Seminar five: Life in the city

Overview:

This seminar looks at the processes of urbanisation, its expansion and its greater social affects. We will consider the juxtaposition of these different affects – accumulation of wealth, abject poverty, extensive renewal and urban decay. Let us first  look at the historical the processes that lead to this extensive expansion in urbanism.

Essay plans

By next week I will be giving back the plans with some feedback, so for those of you who haven’t given in your essay plans, please send them in through by email, as soon as possible — modernsocieties@gmail.com

The objective of the essay plan is to get you started thinking and preparing for your first essay.

What Is McDonaldization?

Overview

McDonaldization is the term invented by George Ritzer to describe a sociological phenomenom that is happening in our society. You may think it started with Ray Kroc in the 1950’s when he bought his first hamburger restaurant, but it’s origins were actually much earlier than that. In fact, Henry Ford was the first McDonaldization pioneer with his vision of an assembly line for improving the production of automobiles. His revolutionary idea dramatically changed how many automobiles could be produced and was very efficient.

Social Stratification

An interesting presentation on social stratification. Part one:

And part two:

Seminar four: Industrial Society

In this seminar we will discuss the processes of industrialisation and some of its consequences. We will cover how industrialisation has impacted upon social relations – related themes, from other seminars, such as city, enlightenment and globalisation, will also be linked and touched upon.

The rise of industrial society

The processes of industrialisation has meant a change in the patterns of living and social relations. More obvious is the shift from the land and country to the factory and town. This is followed by the emergence of new class dimensions, such as the industrial working classes and later on the centralisation of new functions for the state.

Seminar Three: The Enlightenment – The making of the modern world

Overview

Let us start by contextualising the historic period of the enlightenment:

… It is broadly co-extensive with the eighteenth century, beginning with the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the writings of Locke and Bayle, and ending with either the Declaration of Independence of 1776 or the French Revolution of 1789 or the defeat of postrevolutionary France in 1815 and the romantic reaction.

This period saw major shifts and upheavals, termed as the ‘Age of Reason’, age old traditional structures were questioned in the spirit reason and rationality. The motto Kant coined was ‘dare to know’:

Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity. Immaturity is the inability to use one’s understanding without guidance from another. This immaturity is self-imposed when its cause lies not in lack of understanding, but in lack of resolve and courage to use it without guidance from another. Sapere Aude! [dare to know] “Have courage to use your own understanding!”–that is the motto of enlightenment.