bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Family Diversity
Authors: van Eeden‐Moorefield Brad , Demo David H.
Published: September 2017

Family living arrangements in the US and throughout much of the world are considerably more diverse, pluralistic, and fluid than they were just a few decades ago. We have witnessed profound demographic changes, including longer life expectancy, postponed marriage and childbearing, dramatic increases in both childbearing and childrearing outside of marriage, and substantial growth of singlehood, cohabitation, divorce, and remarriage (Teachman et al. 2000). As a result, there has been a sharp increase in the visibility of diverse family forms such as single‐parent (mostly single‐mother) families, stepfamilies, households headed by gays and lesbians, and families living in poverty (Rank 2000). These changes have stirred considerable debate surrounding the definition of family. For example, do two cohabiting adults and their dependent children constitute a family? Are they still a family without the presence of children in the household? What if the two adults are gay or lesbian?
Family Diversity
Authors: Van Eeden‐Moorefield Brad , Shih Kristy
Published: September 2017

Beginning in the middle of the twentieth century, the Standard North American Family (SNAF) emerged as the “benchmark” family type in the United States, and has been pervasive since (Coontz, 2011). Many changes in the social context, during this period following World War II, influenced the development of SNAF and supported a set of values and beliefs that created and privileged the two biological parent – male breadwinner, female homemaker – family. Some influences included: men returning to the labor force, a postwar economic boom, an increasing standard of living, and increases in marriage and birth rates. Although SNAFs often are viewed with nostalgia today, evidence shows that many families of this era actually were characterized by severe inequities, male dominance, men's over involvement in work and under involvement in family activities, wife abuse, and alcoholism (Coontz, 2011). Importantly, SNAF was primarily a white, heterosexual, middle‐class phenomenon. In these ways, SNAF is much more of a social construct based in imaginative ideals rather than a lived reality for many families.
Family Planning, Abortion, and Reproductive Health
Authors: Biddlecom Ann E.
Published: September 2017

Many societies have made the transition from high mortality and large family sizes to settings where most children survive, small families are desired, and most people control their fertility. In the early 1960s, the average woman could expect to have almost five children over her life, but now she can expect to have fewer than three children. The conscious use of contraception and abortion to control fertility thus assumes paramount importance in explaining basic aspects of contemporary human society. However, substantial differences exist in fertility and contraceptive levels and access to services between developed and developing regions of the world. For example, while in more developed regions women now have fewer than two children on average and nearly 7 in 10 women in marital or consensual unions use contraceptives (mainly sterilization, the pill, or the male condom), women in Africa have about five children on average and fewer than 3 in 10 women in marital or consensual unions use contraceptives (mainly the pill, injectables, and implants) (United Nations 2004). Other factors such as social structure, culture, gender relations, and economic opportunities also contribute to these regional differences.
Family Structure and Child Outcomes
Authors: Jekielek Susan M. , Moore Kristin A.
Published: September 2017

The implications of family structure for child well‐being have been a central topic of research for several decades. In its simplest form, it is the comparison between two‐parent and one‐parent families that is the root of concern for child well‐being. Children who live with two married parents are defined in most government statistics as living in two‐parent families, whereas children who live with just one biological parent due to death, divorce, or having never married have been considered to live in single‐parent families. However, the issue is much more complex, and trends in family structure among American children over recent decades make it increasingly necessary to specify the biological and social relationships between children and the adults in their lives in order to understand the implications for child well‐being.
Fatherhood
Authors: Dermott Esther
Published: September 2017

Fatherhood is a social institution and includes the rights, duties, responsibilities, and statuses associated with being a father. The study of fatherhood is interdisciplinary; it draws from and contributes to debates in sociology, but also psychology, psychoanalysis, history, geography, geography, sociolegal, studies and policy studies. In line with its broad range of disciplinary perspectives, fatherhood researchers use a wide range of methodological approaches. Assessing the extent to which ideas of fatherhood and fathering practices have changed and the consequences of changes that have taken place is a major focus of discussion. Other foci include: describing the components of contemporary fatherhood and developing understandings of the relationships between fathers and children; examining the role of paid work in relation to “good” fatherhood including how fathers achieve work–life balance; describing the diversity of contemporary fatherhood; and examining the role of policies and legal frameworks in supporting or undermining dominant formations of fatherhood.
Federalism
Authors: Galligan Brian
Published: September 2017

Federalism consists of two spheres of government, national and state, operating in the one political entity according to defined arrangements for sharing powers so that neither is sovereign over the other. According to William Riker (1964), the activities of government must be divided in such a way that each government has some activities on which it makes final decisions. Daniel Elazar (1987) summed up federalism as a system of “self‐rule plus shared rule” – self‐rule in regional communities and shared rule at the national level. The older notion of federalism was an association of associations, or a league or confederation of independent member states whose delegates managed central institutions. This was the institutional form of the American Articles of Confederation that provided a weak form of national government during the War of Independence. In the 1789 Constitution, as explained in the Federalist Papers, the American founders created modern federalism by strengthening the powers of national government and making its key offices directly responsible to the people. Modern federalism was a significant innovation in both institutional design and popular sovereignty: the people became dual citizens, or members of the new national union while remaining members of the smaller state unions. Federalism was also a key feature of republican government, with powers controlled and limited through being divided between governments and constitutionally specified. The federal constitution was based upon popular sovereignty, with the leading institutions either directly elected or indirectly accountable to the people.
Female Sex Work as Deviance
Authors: Weitzer Ronald
Published: September 2017

Sex work (in this case, involving female workers) refers to sexual services or performances provided in return for material compensation. Examples include pornography, prostitution, stripping, and telephone sex. The most common forms of sex work involve female workers and male customers – which reflects larger, traditional gender relations between men and women. Objectification of women is taken to the extreme in sex work, where the workers are valued almost exclusively for sexual purposes. The existence of commercial sex also provides men with an avenue for reaffirming their masculinity, by satisfying their “need” for sexual stimulation and fantasy or their desire for a certain type of sex with a certain type of woman. The gendered character of the sex industry is also evident in its power structure: most managers are men who exercise control over female workers and reap much of the profit. In general, power is largely concentrated in the hands of pimps, traffickers, and those who run brothels, strip clubs, and companies that produce and distribute.
Femininities/Masculinities
Authors: Lind Amy
Published: September 2017

Femininities and masculinities are acquired social identities: as individuals become socialized they develop a gender identity, an understanding of what it means to be a “man” or a “woman” (Laurie et al. 1999). How individuals develop an understanding of their gender identity, including whether or not they fit into these prescribed gender roles, depends upon the context within which they are socialized and how they view themselves in relation to societal gender norms. Class, racial, ethnic, and national factors play heavily into how individuals construct their gender identities and how they are perceived externally (hooks 2004). Gender identities are often naturalized; that is, they rely on a notion of biological difference, “so that ‘natural’ femininity [in a white, European, middle‐class context] encompasses, for example, motherhood, being nurturing, a desire for pretty clothes and the exhibition of emotions” (Laurie et al. 1999: 3). “Natural” masculinity, in contrast, may encompass fatherhood, acting “tough,” a desire for sports and competition, and hiding emotions (Connell 1997; Thompson 2000). In both cases, these constructions of gender identity are based on stereotypes that fall within the range of normative femininities and masculinities. Yet, as many sociologists have pointed out, not all individuals fit within these prescribed norms and as such, masculinities and femininities must be recognized as socially constituted, fluid, wide ranging, and historically and geographically differentiated (Connell 1997; Halberstam 1998; Laurie et al. 1999).
Feminist Pedagogy
Authors: MacLean Vicky M.
Published: September 2017

Although many, if not most, academics and others in the public arena today assume the need for a feminist pedagogy aimed at enhancing the educational experience of women and girls globally, this has not always been the case. A growing awareness of the need for feminist pedagogy was created by the pioneering research and pedagogy of committed feminist scholars (Hall & Sandler 1982; Sandler & Hall 1986; Harding 1987, 1992; Weiler 1988; Geismar & Nicoleau 1993; Rosser 1993, 1995; Maher & Tetreault 1994).Feminist pedagogybegins with the premise that gender and the social inequality it represents in the wider society are often reproduced in the classroom. Existing curricula and classroom practices contain sexist biases and patriarchal assumptions as reflected in the fact that the contributions of women are often absent from textbooks; girls and women are portrayed in stereotypic ways in much of the literature of all disciplines; girls and women are often directed to certain fields of study and are directed away from others; and teaching practices typically favor the learning styles of boys and men. Teachers informed by principles of feminist pedagogy seek to express feminist values and goals in the classroom and to challenge traditional androcentric knowledge (Geismar & Nicoleau 1993). Those adopting a feminist pedagogy ultimately seek to advance the status and education of women and girls by providing them with educational experiences that encourage consciousness‐raising, empowerment, and voice through active and innovative educational strategies (Naples & Bojar 2002). While there is no single definition of feminist pedagogy, basic principles include: (1) the centrality of gender as an analytical tool; (2) multiculturalism and inclusion of all students; (3) collaborative knowledge construction; (4) collaborative teaching; (5) encouraging voice through linking personal experience with learning; and (6) democratization of the teacher's authority and power.Feminist multicultural pedagogyis sometimes used to emphasize an awareness of the ways in which differences of race/ethnicity, class, gender, sexual orientation, age, geopolitical location, and religious diversity can potentially translate into oppressive classroom interactions that reproduce dominant hierarchies, or alternatively, can contribute to enriching cultural interactions (Weir 1991; Brady 1993).
Fertility: Adolescent
Authors: Cooksey Elizabeth
Published: September 2017

Adolescent fertility refers to the childbearing of women who are less than 20 years old. Despite recent declines in adolescent fertility levels throughout the world, over 15 million babies are born to adolescent women each year. Adolescent fertility rates (defined as the annual number of live births to girls aged 15–19 per 1,000 girls aged 15–19) vary considerably by world region. The worldwide average for the period 2000–5 is estimated at approximately 50 per 1,000, but rates in Sub‐Saharan Africa average 127 per 1,000 where countries such as Liberia, Niger, and Uganda have rates above 200 per 1,000. Adolescent fertility is also relatively high in Latin America and the Caribbean at 71 per 1,000. Together, the industrialized countries have an average rate of 24 per 1,000. As a region, East Asia and the Pacific has the lowest figure of only 18 per 1,000 due to rates of 5 or less in China, Japan, and Korea (UN Population Division 2000).
Fertility: Low
Authors: Morgan S. Philip
Published: September 2017

Low fertility implies a “not low” referent. There are two. The first is defined as a maximal, hypothetical level for a population, that is, one with early marriage, close birth spacing, and no attempt to control family size. Fifteen births per woman provides a reasonable estimate of mean maximal fertility. The highest observed levels of fertility are closer to 10 births per woman and, even in the absence of substantial contraceptive use and abortion, can be one‐half of this level. Regardless, low fertility implies much lower levels – levels approximating two or fewer births per woman. The fertility transition refers to the societal shift from high to low fertility (and is produced by deliberate attempts to achieve small family sizes).
Fertility and Public Policy
Authors: Bongaarts John
Published: September 2017

Fertility levels vary widely between contemporary populations, from a high of 7.6 births per woman in Niger to a low of 0.9 in Macao (United Nations, 2013). These levels are largely the result of decisions made by couples who are trying to maximize their families’ welfare. In the least developed countries, fertility is high because children are valued for the social and economic benefits they provide to their families, and the cost of childbearing and rearing is typically low. In contrast, in the most industrialized countries, couples want and have small families because the value of children is relatively low and their costs are high. However, the fertility that results from this parental decision‐making is not necessarily optimal from a societal point of view, thus suggesting a potential role for government intervention.
Feuerbach, Ludwig (1804–1872)
Authors: Staples Clifford L.
Published: September 2017

Ludwig Feuerbach was born into a large, prominent, academic family in Landshut, Bavaria. His father was a distinguished professor of jurisprudence, and three of Ludwig's four brothers went on to noteworthy careers in mathematics, law, and archeology. But unwilling to heed his father's advice to steer clear of radical ideas, and unable to negotiate the repressive atmosphere of academic and political life in mid‐nineteenth century Germany, Feuerbach became an important academic failure. Some social theorists and sociologists are familiar with Feuerbach's writings on religion, but most sociologists know Feuerbach primarily because of his influence on the young Karl Marx – a central figure within the sociological tradition. Feuerbach's critique of Hegel provided Marx with the occasion to, in turn, critique Feuerbach, and in the process Marx worked his way toward a thoroughly sociological approach to such core topics as history, ideology, and social evolution – topics approached before Marx usually as theological or philosophical problems. For his time and place, Feuerbach was a radical, though not quite radical enough for Marx.
Finalization in Science
Authors: Krohn Wolfgang
Published: September 2017

Finalization in science is a theory concerning the relationship between science and society from a historical and political perspective. It was developed in the 1970s by Gernot Böhme, Wolfgang van den Daele, and Wolfgang Krohn (Böhme et al. 1972, 1973, 1976, 1978). Its main thesis is that modern science has internal dynamics that allow it to absorb external goals of research on an increasing scale. The expression “finalization” is meant to denote this tendency (Latinfinis; purpose, goal). This theoretical model is continuous with the paradigmatic view of Thomas Kuhn and with Imre Lakatos's methodology of scientific research programs, but adds additional features concerning the social contexts of science.
Foucauldian Archeological Analyses
Authors: Joseph Scheurich James , Bell McKenzie Kathryn
Published: September 2017

To begin to understand Foucault's archeology, it is first crucial to know that Foucault was
not
referring to archeology as an academic discipline or to any popular picture of an archeologist. Indeed, thinking of Foucault's archeology as having anything to do with digging in the earth for ancient artifacts is not useful at all. As Foucault (1972) says,
The Archaeology of Knowledge
“does not relate to geological excavation.” For the most part, these allusions will only get in the way of building an understanding of his archeological method.
Friendship during the Later Years
Authors: Adams Rebecca G.
Published: September 2017

Gerontologists were responsible for much of the early scholarship on adult friendship and continue to focus more attention on it than other researchers do. This is probably due to their historical preoccupation with theoretical questions regarding older adults’ social integration, engagement, and psychological well‐being. Friends are, however, important during later adulthood in many other ways as well, serving as sources of affection and social support and contributing to physical health and even to longevity.
Friendship: Interpersonal Aspects
Authors: Rawlins William K.
Published: September 2017

Friendship refers to a broad category of positively disposed interpersonal relationships characterized by varying degrees of equality, mutual good will, affection and/or assistance. People employ the word
friend
to describe a recent acquaintance, a longtime co‐worker, a family member, a romantic partner, or an irreplaceable individual they have known for years. Friendship also complements, fuses with, competes with, or substitutes for other personal and social relationships. For example, friendship can complement the professional relationship of two co‐workers, but compete with the demands of a superior/subordinate relationship. Friendship can fuse so completely with spousal or sibling relationships that it is difficult to identify whether persons are acting as spouses or siblings or as friends. Finally, without close kin, friends may substitute for one's family. The range of uses of the word friendship in North American culture finds summary definitions altered according to social circumstances. Across situations, however, friendship typically invokes benign connotations and social ideals of shared good will, pleasure, assistance, and moral comportment dating back to Aristotle's treatment of the topic.
Fromm, Erich (1900–1980)
Authors: McLaughlin Neil , Mergler Iga , Traoré Ismaël
Published: September 2017

Best known as a Freudian revisionist, public intellectual, and social critic, German‐born scholar Erich Fromm also made important and lasting contributions to sociology. Fromm was trained in sociology at Heidelberg University, receiving his PhD in 1922 under the direction of Alfred Weber, Max Weber's younger brother (Burston, 1991). Fromm then underwent psychoanalytic training and began a therapeutic practice in Berlin and later in Frankfurt. In the late 1920s and early 1930s he became a core member of the early Frankfurt School, an influential network of neo‐Marxist social philosophers and critical theorists formed under Max Horkheimer's direction. Owing to the sponsorship and financial support offered by the radical son of a wealthy German grain merchant, these critical theorists were able to remain independent from rigid traditional academic disciplines and the organized left (McLaughlin, 1999). Later, in the wake of Nazism, they moved to the United States, when Robert Lynd and the sociology department at Columbia University were interested in Fromm's empirical social psychology (Wheatland, 2009). Fromm played a key role in sealing an arrangement whereby the Horkheimer circle moved to Morningside Heights (Wheatland, 2009).
Functionalism/Neofunctionalism
Authors: Nielsen Donald A.
Published: September 2017

Functionalism is a theoretical perspective in sociology, and the social sciences generally, which emphasizes the positive contributions made by any given social arrangement (e.g., institutions, cultural values, norms, rites, and so forth) to the current operation and continued reproduction of society and its cultural pattern. It has rested heavily as a theory on a broad analogy between societies and biological organisms, a tendency especially noted in the work of early functionalists such as Spencer and Durkheim. However, reliance on the organic analogy is already less evident in the work of social anthropologists such as Radcliffe‐Brown and Malinowski, who drew selectively on Durkheim's work, and has become muted in more recent forms of functionalism, which draw more frequently on general systems theory and not merely on the analogy with organisms. Functionalists also regularly couple the use of analogical reasoning with a claim to the objective analysis of society through the use of scientific methods and have linked their theorizing to one or another form of positivism in philosophy.
Figurational Sociology
Authors: Liston Katie , Mennell Stephen
Published: September 2017

“Figurational” sociology is the term used for the research tradition stemming from the work of Norbert Elias (1897–1990). The name comes from Elias's use of the grounding concept of “figuration” as a deliberate attempt to bypass and reformulate the speech and thought parameters of what he saw as homo clausus (“closed person”) assumptions underlying much of sociology. Figurational sociologists reject such common notions as agency–structure, action–structure, or “individual” and “society,” all of which imply that “the individual” is something separate and isolated from “society.” They think instead in terms of figurations or complex webs of interdependent relationships between people (homines aperti, or “open people”). These complex webs of interdependence are always in a state of flux, hence the alternative title of “process sociology” preferred by many researchers working within this tradition. Figurational dynamics can be seen in the longer and shorter term and might include state formation processes, civilizing and decivilizing processes, or the deamateurization of sport amongst many others.
Gambling as a social problem
Authors: Schmidt Lucia
Published: September 2017

Gambling refers to wagering money or other belongings on chance activities or events with random or uncertain outcomes (Devereux 1979). Gambling opportunities are now available throughout the world and, as a source of entertainment and recreation, playing with and for money is widely accepted. However, a growing tendency to highlight problematic aspects is clearly to be noticed.
Gangs, Delinquent
Authors: Brunson Rod K.
Published: September 2017

Discussions of gangs in the twenty‐first century stereotypically conjure up images of young minority males, outfitted in hip‐hop clothing, hanging out on street corners in impoverished urban communities, and engaging in unlawful acts. Using shorthand to identify gang members may seem logical to citizens, police officers, the media, and social service workers. It fails to recognize, however, the variation that exists among gangs and gang members. This begs the question whether the focus should be on gang members or on examining the conditions and processes involved in gang formation. Both approaches require their own orientation and have specific policy implications for addressing gang membership. At the center of these issues is the lack of consistency regarding how gangs are defined.
Gay Bashing
Authors: Smyth Michael
Published: September 2017

Often subsumed under the contemporary rubric of “hate crime,” “gay bashing” denotes the perpetration of violence aimed at people identified as, or assumed to be, homosexual, including gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgendered individuals. Although examples of this type of bias‐motivated behavior range from acts of symbolic and rhetorical violence to physical assaults and homicide, selection of the victim based on his or her perceived non‐normative sexuality is common to gay bashing in all of its manifestations. The targeting of victims based on perceived sexuality may be seen as a function of perpetrators' hatred for individuals thought to be members of a despised sexual minority. Indeed, gay bashing constitutes a form of victimization and intimidation aimed not only at a primary target, but at the entire group to which that individual is thought to belong.
Gay and Lesbian Movement
Authors: Valocchi Stephen
Published: September 2017

The gay and lesbian movement refers to the manifold collective efforts to benefit people with same‐sex desire. A movement for gays and lesbians could not have happened until “the homosexual” emerged as a distinct person rather than just a set of acts. This occurred in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as the result of the efforts of sexologists to define and control non‐normative sexual and gender practices in Europe and the United States. Although an organized movement to reverse the negative discourse of the sexologists first appeared in Germany in the late nineteenth century, this effort was short‐lived. The first sustained activities, organizations, and network‐building for the positive recognition of lesbians and gays and the improvement of their social and political conditions appeared both in Europe and in the United States in the 1940s and 1950s.
Gellner, Ernest (1925–1995)
Authors: Tzanelli Rodanthi
Published: September 2017

Perhaps one of the most prolific scholars of the twentieth century, Ernest Gellner remains a highly influential figure across many disciplines (sociology, history, anthropology, and philosophy). He was born in Paris, but was of Czech Jewish parentage and he grew up in Czechoslovakia. In 1939, with the resurgence of anti‐Semitism in Central Europe, he moved to England, where he spent most of his life. During World War II he served in the Czechoslovakian Armored Brigade (1944–5), and later he returned to Oxford, where he received a degree in politics, philosophy, and economics. From 1949 until 1984 he was in the department of sociology at the London School of Economics (LSE), where he completed his doctorate in social anthropology (1961) and became professor of philosophy (1962–84). He was, among other things, Visiting Fellow at Harvard (1952–3), the University of California, Berkeley (1968), and the Centre de Recherches et d'Etudes sur les Socits Mediterranens (1978–9), member of the Social Science Research Council (1980–6), and Chairman of the International Activities Committee (1982–4). Between 1993 and 1995 he was Director of the Centre for the Study of Nationalism at the Central European University in Prague, where he died in 1995.
Gender, Aging and
Authors: Calasanti Toni
Published: September 2017

Interest and research in gender and aging have progressed through a variety of different phases, each spurred by developments in both feminist scholarship and aging studies. While each stage has emerged from the previous, all can be found in contemporary theory and research.
Gender, Consumption and
Authors: Cabrera Sergio a.
Published: September 2017

The history of modern consumerism has been shaped by gender inequality. During the premodern era most people lacked the necessary surplus in their means of sustenance to engage in substantial consumerism. Moreover, those who did (the upper classes and nobility) enforced rigid social hierarchies that prohibited the lower orders from traversing social boundaries through consumerism (Stearns, 2006). Among the transformations in the social structure brought about by industrialization was the separation between the “public” and “private” spheres. “Productive” activity came to be seen as a public, appropriately masculine, endeavor, while consumption became associated with the private domestic sphere and the purview of women. Although the separation of spheres was more a cultural ideal than historical practice, particularly for many marginalized social groups (African Americans, the poor, immigrants), during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the association of women with consumption shaped research and theory on consumerism. As is argued here, consumerism today is less feminized, yet it remains a gendered phenomenon. Moreover, this entry will highlight how globalization and technological developments are shaping the ways in which gender and consumerism intersect, and discuss how the ensuing social hierarchies privilege some while disadvantaging others.
Gender, Friendship and
Authors: Oliker Stacey
Published: September 2017

The subject of gender and friendship links two fields of sociological scholarship. Gender was rarely a salient theme in pioneering studies of friendship, communities, and social networks that emerged in anthropology and sociology in the 1960s. By the 1980s, though, burgeoning gender scholarship in the social sciences ignited interest in gender and friendship. For the most part, the sociology of gender and friendship has explored how differences in the meanings, expectations, experiences, and identities that are culturally associated with biological sex create patterns of difference in the friendships of men and women. A second perspective, examining friendship patterns as a force in the constitution of gender difference and inequality, is less prominent in the literature, but it is promising.
Gender, Health, and Mortality
Authors: Larsen Ulla
Published: September 2017

Although life expectancy at birth of women in western societies is significantly longer than that of men (e.g., 80 versus 74 years in the United States), women experience more sickness and non‐fatal health problems than men (e.g., higher morbidity). Specific biological and behavioral explanations for these gender differences are largely unknown. It remains unclear whether these gender differences in health and mortality are found throughout the world. Here, the term “gender” refers to the way biological differences are socially and culturally constructed and expressed in actions and thoughts, whereas the term “sex” is used to define a biological category based on anatomical and physiological differences between males and females. “Health” is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well‐being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). “Mortality” is the rate of death in a population in a specified time period.
General Linear Model
Authors: Fan Xitao
Published: September 2017

The social science researcher's repertoire of statistical tools ranges from simple techniques (e.g.,
t
‐test) to sophisticated multivariate analytic techniques (e.g., structural equation modeling). Many of these statistical techniques appear to be different analytic systems designed for different research situations. The distinctions, however, are often superficial. Fundamentally, many techniques are related to each other to such a degree that they can be considered as variations of a more general statistical model. For quantitative researchers in social sciences, understanding the relationship among the seemingly different analytic techniques is important, because such understanding helps researchers make judicious choices of analytic techniques in research.
Genetic Engineering as a Social Problem
Authors: Abels Gabriele
Published: September 2017

Genetic engineering (GE) is the technique and science of intervention into the genetic mechanisms of an organism, whether it be micro‐organism, plant, animal or human. GE is one of the most socially contested of technologies. In the public debate, the terms GE and biotechnology are often used synonymously; yet, in a narrower sense, GE is only one important technique in the field of biotechnology.
Genre
Authors: Horrocks Roger
Published: September 2017

A genre is any group of texts identified as sharing a cluster of characteristics (such as structure, theme, style, mood, spatial or temporal setting, or function). The term may imply a precise list of characteristics or be used more flexibly as a way of exploring “family resemblances” (in Wittgenstein's sense of that phrase). New genres are constantly being identified, but use‐value determines whether a proposed grouping gains long‐term acceptance. The most useful tend to be highly specific groupings of examples which are closely related in space and time as well as form, regarded as “subgenres” of traditional genres. The idea of genre is not only a conceptual tool of scholars, but is also employed constantly in everyday life in the production, distribution, and reception of media products. In that sense it calls for investigation as an important social and industrial (as well as creative) phenomenon. Indeed, it has been studied for so many centuries that sophisticated traditions of theory and criticism have developed around it, reflecting changing conceptions of the text and its relationship with social contexts. Those traditions have sometimes remained specialized and separate (within the arts, linguistics, and media industries), but in recent years there has been an increased emphasis on interdisciplinary approaches that seek to articulate the semiotic with the social.
Gouldner, Alvin (1920–1980)
Authors: Kane Nazneen
Published: September 2017

Described as an “outlaw sociologist” and political radical, social theorist Alvin Ward Gouldner is most widely recognized for his critical intervention in mid‐century American sociological theory during a historical moment marked by the dominance of structural functionalism. Gouldner's criticisms of academic sociology were as tumultuous to the discipline as was his biographical reality. His life and career seemed to be beset with contradictions and intellectual turmoil, evidenced most profoundly in his retreat to the Swiss mountains in search of a refuge conducive to his intellectual and political projects (which were inextricable for Gouldner). Both his life and work possess ongoing movement between positivism and postpositivism, radicalism and academicism, and objectivism and reflexivity. Despite Gouldner's criticisms of professionalization, his training by Robert Merton at Columbia University in many ways made possible a successful career in mainstream sociology.
Ghetto
Authors: Michlic Joanna
Published: September 2017

The term ghetto is a concept with many meanings. It is frequently used to describe any dense areas of Jewish residence, even if no compulsory policies of residential segregation were imposed. It is also employed as a description of the geographical and social isolation of minorities other than Jews; for example, it is applied to African Americans and other ethnic communities in the US and to minorities in Japan such as ethnic Koreans. Scholars recognize that the term has assumed a life of its own since its first application and have called for systematic examination of the history of its changing meaning from the time it was first used in connection with Jews until the present (Ravid 1992).
Global Justice as a Social Movement
Authors: Williams Matthew
Published: September 2017

The global justice movement is a transnational social movement, rooted in the confluence of the human rights, labor, environmental, indigenous, peasant, and feminist movements’ shared opposition to neoliberal globalization and vision of a more democratic, equitable, ecologically sustainable world. Neoliberal globalization refers to those structural changes in the global economy being carried out under a discourse of free markets that weaken or eliminate policies that favor grassroots social actors, such as labor unionists, environmental activists, and indigenous peoples, while creating a regulatory apparatus that favors transnational corporations (TNCs). The global justice movement is truly global in scope, with strong constituent movements in western countries, Latin America, South and Southeast Asia, and parts of Africa; it is weakest in the Middle East, East Asia, and the former Soviet bloc. Constituent organizations range from traditional non‐profits and volunteer groups in the global North (first world), to large grassroots labor, peasant, and indigenous organizations in the global South (third world). The global justice movement is a relatively young movement, coalescing in the 1990s and only becoming highly visible with the massive 1999 protests against the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Seattle, Washington.
Globalization, Consumption and
Authors: Langer Beryl
Published: September 2017

Globalization is not one process but many, and its implications for consumption are contradictory. Consumer culture produced by global corporations undermines the viability of “local” products and threatens cultural diversity, while the movement of people around the globe circulates cultural difference and generates hybridity. Inequalities in the relations of production and consumption of global consumer culture raise questions of human rights and social justice, while resource consumption and the generation of waste associated with global consumer culture threaten environmental sustainability.
Globalization, Culture and
Authors: Robertson Roland
Published: September 2017

The idea of global culture involves the reformulation of traditional, social‐scientific, conceptions. The key problem in the analysis of global culture concerns the relationship between homogenizing, or standardizing, forces in relation to heterogenizing ones. Recent scholarship suggests the greater importance of the latter in contrast to the older emphasis on homogeneity. In general, the idea of world, or global, culture is given particular attention. Presently, global culture is the site of considerable conflict as a result of massive geopolitical shifts in the shaping of the world. The relationship between cultural clashes within societies and such clashes between societies is given particular attention, along with the ways in which contemporary capitalism has, somewhat paradoxically, accentuated the significance of culture on a worldwide basis. Running through this entry are the themes of religion, cultural diffusion, and the relativization of specific cultures.
Globalization and Global Justice
Authors: Rucht Dieter
Published: September 2017

Global justice movements (GJMs) are a loose alliance of contemporary leftist movements whose common denominator is their resistance to globalizing neoliberalism that promotes free trade, deregulation, and privatization as keys to universal progress. In the eyes of its critics, neoliberalism serves the interests of economic and political elites at the cost of the large majority of the population within, but especially beyond, the most developed countries (Rucht 2003). GJMs identify the driving force of neoliberalism in relentless profit‐seeking that causes a plethora of evils, such as violation of human and civil rights, destruction of indigenous cultures, growing unemployment and increasingly precarious jobs, environmental degradation, and the widening gap between the affluent and the poor.
Grandparenthood
Authors: Szinovacz Maximiliane E.
Published: September 2017

Grandparenthood can be considered at three distinct levels: the societal level (referring to societal norms, functions, and esteem of grandparents), the family level (referring to interactions and supports among grandparents, parents, and grandchildren), and the individual level (referring to the meaning and significance of grandparenthood to the grandparents). The meaning and significance of grandparenthood often derive from societal and familial contexts that are beyond grandparents’ own control. On the societal level, the prevalence and duration of grandparenthood as well as the normative underpinnings of the grandparent role reflect cultural and demographic change. On the familial level, grandparents’ functions within the family context are often shaped by special needs of the children or grandchildren rather than by grandparents’ own aspirations. On the personal level, individuals experience the transition to grandparenthood as a countertransition, contingent on the fertility decisions of their children, and access to grandchildren is often mediated by the parent generation.
Gumplowicz, Ludwig (1838–1909)
Authors: Weiler Bernd
Published: September 2017

Around 1900, Ludwig Gumplowicz was internationally regarded as one of the most influential sociological theorists and, together with his fellow countryman Gustav Ratzenhofer (1842–1904), as the leading representative of the so‐called Austrian Struggle or Conflict School. Born into an assimilated Jewish family in the quarter of Kazimierz in the Free State of Cracow, which was incorporated into the Austro‐Hungarian Monarchy in 1846, the young Gumplowicz strongly identified with Polish culture and fervently supported the movement for greater autonomy of Galicia. After graduating in law from the Jagiellonian University in 1861, Gumplowicz joined the liberal democratic and positivist circles of his deeply conservative hometown and, as a lawyer, journalist, political activist, and chief editor of the progressive newspaper
Kraj
(“The Country”), took an active part in the educational, social, and political affairs of Cracow. Disappointed at his failure to bring about the desired reforms, he left Cracow in 1875 and moved to Graz, where he became a lecturer and in 1893 a full professor of law. Throughout his life, however, he maintained a strong interest in the politics of his native Galicia. Apart from numerous works on Austrian administrative and constitutional law, the prolific writer Gumplowicz dedicated his scientific work to the newly emerging discipline of sociology. After the publication of his booklet
Rasse und Staat: Eine Untersuchung über das Gesetz der Staatenbildung
(1875), in which he first sketched his sociological principles, Gumplowicz wrote
Der Rassenkampf: Sociologische Untersuchungen
(1883), followed shortly thereafter by his most famous work,
Grundriss der Sociologie
(1885),
Die sociologische Staatsidee
(1892),
Sociologie und Politik
(1892), and the posthumously published
Socialphilosophie im Umriss
(1910). Already during his lifetime his main sociological works were translated into several languages, including English, French, Italian, Spanish, Polish, Russian, and Japanese. His theories were especially influential in Italy and the US. In 1909, two years after his retirement, Gumplowicz, who suffered from an incurable cancer of the tongue, and his half‐blind wife committed suicide.
G
umplowicz,
L
udwig (1838–1909)
Authors: Soyer Mehmet
Published: September 2017

Ludwig Gumplowicz was a pioneer social conflict theorist. He focused on the driving factors behind social conflict, highlighting racial hatreds as a major conflict factor. Moreover, Gumplowicz considered conflict to be a cycle that brought on the economic exploitation of others. Gumplowicz formularized that history is as a repetitive cycle consisting of groups attacking, suppressing, and absorbing each other. The state emerges as a means to subjugate inferior groups, and laws are formulated to help govern them. This cycle of inequality drives the continual formation of social groups. Gumplowicz theorized that war between social groups was influenced by the groups' desire to expand their economic dominance. War results in violence and aggression against the group being conquered. Furthermore, groups have motivations in subjugating and economically exploiting their conquered subjects. Gumplowicz theorized that the concept known as the state originated from one social group establishing dominance over another.
Gorz, André (1923–2007)
Authors: Silva Josué Pereira da
Published: September 2017

André Gorz is one of the most important contemporary European social theorists, despite the fact that his entire intellectual endeavour took place outside the academic milieu. A philosopher and journalist, he produced 19 books and hundreds of articles and interviews dealing with the most relevant themes of contemporary social theory and politics. Born to a Catholic mother and a Jewish father, André Gorz, whose real name was Gerhard Horst, was born in Vienna, Austria, in February 1923. In 1938, after the Nazi invasion of Austria, his mother sent him to Switzerland, fearing that he might be drafted into the Nazi army or even jailed because of his Jewish descent, as had happened to his father when Hitler's troops occupied Austria. In Switzerland, where he lived until the end of World War II, Gorz studied chemical engineering and encountered the works of Jean‐Paul Sartre.
Halbwachs, Maurice (1877–1945)
Authors: Vromen Suzanne
Published: September 2017

The French sociologist Maurice Halbwachs was a prominent representative of Durkheimian sociology during the interwar years, and an important contributor to the
Annales sociologiques.
He was also a statistician, a demographer, an expert at analyzing working‐class budgets, and an urban sociologist. His pathbreaking contribution to sociology, however, consists in the way he conceptualized how memory is socially constructed.
Hate Crimes
Authors: Levin Jack
Published: September 2017

The term hate crimes has been employed since the mid‐1980s to identify criminal acts motivated either entirely or in part by the fact or perception that a victim is different from the perpetrator. The term first appeared in newspaper accounts of a 1986 racial incident in the Howard Beach section of New York City, in which a black man was killed while attempting to flee a violent mob of white teenagers, shouting racial slurs. By the early 1990s the hate crime designation was being applied not only to attacks based on race and religion, but also on sexual orientation, national origin, disability status, and gender.
Health Lifestyles
Authors: Cockerham William C.
Published: September 2017

Health lifestyles are collective patterns of health‐related behavior based on choices from options available to people according to their life chances. Health lifestyles are becoming an increasingly common form of social behavior as individuals recognize they are ultimately responsible for their own health. The most common health lifestyle practices investigated by researchers are alcohol use, smoking, dietary habits, exercise, along with other practices. The early theoretical work of Weber and Bourdieu on lifestyles is examined, along with Cockerham's health lifestyle theory.
Health Maintenance Organization
Authors: Wholey Douglas R. , Burns Lawton R.
Published: September 2017

A health maintenance organization (HMO) is a managed care organization that integrates health insurance and delivery functions in an effort to contain costs and maximize quality. HMOs differ from indemnity health insurance, where the insurer compensates the consumer for the cost of specified services. On the continuum between indemnity health insurance and HMOs lie organizations such as preferred provider organizations (PPOs) that manage care delivery more than indemnity health insurance yet do not integrate health insurance and services.