bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Cloud Properties Observed From the Surface and by Satellite at the Northern Edge of the Southern Ocean
Authors: Alexander S. P. , Protat A.
Published: December 2017

A Raman depolarization lidar was deployed at Cape Grim, Australia (40.7°S, 144.7°E), at the northern edge of the Southern Ocean from July 2013 to February 2014 from which we determine cloud boundaries, cloud phase, ice virga, and cloud effective top heights. We compare surface‐based lidar with results from the raDAR/liDAR (DARDAR) data set within 1,000 km of Cape Grim. DARDAR combines information from the CloudSat and Cloud‐Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) instruments. We extract single‐layer clouds that are sufficiently thin for signal to be present on the farside of the cloud and which have a liquid cloud top phase. These conditions maximize the likelihood that both surface‐based lidar and DARDAR are observing the full vertical extent of the same clouds. Differences in low‐level cloud occurrence frequencies for these single‐layer clouds reveal that DARDAR underestimates cloud at 0.2–1.0 km altitude by a factor of 3 compared with the surface‐based lidar. When multiple cloud decks are present, the underestimate in this altitude region is around 2.5 times. Heterogeneous glaciation observed by the Cape Grim lidar in midlevel stratiform supercooled water clouds is similar to that reported by previous surface‐based observations adjacent to the Southern Ocean, with half of these clouds precipitating ice at cloud top temperatures of −20°C. This transition occurs around −15°C in the DARDAR data set, and this difference is likely due to the reduced sensitivity of surface‐based lidar in detecting precipitating ice compared with what a surface‐based radar could observe.
Physical Interpretation of Mixing Diagrams
Authors: Khain Alexander , Pinsky Mark , Magaritz‐Ronen L.
Published: December 2017

Type of mixing at cloud edges is often determined by means of mixing diagrams showing the dependence of normalized cube of the mean volume radius on the dilution level. The mixing diagrams correspond to the final equilibrium state of mixing between two air volumes. While interpreting in situ measurements, scattering diagrams are plotted in which normalized droplet concentration is used instead of dilution level. Utilization of such scattering diagrams for interpretation of in situ observations faces significant difficulties and often leads to misinterpretation of the mixing process and to uncertain conclusions concerning the mixing type. In this study we analyze the scattering diagrams obtained by means of a Lagrangian‐Eulerian model of a stratocumulus cloud. The model consists of 2,000 interacting Largangian parcels which mix with their neighbors during their motion in the atmospheric boundary layer. In the diagram, each parcel is denoted by a point. Changes of microphysical parameters of the parcel are represented by movements of the point in the scattering diagram. The method of plotting the scattering diagrams using the model is in many aspects similar to that used in in situ measurements. It is shown that a scattering diagram shows snapshots of a transient mixing process. The location of points in the scattering diagrams reflects largely the history and the origin of air parcels. Location of points on scattering diagram characterizes intensity of entrainment, and different parameters of droplet size distributions (DSDs) like concentration, mean volume (or effective) radius, and DSD width.
One‐Dimensional Convective Thermal Evolution Calculation Using a Modified Mixing Length Theory: Application to Saturnian Icy Satellites
Authors: Kamata Shunichi
Published: December 2017

Solid‐state thermal convection plays a major role in the thermal evolution of solid planetary bodies. Solving the equation system for thermal evolution considering convection requires 2‐D or 3‐D modeling, resulting in large calculation costs. A 1‐D calculation scheme based on mixing length theory (MLT) requires a much lower calculation cost and is suitable for parameter studies. A major concern for the MLT scheme is its accuracy due to a lack of detailed comparisons with higher dimensional schemes. In this study, I quantify its accuracy via comparisons of thermal profiles obtained by 1‐D MLT and 3‐D numerical schemes. To improve the accuracy, I propose a new definition of the mixing length (l), which is a parameter controlling the efficiency of heat transportation due to convection, for a bottom‐heated convective layer. Adopting this new definition of l, I investigate the thermal evolution of Saturnian icy satellites, Dione and Enceladus, under a wide variety of parameter conditions. Calculation results indicate that each satellite requires several tens of GW of heat to possess a thick global subsurface ocean suggested from geophysical analyses. Dynamical tides may be able to account for such an amount of heat, though the reference viscosity of Dione's ice and the ammonia content of Dione's ocean need to be very high. Otherwise, a thick global ocean in Dione cannot be maintained, implying that its shell is not in a minimum stress state.
Strengthening Hydrological Regulation of China's Wetland Greenness Under a Warmer Climate
Authors: Wei Da , Zhang Xiaoke , Wang Xiaodan
Published: December 2017

Natural wetlands are permanently or seasonally inundated with water, and the growth of vegetation in these wetlands is assumed to be sensitive to a warming climate. China's natural wetlands are mostly found in cold, high‐latitude (>40°N in NE China) and high‐altitude (>4,000 m in average on the Tibetan Plateau (TP)) areas. Rapid warming of regional climate (>0.30°C decade−1 since the 1960s) is thought to have promoted the growth of vegetation in these cold wetlands. However, using three independent greenness data sets, we show that the wetlands in the TP and NE China experienced significant browning between 1999 and 2007, rather than a straightforward increase in greening. The interannual variation in wetland greenness on the TP was regulated by both the temperature and the amount of solar radiation. In NE China, however, the effect of temperature and solar radiation was unable to explain the temporal variation in greenness and the changes were mostly regulated by the soil moisture content and drought. There was a decrease in the dependence of vegetation growth on temperature in NE China, but no significant change on the TP, which has experienced a warmer and wetter climate in recent decades. The effect of drought and the soil moisture content on the interannual variation in the greenness of wetlands consistently increased across the TP and NE China. Our results highlight the hydrological regulation of the growth of vegetation in a warmer climate, even in wetland environments.
Genetic Disorders of Human Infertility
Authors: Vogt Peter H
Published: December 2017

Diagnostic identification of human genetic disorders causing male or female infertility is of paramount interest in each infertility clinic dealing with the term ‘idiopathic infertility’, which means ‘no reason found for observed infertility pathology’. In such cases, if there is a genetic disorder behind (in about 30%), there is usually a high risk of transfer of this genetic lesion to the offspring by the applied fertilisation protocol. Such genetic‐based infertility disorders can be unbalanced chromosome aberrations including aneuploidies and/or specific gene mutations, respectively. As comparative genomic hybridisation (CGH) and next‐generation sequencing (NGS) tools have now shown that the normal human genome can have a highly variable sequence composition, thus also in men and women with normal fertility, it has become a major challenge for the clinicians to then identify only those genome/gene mutations which may indeed cause the observed infertility pathology.

Key Concepts

Genetic disorders can cause about 30% male and female infertility.

Analysis of chromosome aberrations (aneuploidies) is mandatory before ART application in ‘idiopathic’ male and female infertility.

Artificial insemination protocols such as ICSI can increase genetic disorders causing infertility in offspring.

Genes causing male or female infertility can have pleiotropic somatic genetic disorders such as cystic fibrosis.

Genes on the Y chromosome causing male infertility (AZF genes) are inherited by ICSI to male offsprings with 100%.
A
dorno,
T
heodor
Authors: Garlitz Dustin
Published: December 2017

Theodor W. Adorno was a German philosopher, sociologist, and musicologist and one of the leading progenitors of critical theory at the Frankfurt School, or Institute for Social Research. This encyclopedia entry discusses Adorno's notable works, including
Dialectic of Enlightenment
(co‐authored with Max Horkheimer),
Negative Dialectics
,
Aesthetic Theory
,
The Jargon of Authenticity
, the co‐authored
The Authoritarian Personality
,
Minima Moralia
,
Philosophy of New Music,
as well as other works that spanned social theory, continental philosophy, and musicology. Attention is also given to Adorno's intellectual development and scholarly influences.
AIDS, Sociology of
Authors: Govender Kaymarlin , Poku Nana
Published: December 2017

The entry offers a symbolic analysis of the social construction and signification of HIV/AIDS as one of the major pandemics in modern history. Central to this constructionist (and postmodern) analysis, we assert that sociological theorizing has contributed to some central insights regarding the discursive formations used by the public health paradigm for the surveillance of bodies and governmentality of the epidemic. Key symbols that have dominated the AIDS landscape include the gay plague, risk behaviors and social vulnerability, AIDS denialism and treatment activism, and the eminence of the biomedical response. We conclude this commentary by arguing for AIDS as a condition of the postmodern body, associated with late capitalism, and assert for “the legitimation” of localized responses to the condition.
Axial Age
Authors: Torpey John
Published: December 2017

This entry addresses the recent discussion of the axial age among social theorists. It argues that the idea of the “axial age,” as conceived by Karl Jaspers, was an attempt to create an idea of humanity as “unity in diversity” in the aftermath of the “German catastrophe.” In contrast to Jaspers's understanding of the axial age, which stressed the commonalities in the responses of different world civilizations to the challenges of the middle centuries of the first millennium
BCE
, Weber's approach emphasized the divergent stances of Confucianism and Taoism, Hinduism, and Buddhism, and the Abrahamic religions and the consequences of their differences for the trajectory of world history.
B
ataille,
G
eorges
Authors: Possamai Adam
Published: December 2017

Bataille was a French intellectual who was active in various twentieth‐century leftist social and political circles and wrote on philosophy, literature, sociology, and his own fictions. His theory on religion includes the process of transgression which can lead to the sacred. He also theorized mysticism without God in which ecstasy refers to the experience of emptiness.
B
oas,
F
ranz
Authors: Bauer J. Edgar
Published: December 2017

Generally regarded as the founder of American anthropology, Franz Boas (1858–1942) was an advocator of cultural relativism, the understanding of cultures as “individual phenomena,” and the de‐hierarchization of races. Among his most significant publications are
The Mind of Primitive Man
(1965/1911) and
Race, Language and Culture
(1966/1940), a selection of essays and studies covering the period between 1887 and 1939. A leading expert in the culture and language of the Inuit as well as of the First Nations of the Pacific Northwest, Boas attained a commanding influence within the emerging discipline of anthropology through his numerous scholarly contributions and the network of his students and associates, including Ruth Benedict, Melville Herskovits, Zora Neale Hurston, Margaret Mead, and Edward Sapir.
Caucus of Black Sociologists
Authors: Turner Bryan S.
Published: December 2017

The Caucus of Black Sociologists was founded in 1968. It emerged in the growth of political activism in professional sociologists, especially in the 1970s in response to the war in Vietnam, but it also included the women's liberation movement. The American Sociological Association has been a conservative profession but in response to these movements it built race, gender, and various social movements into its program. The Caucus eventually evolved into the Association of Black Sociologists.
Cognitive Dissonance
Authors: Jacob Edwin Daniel
Published: December 2017

Cognitive dissonance is a psychological condition that Leon Festinger identified in 1957. It occurs when an agent holds a set of contradictory beliefs on a given situation he or she encounters. Possession of conflicting beliefs makes decisions made by the agent problematic, as an individual's actions are based on maintaining a link between beliefs and acts. Cognitive dissonance manifests itself when the link binding this connection is stretched or broken. Adapting behavior to mitigate dissonance is, thus, the only recourse to overcoming cognitive dissonance.
Compulsory Heterosexuality
Authors: Hidalgo Danielle Antoinette , Royce Tracy
Published: December 2017

The term “compulsory heterosexuality” originated with the publication of Adrienne Rich's influential lesbian feminist essay, “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence,” in 1980. Rich asserted that heterosexuality is deeply ingrained in our political institutions and everyday lives. Although heterosexuality is frequently represented as innate or freely chosen, heterosexuality is instead the result of “compulsory” social arrangements that normalize opposite‐sex relationships while erasing, marginalizing, and pathologizing same‐sex affection and sexuality. Rich also maintained that compulsory heterosexuality ensures men's domination of women.
Divorce
Authors: Poole Lisa
Published: December 2017

Divorce is the legal declaration of the dissolution of a marriage by a court or similar legal body. Although the specific legal qualifications for divorce vary among countries, the reasons for divorce fall into two broad categories: “fault” and “no fault.” Recent changes in divorce law have made divorces easier and more affordable globally, as well as providing more equal access for men and women to divorce. Divorce is increasing globally due to cultural, social, and demographic factors, influenced by and impacting broader social change regarding the structure of the family.
Economy
Authors: Simandan Dragos
Published: December 2017

This entry discusses the ontological and epistemological status of “the economy” as well as the social theoretical critique of economics, economism, and the scarcity assumption. It then addresses the theoretical controversy surrounding the distinction between the formal economy and the informal economy. The entry concludes by highlighting the role of social theory in both the emergence of heterodox economics and the ongoing articulation of political economy approaches with poststructuralist, performative, and feminist perspectives.
G
arfinkel,
H
arold
Authors: Delaney Tim
Published: December 2017

Harold Garfinkel (1917–2011) is an American sociologist who established the field of ethnomethodology, a sociological analysis of the interactions and conversations of everyday people in their social worlds. Garfinkel proposed that people interact with one another in a taken‐for‐granted attitude of the social environment that surrounds them and, consequently, expect people to behave in specific ways in given situations. Language is an important tool that helps to shape the taken‐for‐granted world. Garfinkel conducted breaching experiments as a method to test his theories. Garfinkel also describes the role of breaching experiments as society's way to stigmatize those individuals whose behaviors violate the collective taken‐for‐granted perspective on proper behavior.
Industrialization and the Factory System
Authors: Khondker Habibul Haque
Published: December 2017

The Industrial Revolution that set up the process of industrialization was a watershed, comparable to the Neolithic revolution that incorporated both agricultural revolution and urban revolution. Industrial revolution is defined as a rapid transformation of production and transportation caused by the application of new machines that use inanimate, replacing animate, sources of energy.
Internal Colonialism
Authors: Pinderhughes Charles
Published: December 2017

This entry assesses ghettos, barrios, and reservations as USA internal colonies and explores the evolutionary history of the term internal colonialism from the Negro vernacular “nation within a nation,” to 1960s Black Power organizations' consensus on the African American internal colony, to the roots of internal colonialism in Latin American sociology prior to the development of foundational writings on USA internal colonialism by Robert Blauner, Robert L. Allen, and Mario Barrera. It concludes with an outline of a new assessment of internal colonialism by Charles Pinderhughes which, applied to African American communities, offers a conflict between the “geo‐focused” idea of each geographically separate territory as a distinct colony versus the classic conception of one single dispersed black colony (the colonial analogy).
K
insey,
A
lfred
Authors: Pastoetter Jakob
Published: December 2017

Alfred Kinsey introduced sex as a scientific field of research. He was not only a sexuality researcher but also a social pioneer. Besides publishing two major works that influence sexuality research to this day, he invented the Kinsey scale as a measure of heterosexual and homosexual behavior. He was the founder of the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction.
M
althus,
T
homas
Authors: Turner Bryan S.
Published: December 2017

Thomas Malthus (1766–1834) published his
Essay on the Principle of Population
in 1798. It quickly became a mainstay of political economy, albeit heavily criticized by both Karl Marx and J. S. Mill. Subsequently Malthus and Marx were often coupled together, despite Marx's attempts to expunge any assumptions about biology and general population in particular from his theories. Michel Foucault, who only refers to Malthus briefly in his work on security and population, treats Malthus, along with Marx and Ricardo, as the basis of nineteenth‐century political economy. With his pessimistic view of human nature, Malthus remains a controversial figure.
Monopoly Capitalism
Authors: Peden Mindy
Published: December 2017

Monopoly describes a concentration of market share where competition is limited or nonexistent. The term “monopoly capitalism” is used to describe an aspect or stage of capitalism in which monopoly control is widespread and explicit, though the ideological fiction of free markets and competition is still maintained in public discourse. V. I. Lenin observed that it was financial sector gains from colonization that drives the economics of imperialism which is in turn crucial to understanding modern warfare and politics. Financial and monopoly capitalism has involved banks, but technical control is located in stockbrokers (who control trusts) and individual large‐scale entrepreneurs (who control cartels). The identification of monopoly capitalism on a worldwide scale also led to the core–periphery model of political and economic power. While it is often thought that monopoly signals a move away from competition, it is more accurate to say that monopolies intensify cooperation among a ruling class and intensify competition between classes.
Multiculturalism
Authors: Moraga Jorge
Published: December 2017

Multiculturalism, as an ideological and institutional phenomenon, emerged in the late twentieth century in response to local and national dissatisfaction with historical systems of human exclusion. Though originally conceived as harbinger of multiple races and cultures, the term has had lasting consequences for the ways the state and, increasingly so, corporations negotiate difference based along color lines. Despite having strong US‐based origins, particularly in education curriculum reform movements, multiculturalism continues to permeate multiple Western liberal democracies on account of shifts in human migration and political economy. This entry provides an overview into the origins, development, and lasting implications of multiculturalism as social theory, political philosophy, and state policy as understood by political theorists, race and ethnicity scholars, historians, and sociologists. It concludes with an overview into the growing global implications of multiculturalism into the twenty‐first century, marked by heightened national security and global neoliberalism.
M
yrdal,
G
unnar
Authors: DiTomaso Nancy
Published: December 2017

Gunnar Myrdal was a prominent scholar and statesman, trained in economics, but whose career was influential across the social sciences. He had global influence on both research and policy. He was the recipient of many prizes and honors, including the Nobel Prize in Economics. Myrdal was one of the architects of Swedish social democracy and later was an official at the United Nations. He made significant research contributions to monetary theory, racial inequality in the United States, and on development and trade theories. His research spoke to responsibilities of governments in both rich and poor countries. Myrdal is noted for his insistence on the importance of making value assumptions explicit in research, for elaborating a theory of cumulative causation on how vicious or virtual circles affect social economic systems, and for his firm commitment to the Enlightenment belief that people can intervene to improve social welfare.
Neoliberalism
Authors: Davies William
Published: December 2017

Neoliberalism is a term which describes a broad collection of intellectual, political, and policy movements, which share the ambition to reinvent market liberalism in the changing context of twentieth‐ and twenty‐first‐century capitalism. This includes those scholars who mounted a critique of socialism and Keynesianism between the 1920s and 1940s; the development of a distinct neoliberal movement in the form of the postwar Mont Pelerin Society; and the period of applied neoliberalism that began in the 1970s. Neoliberalism differs from liberalism in important ways. Most crucially, it depends on an active state to re‐engineer society in pro‐enterprise ways. It also inculcates a new vision of the self and subjectivity, in which individuals act as entrepreneurs, constantly strategizing toward future goals.
Participatory Action Research
Authors: Payne Yasser Arafat
Published: December 2017

Participatory action research (PAR) is a community‐centered research‐activist methodological framework mostly used in the social, educational, and public health sciences. PAR's long legacy is complex and nonlinear and its use as a methodology is extremely varied. This entry examines the historical origins of PAR, provides a spectrum of PAR orientations, presents current debates and some critical reflections in the PAR literature, and considers future directions.
Professions
Authors: Jackson Keith
Published: December 2017

Professions can be understood as social entities formed by groups of people for specific purposes. Historically, professions give structure and direction in the development of all societies; the activities of their members guide the formation of institutions that serve to distinguish one society from another. One feature distinguishing professions from occupations generally is their claim to self‐regulate. As effects of globalization, such as demographic shift and technological advances, play out, the social status of professions is evolving.
S
ay,
J
ean‐
B
aptiste
Authors: Shelton Joel T.
Published: December 2017

Jean‐Baptiste Say (1767–1832) was a French political economist best known for his law of markets (Say's law) and for his theory of entrepreneurship. While John Maynard Keynes's reading of Say's law is well established, interpretations of Say's work on the relation between production and demand have proliferated in recent decades and continue to be invoked and contested in the aftermath of the Great Recession.
Scarcity
Authors: Turner Bryan S.
Published: December 2017

Scarcity as a concept is fundamental to economics where a basic assumption is that, given scarcity of basic resources to sustain life, individuals will be forced to economize by limiting demand and increasing supply. In other words, where means are in scarce supply, individuals will be forced to compete to achieve their ends. In classical economics both Thomas Malthus and David Ricardo based their economic theories on the scarcity of arable land. Contemporary politics are also based on assumption about scarcity. For example, the economic crisis of 2008 and onward was, according to post‐Keynesian economists, based on unsustainable private debt. The response has been to embrace austerity limiting government expenditure as a response to underlying scarcity. These ideas have been typically challenged by sociologists who believe that scarcity is socially produced. Whereas classical economists thought that scarcity was caused by the niggardliness of nature, sociologists believe that scarcity is created by society (with the implication that scarcity is contingent and hence we do not need to base economic policies on austerity).
Sexism
Authors: Hidalgo Danielle Antoinette , Royce Tracy
Published: December 2017

Sexism consists of biases and discriminatory practices that position one sex or gender as inferior to another. While the targets of sexism are typically women, sexism may also affect people of various genders (men, transgender individuals). Like racism, sexism is both interpersonal and institutional in nature. Despite feminists' historical and recent advances, sexism continues to permeate various aspects of contemporary culture, including language, politics and public policy, popular culture (including new media and virtual spaces), and institutions such as colleges and universities.
Sexual Citizenship
Authors: Richardson Diane
Published: December 2017

Over the past two decades sexuality has emerged as an important theme in citizenship studies leading to the development of the concept of sexual citizenship. Sexual citizenship is a multifaceted concept, understood in a variety of different ways, with some writers preferring the term “intimate citizenship.” Some analyses use the term sexual citizenship to refer to rights granted or denied to different social groups on the basis of sexuality, including but not restricted to rights of sexual expression and identity. Much of this work focuses on the rights of nonheterosexual and nongender‐normative people. A great deal of the literature, however, focuses on examining the underlying assumptions embedded in frameworks or models of citizenship and the practice of policy in order to show how, in addition to being informed by ideas about gender, class, and race, notions of citizenship are grounded in normative assumptions about sexuality.
Sick Role
Authors: Cockerham William C.
Published: December 2017

The idea of the sick role points to the fact that being sick has significant social aspects. The sick role describes the expectations of a person who is regarded as suffering from some illness. For example, it is expected that a person with health problems will seek medical advice and treatment. Once defined as sick, a person may take time off from work. Sickness is a form of deviance in the sense that everyday expectations about work and other duties may be suspended. The concept is closely associated with the medical sociology of Talcott Parsons.
Social Comparison Theory
Authors: Crosby Faye , Hamilton Veronica
Published: December 2017

Over the last 60 years, research on social comparison theory and relative deprivation theory has been complementary. We present a brief overview of relevant theory and research and hint at future directions.
Social Role Theory
Authors: Scalambrino Frank , Lowery Rebecca
Published: December 2017

Stemming from sociology and social psychology, social role theory treats the acceptable and expected norms, that is, the “roles,” of individuals in society as socially constructed. Hence, social role theory suggests behaviors associated with social roles may be altered and highlights the manner in which “traditional” social roles reflect political choices.
Sombart,Werner
Authors: Grundmann Reiner , Stehr Nico
Published: December 2017

Werner Sombart (1863–1941) was a German sociologist, economist, and founding figure of sociology. While he was a very prominent and successful scholar during his lifetime, he was largely forgotten after his death. Outside of Germany, Sombart is perhaps best known for his essayWhy Is There No Socialism in the United States?To this day, political scientists, historians, and labor specialists refer to the “Sombart question” when addressing the exceptional character of the American labor movement.
Spirituality
Authors: Obadia Lionel
Published: December 2017

At the turn of the twentieth and twenty‐first centuries, “spirituality” has taken a central place in religious studies: established as an alternative or a substitute for religion, the latter institutionalized and rooted in traditional settings, spirituality has rapidly come to represent a modern form of sacredness, centered on the individual and oriented towards emotions and experiences, rather than based on rites and aligned on norms. But the term is far from neutral: not only is it associated with a specific perspective on the history of religion; it also still carries a heavy cultural and monotheistic heritage.
Tribes
Authors: Bodley John H.
Published: December 2017

Tribes probably originated with fully modernHomo sapiensbeginning about 200,000 years ago. The tribe was the minimal social unit that could in theory be a self‐sufficient and self‐replicating, endogamous, or in‐marrying group sharing a language and territory. Marriage within a tribe was between exogamous subgroups designated as bands, clans, or moieties. Tribes are composed of autonomous subgroups with weak leaders rather than rulers, and they split when conflicts arise, rather than creating hierarchy. The rejection of political hierarchy and the related insistence on social equality is a crucial feature of tribal societies. The downside of rulerless tribal societies is the difficulty in preventing feuds. The upside is that there is no incentive for growth in scale and complexity, and this minimizes the problem of elite‐directed growth and concentrated power.
V
eblen,
T
horstein
Authors: Kemple Thomas
Published: December 2017

The influential work of US cultural sociologist and institutional economist Thorstein Veblen (1857–1929) is discussed with a focus on his classic book of 1899,
The Theory of the Leisure Class
. Veblen's thesis concerning an emerging class that pursues “invidious distinctions” through “conspicuous consumption” – the display of wealth and status symbols – is shown to anticipate later sociologies of mass culture, consumerism, fashion, and affluence. Veblen's many examples from everyday life – such as table manners, dress, sports, and higher education – illustrate the economic and cultural value of this rising unproductive class in modern societies.
Weber,Max
Authors: Kalberg Stephen
Published: December 2017

In his sweeping comparative‐historical writings, Max Weber formulated a complex sociology of civilizations. It repeatedly examined large questions: What is the fate of ethical action and compassion in the modern industrial society? How do persons in other civilizations and epochs attach meaning to their activities? In what ways can the modern West be described as unique? His three major works are investigated here from the vantage point of their overarching themes and rigorous mode of analysis. In combination they construct a singular sociology of civilizations anchored in “interpretive understanding,” an array of societal domains, and multicausal procedures.
Work, Domestic Work, Emotional Labor
Authors: Klimczuk Andrzej
Published: December 2017

The concept of work can be understood as a purposeful human activity, which is focused on the processing of natural goods, items and/or information by using tools to meet tangible and intangible needs. Work is the usage of instruments to support the existence of humankind and the social world. Domestic work refers to work of domestic help, which applies to employees, usually individuals who work and often live in the house of the employer. Emotional labor takes place in the public sphere as a social and economic exchange sold for wages during interactions with customers or coworkers. Emotional labor requires certain emotions to be displayed and expressed in line with organizational aims.
Abortion
Authors: Poston Dudley L. , Zhang Huanjun
Published: December 2017

The incidence and rate of abortion are discussed for the world and the United States for the first decade of the twenty‐first century.
A
sch,
S
olomon
Authors: McCauley Clark
Published: December 2017

Solomon Asch opposed the mechanical and behaviorist theories of human behavior that dominated psychology in his day. He invented methods of studying the complexities of social perception and social influence that are still in use today.
Dahl,Robert
Authors: Blokland Hans
Published: December 2017

Robert Allen Dahl (1915–2014) was a founder of the postwar political theory of pluralism. Pluralism and the historically related behavioralist model of science was the dominant paradigm of Anglo‐American political science between the 1940s and the 1970s. Current political science can only be properly understood in the context of the critiques of pluralism and behavioralism. During his whole life Dahl was a staunch social democrat, strongly in favor of the redistribution of income, wealth, education, and power, of welfare state provisions, and of meaningful and widespread political participation and deliberation, both in the political and economic sphere. Methodological individualism in the 1960s brought him to a relatively benign view of the status quo, which he later strongly corrected.
Division of Labor, Gender
Authors: Charles Maria , Lopez Amber
Published: December 2017

The gendered division of labor refers to the performance of different work tasks by men and women. This division has been the focus of much attention by scholars, policymakers, and feminist activists because women often reap lesser material and nonmaterial rewards for their work than do men and because gender differentiation may limit individual freedom, reinforce stereotypes, and generate powerful self‐fulfilling prophesies about gender difference. Among the most economically and socially significant divisions of labor in complex societies are those that occur within households, between households and the formal labor market, and within the labor market. While men's and women's access to paid employment equalized dramatically in most regions of the world during the twentieth century, this equalization has been accompanied by persistent gender differentiationwithinlabor markets and households. The forms of gender differentiation that are most resilient in liberal egalitarian societies tend to be those that are most readily interpreted as reflecting free choices by formally equal but naturally different men and women.
Gramsci,Antonio
Authors: Pastore Gerardo
Published: December 2017

Antonio Gramsci (Ales, Sardinia 1891–Rome 1937) was an Italian politician, Marxist theorist and an expert scholar of the political, social, and cultural life of his time. From his work, and particularly in hisQuaderni del carcere[Prison Notebooks] andLettere dal carcere[Letters from Prison], it is possible to reconstruct his original social theory. Gramsci's starting point was clearly of Marxist origin. In line with the teachings of Antonio Labriola (1843–1904) Gramscian Marxism was a critical and antidogmatic Marxism, relating to the philosophy ofPraxis. From these theoretical and practical premises, Antonio Gramsci addressed social, political, historical, and cultural issues of great importance. This included studies on the Italian Risorgimento, the condition of Italy's South, the role of intellectuals, as well as the drawing up of the concepts ofhegemony,passive revolution,historical bloc, andcivil society.
Masculinities/Men's Studies
Authors: Gerke Markus , Kimmel Michael , Leek Cliff
Published: December 2017

Men's studies, also commonly referred to as masculinity studies or critical studies of men and masculinity, is an interdisciplinary field, under the broader auspices of gender studies, which is concerned with the social, historical, cultural, and psychological construction of masculinities.
Pay Gap
Authors: Madden Janice Fanning
Published: December 2017

The 2013 gender pay gap in the United States is 21.7 percent among full‐time year‐round workers, which is greater than for most industrialized countries. Half of the gap is associated with differences in skills and experience, but a substantial portion that remains “unexplained” is potentially due to discrimination.
Public Goods
Authors: Smith Alasdair
Published: December 2017

This entry discusses the defining characteristics of public goods and explains why private markets are typically not suitable mechanisms for the supply of such goods. A fundamental problem is that the socially desirable supply of a public good depends on the sum of the demands of citizens, but citizens may have an incentive to misreport their preferences.
Urban Renewal
Authors: Esfahani Azadeh Hadizadeh
Published: December 2017

Urban renewal describes the process of intervention to transform an urban area including its physical improvement accompanied by either enhanced social, economic, or environmental opportunities. While earlier attempts for urban renewal were often led by the state, in the current dominance of neoliberalism, market‐led renewals focusing on increasing competitiveness of cities have pervaded. Today, despite calls for sustainable or participatory renewal processes in order to pay the undesired outcomes of renewal process, new forms of renewal under the neoliberal rubric have emerged, such as event‐based or culture‐led renewals, predominantly prioritized and justified by promoting economic growth.
Blog
Authors: Bruns Axel
Published: December 2017

Weblogs, or blogs, are a particular form and format for publishing a series of what are usually relatively brief articles to a website, where they are listed in reverse chronological order. Originally used mostly for publishing personal diaries, blogs were widely adopted across a range of personal and professional purposes, and arguably inspired the format of subsequent social media platforms; today, blog‐style content is ubiquitous on the Web, without the term “blog” necessarily being applied in all cases.
Carceral Society
Authors: Pastore Gerardo
Published: December 2017

The concept of
carceral society
refers to the spreading of techniques for regulating human behavior and surveillance processes typical of modern prisons throughout society as a whole. Michel Foucault made the relationship between power and surveillance his central point of observation more than any other scholar. Foucault devoted special attention to this issue in his book
Discipline and Punish
(1977). A central place in this entry must be given to Foucault's idea of the Panopticon originally conceived by Jeremy Bentham as an architectural project for the construction of an ideal prison. This form of disciplinary power, Foucault notes, even tends to become operative beyond prison walls, encouraging a pervasive culture of control in all other
total institutions
and all of society, which, in that sense, becomes a
carceral society
.
Civil Rights Movement
Authors: Kivisto Peter
Published: December 2017

The American civil rights movement succeeded in ending an era of the nation's history known as Jim Crow. This was the post‐slavery racial formation that, lasting from the late 1860s until the early 1960s, reinforced the continuing oppression and exploitation of African Americans while requiring segregation in many arenas of social life and political marginalization. Black people had become citizens of the nation in the wake of the Civil War (1860–1865) and the passage of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution (1868), but during Jim Crow they were decidedly second‐class citizens.
Discourse Analysis
Authors: Simbürger Elisabeth
Published: December 2017

Discourse analysis is commonly understood as the analysis of the interrelationships between language, power, and society. It is the study of the ways in which language in its oral, written, and visual formats is used in society and how it represents underlying social structures in society. Discourse analysis takes its theoretical origins from sociolinguistics, poststructuralism, and Marxism. It is now an interdisciplinary field of inquiry, applied to a wide range of themes.
Division of Labor
Authors: Elger Tony
Published: December 2017

The division of labor involves the distribution of work among members of a society, with distinctive combinations of work tasks and degrees of specialization. The capitalist transformation of the division of labor made it a central concern of social theorists, and Smith, Marx, and Durkheim presented contrasting analyses of its causes, character, and consequences. Many contemporary analyses emphasize the organizational and political, rather than simply market, dynamics of spatial and hierarchical divisions of labor, influenced by turbulent market relations, the organizational strategizing of managers, compliance and resistance among workers, and shifting state policies.
Focus Groups
Authors: Orozco Mel
Published: December 2017

The term “focus groups” refers to group interviews: engaged discussions that expose and explore participants' thoughts on a topic selected by the analyst. The origins of this concept hark back to the configuration of focused interviews in social research, and its adaptations for the study of markets and democratic participation. Focus groups are used across a wide range of fields and, over the years, their uses have multiplied.
Hegemony
Authors: Joseph Jonathan
Published: December 2017

The concept of hegemony dates back to Ancient Greece and China, but is most associated with realist debates in international relations and Gramsci's approach to social rule. In the realist account hegemony usually refers to the dominant state in the international system and significant debates concern whether the international system needs a hegemon. In Gramsci hegemony refers to the way that the dominant group relies on both coercion and consent. It too has been used in international relations to add a more consensual or cultural element to power politics.
H
oggart,
R
ichard
Authors: Hughson John
Published: December 2017

Richard Hoggart's book
The Uses of Literacy
(1957) pioneered the study of working‐class life and culture. Hoggart founded the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham in 1964, giving rise to a variety of research by others on such themes as youth subcultures and television soap opera. Hoggart's own intellectual style remained closer to an older English literary criticism, and his relevance to cultural studies seemed outdated by the 1970s. However, his writing, and contribution to public office, were tempered by a humanism that has come back into vogue with the declining interest in postmodernism. His scholarship is thus experiencing a renewed appreciation.
Ideal Type
Authors: Grønning Terje
Published: December 2017

An ideal type is, according to Max Weber, an analytical construct formed through the accentuation of one or several points of views and through synthesizing concrete individual phenomena. Weber proposed that such ideal types could be used as tools for further theorizing within his overall program of understanding social processes. The ideal type was thus intended as a methodological tool for revealing the underlying causes of specific social phenomena, and the aim was to link an interpretation of the various ways in which people think and act to a plausible causal explanation for these thoughts and actions. The ideal‐type approach has also met with some criticism, such as the argument that it may be difficult to distinguish between the views of the relevant humans to be included and the researcher's perspective, and that it may be more useful to compare between existing empirical cases rather than referring to a nonexistent ideal type.
Labor Movements
Authors: Martin Greg
Published: December 2017

Labor movements are social movements reflecting the interests of the industrial working class. Trade unions have made up the traditional core of labor movements and political parties have represented working‐class interests, leading most notably to the creation of welfare states across Western liberal democracies during the twentieth century. The relative affluence and security of the postwar period provided a context wherein “new social movements” emerged, which, unlike the labor movements of the past, were not primarily concerned with material issues, such as socioeconomic inequality, but instead emphasized “post‐material” values, such as identity and quality of life. While this implies “old” issues associated with labor movements have disappeared, critics argue transformations globally point to their enduring relevance, as contemporary movements have emerged to protest against new forms of precarity, the human costs of austerity, and material deprivation experienced by people in the developing countries of the Global South.
Material Cultures
Authors: Lorenzo Ronald
Published: December 2017

Material cultures are the various forms of tangible objects that different societies create or have created. Anthropology has approached the phenomena of material cultures through the examination of the mode and qualities of artifacts. Anthropologists attempt to understand cultures through studying the contextual use and manufacture of objects. In sociology, the objects created by societies are reflective of the beliefs and values of society. Material objects reveal information about the relation of individuals to their societies. In sociology, Thorstein Veblen was the first theorist who focused on the objects of the leisure class. Veblen characterizes the material objects of the leisure classes as wasteful. According to Veblen, there is prestige in wasting material goods as long as there are vested interests. Veblen contrasts this with the peaceable use of material goods, which is not to create waste.
Nationalism
Authors: Clott Alec
Published: December 2017

Although highly disputed, the concept “nationalism” generally points to the tendency of an individual or group to identify with the nation as the dominant motivation for political action and expression. The concept is usually broken down into one of two explanatory frameworks: the modernist and primordialist perspectives. Whereas the modernist perspective argues that nationalism results from historically recent social constructions and events, the primordialist perspective contends that nationalism stems from the premodern human tendency to form groups based upon shared ancestry. The substudy of ethnic nationalism demonstrates the ways in which conflicting ethnic and national identities can result in violence. In response to ethnic nationalism, proponents of civic nationalism argue that national identity should be based in shared values and norms – characteristics an individual can choose to adopt that are not necessitated by birth or ancestry. “Hard nationalism” and “soft nationalism” categorize the degree or intensity of nationalist discourse, the former representing extreme exclusive identification and the latter representing moderate non‐exclusive terms.
Populism
Authors: Outhwaite William
Published: December 2017

Populism, like nationalism and democracy, is an ideology of popular rule. However, where nationalism (in some of its aspects) stresses the civic or ethnic “belonging” of the people, populism invokes “the people” as opposed to elites, such as an established political class. It can therefore take a left‐ or right‐wing form, and is often ambiguous or ambivalent between them.