Stratification

Stratification

 

Gender inequality is evident in society. Whether it is in the workforce or everyday interactions between people.  In society, men are often given more power and therefore are able to attain higher paying jobs and positions in the workforce. They also tend to have more positions in the government. On the contrary, women are often faced with the “glass ceiling” that prevents them from reaching the top and their full potential. As we discussed in class, women are often not hired because they are viewed and expected to be nurturing, compassionate, and have children. As a result, they are often the ones who have to take days off of work due to their children and men are given a higher income because they are expected to be the head of the household and support their families. Of course there is the occasional exception. For example, Professor Weffer is usually the one to take off days rather than his wife. That being said, there are people out there in the world fighting for gender equality. There are feminists. Feminism is the “support of social equality for women and men, and opposition to patriarchy and sexism ( www.uah.edu   ).” There are three types of feminism. There is liberal feminism, socialist feminism, and radical feminism. All three types advocate a women’s right control over their reproduction and seek to eliminate the violence women experience. A liberal feminist wants both sexes in a society to have equal opportunity. A social feminist believes that by replacing capitalism with socialism gender equality will come about. A radical feminist wants to get rid of the concept of gender and create a gender-free society an egalitarian. All in all, all of the types are seeking equality in some shape, way, or form.

  Social stratification is also evident in society. People with the most wealth and income have more power than the rest of society. The type of social class one is categorized in establishes what kind of role one may have in society. There are various types of social classes that people can belong to. They can belong to the upper class, which is made up of old money and new money. People who have had money from ancestry such as the Rockefellers are considered old money while athletes are considered new money. Middle class and lower classes are also categories in which people can be placed in. Unfortunately, the elite is made up of the least amount of people, but they have the most power. One way in which a person can move up a social class is education and a way in which people can move down a social class would be divorce.

Overall, there is a lot of stratification in society that influence a person’s way of living. It may impact them positively or negatively. A way in which change can be made would be through social movements. Social movements are the basis of the United States, the Boston Tea Party. These movements are what caused the Civil Rights Movement and the Feminist movement. They are and will continue to be important to society.

 

Source:

 http://www.uah.edu/woolf/feminism_kinds.htm