SOC 1305 Lecture Notes - Lecture 9: Social Stratification
Document Summary
In our society, some individuals obtain high levels of education, earn a lot of money, accumulate a lot of wealth, and have good jobs; others do not. Socioeconomic status (ses), also referred to as social status or social class, is an individual"s position in a stratified social order. It is composed of: education, income, wealth, occupation. Social stratification is a characteristic of society; it persists over generations, and it is maintained through beliefs that are widely shared by members of society. In a stratified society, groups at the top of the hierarchy have greater access to goods and services in a society than members of groups at the bottom. Stereotype: a widely-held but oversimplified image or idea about a particular type of person or group; a broad, overgeneralization about a group of people (e. g. , homeless individuals) >600,000 homeless at any single point in time (~3 million / year) 35% of the homeless are families with children.
