the ways in which so-called lay readers use, experience and form attachments (Felski 2020) to literature and art. Drawing on Felski’s work in combination with Lutz Koepnick’s concept of resonant reading (2019), we study how the medial affordances of the audiobook impact uses of literature among empirical Swedish readers. In this way, we combine the theoretical perspective introduced by Felski with an approach informed by literary sociology (Svedjedal, Murray), in order to draw attention to the importance of considering the significance of media and formats in broader discussions about uses of literature. The article is based on a survey of 1400 Swedish audiobook users, which was published during the fall of 2021, in the Facebook-group Snacka om ljudböcker. We focus on a qualitative analysis of answers to the free-text question “Why do you choose to listen to audiobooks?” Our findings demonstrate that the medial affordances of the audiobook, its mobility and the mediation of literature through sound, impact both why and how readers listen to audiobooks: Respondents report among other things that audiobooks make it possible to integrate literature into everyday life, and that, consequently, it adds value to everyday activities, while the format’s mediation though sound, and especially the voice of the performer “adds a dimension” and “deepens” the reading experience. Thus, while the existing debate often associates audiobooks with distracted or passive reading and, in Felski’s terms, with detachment from the surroundings, and from the text, our findings suggest that the format also helps readers form attachments to and through literature.

An empirical investigation of regional differences in consumption behaviors in an emerging economy

AbstractWidely regarded as one of the most dynamic economies in Southeast Asia, Vietnam has increasingly attracted scholarly interest from diverse business disciplines. However, previous marketing research on Vietnam largely treats the country as a homogenous society. We draw on the literature in sociology, geography, history and predict that significant regional differences exist in consumers' consumption behaviors between the North and South of Vietnam, bearing important implications for international marketers. Using secondary survey data collected by an international market research firm, we show that consumers in Hanoi (HN) and Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC) differ greatly in how they perceive the impact of an economic crisis, how they change their consumption behaviors as a result, and whether they will cut back on spending on themselves, their families, and children. Our results also demonstrate that HN and HCMC consumers differ in their attitude toward luxury product consumption, attitude toward advertising, and marketing versus non‐marketing controlled sources of information. Our research provides important implications for both managers and researchers interested in this fast‐growing economy.

Politics of the Poor and Political Work

Sociological literature on urban poor struggles has produced a rich and vibrant scholarship on the mobilisations of urban poor groups for state welfare and resources. These struggles for basic services and resources essential to survival have been studied as ‘everyday politics’, the ‘politics of life’ and more broadly as ‘the politics of the poor’ or ‘politics of the governed’. Recent ethnographic research has revealed how these engagements are lived and experienced as ‘political work’ and not just as struggles or mobilisations. This discussion piece examines ‘political work’ detailing why these engagements are ‘political’ and why poor women reclaim their engagements with the State as ‘work’. Reviewing the literature on urban poor politics, citizenship and everyday politics, this piece examines how ‘political work’ reveals new forms of gendered work that reinforce the social reproductive roles of women even as women enter the public realm.

It’s a diagnosis for the rich: disability, advocacy and the micro-practices of social reproduction

A considerable body of sociological literature has examined the role that education plays in the ongoing reproduction of class-based inequalities. However, there is a relative lack of research that has focused on the reproduction of inequalities linked to the combined influences of disability and social class. Based on a qualitative study of 19 Australian families, this article examines how the strategies that mothers adopt to advocate for their dyslexic children are shaped by social class. We argue that the expectation by schools that mothers will advocate for their child reproduces inequality because advocacy hinges on mothers having access to specialised cultural capital and considerable financial capital. Our findings also indicate that there is a reliance on mothers to advocate for their child in order to get support. We argue that this reliance on advocacy shifts responsibility for inclusion from the state to mothers, further reproducing a system that is exclusionary of students with disabilities.

Managing the end of life in COVID patients. The role of palliative care in emergency departments during the pandemic.

Managing COVID-19 patients has been an extremely difficult and dramatic task, especially for emergency departments during the strongest waves of the pandemic in Italy. Medical staff and health professionals were redeployed from their work setting to COVID units; many were overwhelmed by the deaths of so many patients in a very short time. This work aimed to explore palliative care health professionals' and physicians' perceptions of end-of-life care management in COVID units during the first two waves of the pandemic in Italy. Qualitative data was collected through 24 semi-structured in-depth interviews. The participants were palliative care medical and health professionals redeployed, or in a supporting role, COVID units from the most affected areas of northern and central Italy. The interview questions were focused on four thematic areas concerning different aspects of the role and responsibilities of the palliative care specialist (physician and healthcare professional). A brief presentation of the main sociological literature on end-of-life management in hospital contexts will be firstly presented and discussed to offer a theoretical frame. Subsequently, some of the most significant results that emerged from our research will be illustrated concerning the role played by palliative care professionals during the pandemic and the relevance of the palliative care approach in emergency contexts.

The Substance of Style: How Social Class-Based Styles of Interpersonal Interaction Shape Hiring Assessments at Large Technology Companies

Individuals' social class background shapes their life experiences and outcomes, including their familial upbringing and educational attainment. However, we know little about how social class background influences the hiring practices of professional settings, and specifically, the ways in which evaluators conceptualize a potential link between social class background and hiring. Through interviewing 50 evaluators at large technology companies, we find that only 19 of them discussed how social class background affects applicants' access to resources, and none articulated the ties between social class background and preferred interpersonal interactional styles. This is particularly troubling because all evaluators described assessing the key hiring criteria of "innovation potential" based on whether applicants display what we term a "transboundary interactional style." This style involves demonstrating an ease with articulating cross-disciplinary ideas as well as facilitating back-and-forth scholarly conversations and debates. While evaluators characterized this style as stemming from applicants' individual personalities, we draw on past sociological literature to suggest that this style is also cultivated in upper-middle-class environments. Given technology companies' expressed desire to hire a diverse workforce by minimizing biases in evaluators' assessments, we conclude with ideas for evaluators to develop more equitable hiring practices.

La representación social de los migrantes durante la pandemia de Covid-19. Un estudio de caso italiano sobre narrativas hostiles y comunicación política visual

The present research investigates the social categorisation and construction of immigrants in Italy during the Covid-19 pandemic. For this purpose, hostile political narratives deployed on Twitter by three monitored Italian political forces (Matteo Salvini - La Lega party -Giorgia Meloni - Fratelli d’Italia - and the neofascist movement Casa Pound) and their visual representation of migration and migrants were analysed. Following a defined theoretical framework on the phenomena of othering, moral panic, processes of social exclusion and the role the “new” digital media play in such processes - especially in terms of negative and emotional political communication - the analysis deconstructs and identifies the founding elements of the political narratives on migrants, focusing on their visual component. The review of the sociological literature on the construction and representation of diversity and otherness introduces the empirical case study of the digital and visual communication monitoring performed from March 2020 to December 2021. Through the qualitative analysis of the visual content retrieved from the tweets collected, recurrent themes and communication strategies were investigated, determining the identification of four macro-categories upon which the construction and representation of immigrants and migration was carried out in the chosen context.

Systematization of family education traditions: A socio-pedagogical classifier

Introduction. Based on an interdisciplinary analysis, the authors have found a contradiction between a wide range of approaches which describe the essence and mechanisms of family education, and the lack of a universal tool which allows to identify, analyze, compare, classify, rank, describe, reveal the essence and specifics of various traditions, which are the bases for the inheritance of culture and transfer of experience from generation to generation. The problem of the article is the lack of tools to systematize and generalize family education traditions. The purpose of the research is to substantiate the approach to investigating traditions of family education and to develop a method that allows to systematize the traditions of family education in their significance, diversity, variability, and transformability. Materials and Methods. Based on a systematic analysis of philosophical, cultural, ethnographic, sociological, psychological, educational, and linguistic literature (n =70, including 35 international studies), the following ten methodological approaches were identified: axiological, hermeneutic, integrative, cognitive, cultural-historical, cultural, ontological, psychosocial, synergetic, and existential. By systematizing them, the main dominants in the study of family education traditions are determined. The typology of these approaches enabled the authors to determine the basis for classifying the traditions of family education. Results. The authors revealed the essential characteristics of family education traditions, identified their basic core based on the national culture values. In order to structure the diversity of family education traditions, the authors used the classification method and developed a research tool - a socio-pedagogical classifier of family education traditions. The tool classifies various traditions according to the following 16 bases: 1) mechanisms of origin; 2) causes of appearance; 3) ways of occurrence; 4) scale; 5) historical heritage; 6) sustainability; 7) the nature of the changes; 8) family functions; 9) methods of inheritance (transfer); 10) forms and methods of fixation; 11) orientation of educational influence; 12) the main purpose; 13) the content of the interaction between family members; 14) style of family education; 15) value-semantic guidelines; 16) goals, objectives, content of moral education of the younger generation. Conclusions. The interdisciplinary approach made it possible to determine the dominants of the identified approaches to the study of family education traditions. Diversity, variability and transformability of family education traditions are taken into account by the authors when developing a research method - a socio-pedagogical classifier. This tool serves as a basis for developing a model methodology for studying the transformation of family education traditions.

Values of local wisdom in Dayak Kanayatn’s folktale: A sociology study of literature

This study aimed at revealing the values of local wisdom contained in 16 pieces of Dayak Kanayatn folklore. Based on the theory of folklore, local values, and sociology of literature this study employed a qualitative descriptive method and a sociological approach to literary works. The results of the analysis and interpretation showed that the local wisdom values contained in the Kanayatn Dayak folklore include: (1) local wisdom values that reflect the human relationship with God such as believing in the existence of Jubata (God) and always being grateful; (2) wisdom values that reflect human to human relations including values of solidarity, obedience to customs and traditions, deliberation and cooperation, respect for guests, respect for gender equality, respect for parents, love for family, and upholding friendship; and (3) the value of local wisdom that reflects the relationship between humans and nature, including respect for nature/forest; believing in signs of nature; depending on nature; and believing in supernatural things. Keywords: values, local wisdom, folktales, Dayak Kanayatn

Unmet expectations? The impact of the Coronavirus crisis on radical right populism in North-Western and Southern Europe

ABSTRACT This article investigates the state of health of the populist radical right in North-Western and Southern European democracies after the outbreak of the pandemic. The research question is whether the Coronavirus crisis represents an enemy or an ally of populist radical right (PRR) parties in these European regions. The thesis put forward is that a priori, based on the copious literature of political sociology and political science on populism, there are four interrelated compelling reasons to argue that PRR parties can benefit from the pandemic. However, I show how the polls and the national elections held during the pandemic suggest the opposite, namely that populist radical right forces have overall found in the Coronavirus crisis a little more an enemy than an ally. Finally, I suggest four remarks on why we are facing this unexpected outcome.

Observing the Outpatient-Waiting Experience in a Day Hospital Setting: Qualitative Exploration

The space-time design of hospital care services is still an underdeveloped topic in sociological and medical literature. The article explores the social affordances inscribed in the space-time design of a hospital outpatient waiting room in relation to people care engagement and emotional comfort. The aim is to extend considerations to the broader context of relational and person-centered care. Observations employed of participants in the field study have a two-fold focus. One is ‘waiting’ for a service or a person, and the other is ‘expecting’ something or someone from a service. ‘Multisensory-scape’ and ‘Self-less subject’ are two metaphors I have adopted to describe the in field patient waiting experience. In the first case, people’s perception of hospital staff seeing and hearing them is central to observation in the care path. The second case is instead the result of people feeling a loss of identity when there is a time-mismatch between daily life routines and hospital organization rules. It is fundamental to consider the impact on people’s waiting experience because citizens and patients trace their feelings of ‘being taken into charge’ and ‘continuity of care’ back to the emotional comfort experienced the first moment they accessed the space-time design of hospital services.

Eyes on the Prize: Toward a Reimagining of the Role of Awards in African Studies

AbstractPhillips and Cheney preface an analysis of the ASA’s Graduate Student Paper Prize in a discussion with past Prize winners with a review of the sociological literature on awards and scholarly critiques of the history of African Studies. They find that the Prize has played an important role in amplifying and recognizing the voices of young scholars who have pushed the thematic and theoretical boundaries of the field. But these contributions are attended by limitations that the ASA should remediate as they consider the GSP Prize in relation to efforts to realize anti-colonial and social justice-oriented approaches to knowledge production.

The Values of Character Education in the Origin of Lampung Folklore: A Study of Literary Sociology

This study seeks to identify and describe the character education contained in the story of Origins of Lampung. By utilizing the Lampung Origin Story as a source of research data, a qualitative descriptive methodology was used. Data analysis was carried out using content analysis techniques. Based on the analysis of the Lampung Origin story, six values of character education have been identified. Tolerance, independence, curiosity, friendly or communicative, social care, and responsibility are the values of character education. These values are the basis for the idea that folklore is not only used to introduce stories that were believed by the ancestors, but also can be used as a means of character education.

Responsibility in Medical Sociology: A Second, Reflexive Look.

Personal responsibility has emerged as an important element in many countries’ public health planning, and has attracted substantial debate in public health discourse. Contemporary medical sociology typically resists such “responsibilization” as victim-blaming, by privileged elites, that obscures important structural factors and inequities. This paper, based primarily on a broad review of how contemporary Anglophone medical sociology literatures treat responsibility and blame, points out advantages of taking responsibility seriously, particularly from the individual’s perspective. These advantages include: empowerment; responsibility-as-coping-mechanism; moral dignity; and the pragmatic logic of doing for oneself, rather than passively awaiting societal reforms. We also offer possible reasons why sociologists and their subjects view these issues so differently, and suggest some areas for future research.

Gerontology in Socıology Lıterature: A Bıblıometrıc Analysıs of Graduate Thesıs Wrıtten in Turkey

Bu çalışmada, sosyoloji yazınında yaşlanmayla ilgili yapılmış olan lisansüstü araştırmaların bibliyometrik analiz yöntemiyle incelenmesi amaçlanmaktadır. Çalışma, sosyoloji lisansüstü yazınında gerontolojiyle ilgili yapılan ilk bibliyometrik analiz olma özelliğini taşımaktadır. Toplumsal yaşlanmayla beraber, sosyoloji alanında gerontolojik çalışmaların ve yaşlılığın toplumsal yörüngeleriyle ilgili yapılan gözlemlerin arttığı görülmektedir. Yaşlılığın, yaşanılan toplumsal özelliklere göre şekillendiği yargısı, diğer yaşlılık çalışmalarına göre (geriatrik, kronolojik, biyolojik, fiziksel yaşlılık) nispeten yeni bir bakış açısı oluşturmaktadır. Yapılan analizlerde de kısa zamanda sosyoloji yazınında yaşlılığa karşı ilginin arttığı görülmüştür. Bu bağlamda çalışmada sosyoloji lisansüstü yazınındaki gerontolojik araştırmalar; konusu, araştırma türü, yapıldığı yıl ve araştırmalarda yararlanılan teori türü dağılımlarına göre analiz edilmiştir. Ulusal Tez Merkezinde kayıtlı ve izin verilen Mart 2022 yılına kadar sosyoloji lisansüstü yazınında gerontoloji ile ilgili araştırmalar incelenmiştir. Yapılan araştırmalar sonucunda 42 yüksek lisans tezi, 9 doktora tezi tespit edilmiştir. Bu araştırmalarda daha çok toplumsal değişme nedeniyle yaşlının statüsünde meydana gelen farklılaşma, yaşlı bakımı, huzurevi ve yaşlılık sorunları çalışmalarının ele alındığı görülmüştür. Araştırmaların büyük bir çoğunluğu nitel yöntemlerden yarı yapılandırılmış görüşme tekniği ile gerçekleştirilmiştir. Çalışmanın sonunda elde edilen bulgular ve yapılan değerlendirmelerle ileride yapılması muhtemel çalışmalar için birtakım önerilerde bulunulmuştur.

PERKEMBANGAN MARGA SOLIN KE TANAH ALAS : KAJIAN SOSIOLOGI SASTRA

This article is entitled Development of the Solin Clan to Tanah Alas: A Study of Literary Sociology. Problem in this study are the intrinsic elements of the development of the Solin clan to the land of Alas, the values ​​of sociology of literature contained in the development of the Solin clan to Tanah Alas and its views the community towards the development of the Solin clan to Tanah Alas. The Development of the Solin Ke . Clan Tanah Alas is a form of story owned by the Pakpak Batak community, which precisely located in Mahala Village, Tinada District, Pakpak Bharat Regency. As for the purpose of the article The following describes the sociological literary values ​​of the development of the Solin Ke Tanah clan: pedestal. The arrangement of stories and events that occur in the folklore of the development of the Solin clan Ketanah Alas is structured and translated into a story and explores cultural values inside it. The method used to analyze the research problem is the method descriptive with field research techniques. This study uses the theory of sociology of literature. Results research from this article found the sociological values ​​in the story of the development of clans Solin Ke Tanah Alas, namely the Kinship System, Responsibility, Please Help, Compassion, Opposition, Religion/Belief, Health, Knowledge System, Livelihood System, and Art. And have a public view of the development of the Solin clan to Tanah Alas is a folk tale that is relevant to the people of Mahala Village in terms of patterns community life in the past. Based on the results of the study, it was concluded that According to the local community, their ancestors believed in the miracles found in The Puak Pakpak tribe, but this Mahala village community no longer believes in this with the reason that religion has emerged into the Batak community so that it forgets belief to the living things around them

LEGENDA LIANG SIPEGE DI DESA SIMARMAR PEATALUN HUTAGAOL KECAMATAN BALIGE KABUPATEN TOBA : KAJIAN SOSIOLOGI SASTRA

This article discusses the Legend of Liang Sipege. The problem in this research is the Intrinsic Element The Legend of Liang Sipege, The Sociological Values ​​of Literature contained in the Legend of Liang Sipege and Community Views on the Legend of Liang Sipege. The legend of Liang Sipege is one form of story that belongs to the Toba Batak community, which is precisely located in the village of Simarmar Peatalun Hutagaol, Balige District, Toba Regency. This research aims to knowing the structure of the story and knowing the Sociological Values ​​of Liang Sipege's Literary Legend. The arrangement of stories and events that occur in the Legend of Liang Sipege story is structured and organized translate it into a story and explore the cultural values ​​in it. The method used used to analyze this research problem is the qualitative method with the field. This study uses structural theory and the theory of the Sociology of Literature. The intrinsic elements in this story include: theme, plot or plot, background or setting, and character or characterization