Referring to the controversy over Pluto’s demotion, in this quick video C.G.P. Grey does a fun job of explaining why the icy rock is no longer a planet. He closes with a discussion of why properly categorizing objects in space with words like “planets” may always elude us. It’s a great example of social construction.
Via Blame it on the Voices. For lots more examples, see our Pinterest pages on the social construction of everything and the social construction of race.
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 10
anon — July 11, 2012
It's kind of strange to to offer the concept "planet" as an example of a social construction. The reason for Pluto's recategorization was was not the expression of some social attitude or the furtherance of the interests of the dominant class. It was recategorized so that the term "planet" would more useful conceptual role in astronomy.
The term "planet" is only "socially constructed" in the utterly trivial sense that there is a society (of sorts) of astronomers that decides what the word means. But the criteria for deciding what the word means are pretty much set by objective features of reality. (I am glossing over a lot of philosophy of science in the interests of being brief.)
If you want a good example of a social construction, consider concepts like "baseball" or "the president". Baseball is baseball because of a shared understanding of the rules of the game, and the president is the president because we decide to act accordingly. The concept of a planet is not socially constructed in this sense.