Gun ownership and the decision to carry a gun in public may seem like an individual choice. However, in a recent Vox podcast, sociologist Jennifer Carlson explains that carrying a gun in public is intertwined with cultural understandings of gender, race, and family. Carlson interviewed dozens of gun carriers and NRA instructors. She even went through the training herself, received her license to carry, and became a certified instructor to understand the culture of individuals who regularly carry guns. 

Regarding race, NRA courses often neglect lessons about the impacts of racial bias in determining who may be a threat, for example. In terms of gender, Carlson finds that men — who carry firearms more often than women– are influenced by feelings of a loss of masculinity, socioeconomic decline, family histories, and ideas around civic responsibility.

“When I talked to [women] I got a very different narrative [than men] about why they are carrying guns… If we [go] back to the Second Amendment debate, it’s often ‘This is my individual right,’ ‘This is about my individual right to self-defense,’ or ‘It’s about self-protection.’  And when I talked to men…oftentimes it was about self-defense but it also was about family protection — family protection was a huge piece of the puzzle. This idea, if I’m working a job at night, and my wife is at home and she’s alone, there needs to be a firearm there so that she can be protected. And that’s a really interesting move because that’s [about an] absent male protector, [whereas] women were individualistic in terms of ‘This is my right to self-defense,’ ‘My life is valuable in and of itself,’ and ‘I can have a gun to protect myself.’  

In other words, both men and women valued owning firearms for protection, but women framed their gun ownership in terms of self-protection, while men viewed gun ownership as a way to protect others. 

Having a high college GPA should strengthen the appeal of a job candidate’s resume. However, for women who majored in STEM fields, this is not necessarily the case. An article in Science Daily features Natasha Quadlin’s recent study, which found disparities in callback rates between men and women who majored in math.

In the study, Quadlin created 2,106 resumes for math, English, and business majors, and sent two applications — one man and one woman — to 261 hiring managers for entry-level, non-major-specific jobs openings. There were no discrepancies in callback rates for business or English majors with GPAs in the A and A- range. For math majors, men had similar callback rates regardless of GPA, but women with high GPAs actually had lower callback rates than those with moderate GPAs. Quadlin explains,

“Men were more likely to get a call back if they were seen as having more competence and commitment, but only ‘likability’ seemed to benefit women… And likability is associated with moderate academic achievement… [Also,] there’s a particularly strong bias against female math majors — women who flourish in male-dominated fields — perhaps because they’re violating gender norms in terms of what they’re supposed to be good at.”

In other words, employers perceived high-achieving women — particularly those who did well in male-dominated fields in college — as unlikable. In response, Quadlin urges these women to seek out employers who value their achievements, but more importantly, she argues that hiring managers must reevaluate their biases, however unintentional they may be. 

Parents of all backgrounds want their children to receive the best education possible, but what sets wealthy “helicopter parents” apart is that they have the resources to ensure it happens. A recent article in The Washington Post describes the role of “college concierges” — affluent parents that meticulously map out important college opportunities for their child — in widening the gap between their own children and children from working-class families, whose parents may not know how to guide their child through the college process.

The article draws from a study by social scientists Laura Hamilton, Josipa Roksa, and Kelly Nielsen about the role parents play in college students’ lives. The authors find that female students from wealthy families graduate at a rate of 75 percent, while their counterparts from low-income families only graduate at a rate of 40 percent. To explain this discrepancy, the authors give an example of two students interested in dentistry — one from a wealthy family accepted into her top-choice dental school, and the other from a poorer family who was not admitted. 

“[The] one from an affluent family…had reviewed applications years earlier and knew what she needed to do to get in…. [The other student’s] parents didn’t know what was required — such as job shadowing — nor did they realize her slipping grades would disqualify her from getting admitted. She ended up as a dental assistant making $11 an hour, a job that didn’t even require a bachelor’s degree.”

Instead of criticizing affluent parents’ behavior, the article’s author suggests we should direct our energy towards providing guidance to students without it, in order to close success gaps like the one illustrated in this study. 

 “Simply providing more aid or more help in getting admitted isn’t enough…. Schools also need to put in place programs — and pay for them — that help middle- and lower-income students find the right mentors, get spots in study-abroad programs and internships, and navigate the often confusing and tricky journey to graduation.”

National Geographic recently made a dramatic, if unsurprising, proclamation: The publication has a racist past. For decades, National Geographic depicted “savage” and “inferior” races on its pages. But in owning this history, argues the Editor in Chief, National Geographic is part of a progressive and nuanced dialogue on race. However, in a recent article in The Washington Post, sociologist Victor Ray explains the problematic nature of this “new” conversation about race and how it overstates the progress made on issues of racism and discrimination.

Ray focuses on National Geographic’s cover story, which features biracial twins:

“The cover photo depicts 11-year-old mixed-race twin girls, with the tabloid-esque framing that one is black, the other white. And the headline makes the grand claim that the girls’ story will ‘make us rethink everything we know about race.’ The ‘we’ here is implicitly white people, and the story of these children doesn’t break new ground so much as reinforces dangerous racial views. The girls in the photo, with their differing skin tones, are depicted as rare specimens and objects of fascination.”

While sociologists have long understood race as a social construction, National Geographic paints this as a new discovery. Additionally, the publication implies that individual attitudes and interpersonal conflicts are the root cause of racism. In doing so, they overlook the effects of structural racism:

“Racism is likely to influence the lives of these girls in ways that can’t be reduced to individual, mean-spirited prejudice. For instance, whites in the United States have, on average, 10 times as much wealth as black people. This wealth gap has multiple causes, including institutional racism in lending and housing discrimination. Similarly, because of current and historical patterns of segregation, black Americans are more likely to live in polluted neighborhoods with adverse implications for their long-term health.”

In focusing on the individual actions and the “personal sin” of racism, we underestimate the impact race can have on structural factors, such as wealth, housing, and health. As Ray suggests, National Geographic can take steps to account for its racist past by avoiding frames that overstate progress.

Throughout history, immigrant groups have been used as scapegoats for social problems — be it the continually unfolding European refugee crisis or the aftermath of the Holocaust. And those in favor of xenophobic policies, tend to encourage these negative sentiments against immigrants to garner support these types of policies. In the United States, many politicians demonize immigrants for their supposed violence, but a recent article in The New York Times features research that undermines the foundations of this contention. A team of researchers, led by sociologist Robert Adelman, examined 200 cities across the United States to uncover the relationship between immigration and crime trends over the course of several decades. Their study concluded that while immigration has risen in almost every city since the 1970s, crime has not:

“In 136 metro areas, almost 70 percent of those studied, the immigrant population increased between 1980 and 2016 while crime stayed stable or fell. The number of areas where crime and immigration both increased was much lower — 54 areas, slightly more than a quarter of the total. The 10 places with the largest increases in immigrants all had lower levels of crime in 2016 than in 1980. And yet the argument that immigrants bring crime into America has driven many of the policies enacted or proposed by the administration so far: restrictions to entry, travel and visas; heightened border enforcement; plans for a wall along the border with Mexico…But while the immigrant population in the county has more than doubled since 1980, overall violent crime has decreased by more than 50 percent.”

And while the researchers cannot use this evidence to establish whether an increase in immigration reduces crime, they clearly show that an immigration influx is not the disastrous picture painted by many news sources and politicians:

“In general, the study’s data suggests either that immigration has the effect of reducing average crime, or that there is simply no relationship between the two, and that the 54 areas in the study where both grew were instances of coincidence, not cause and effect. This was a consistent pattern in each decade from 1980 to 2016, with immigrant populations and crime failing to grow together.”

President Trump’s distaste for “political correctness” has deeply resonated with many Americans, especially in rural communities. In a recent interview for Vox, Robert Wuthnow — a sociologist who spent eight years interviewing members of small, rural communities across the country — argues that resentment in predominantly White, rural towns is less a reflection of economic woes and more a response to threatening cultural and demographic changes.

Rural Americans tend to direct their frustration from adjusting to changing economic and social conditions at lawmakers, who they believe are seizing their resources and giving them to big cities. Many discussed cultural shifts and a “moral decline.” For example, one resident felt like the government was taking away their personal control over their lives because they can’t “spank [their] children without ‘the government’ intervening.” Further, Wuthnow describes how growing diversity in the United States threatens many rural Americans’ Christian, white-normative, and heteronormative lifestyles, resulting in rising White nationalism movements, like the Alt-right.

As the country changes and their kids leave to find work in urban centers, White rural Americans feel they are being left behind. But instead of dismissing them, Wuthnow argues that we should try to understand their perspectives. He concludes,

“Rural America does have real problems — population decline, a brain drain, opioid addiction, etc. We can make of that what we want. But that’s not the whole picture. Not every small town is full of people who are suffering and bitter and angry at Washington…[And while] there are significant differences between small towns and large cities,…there are also commonalities. Since we’re living in a polarized time, it’s worth remembering that not all divisions run along the rural-urban divide.”

It’s no surprise that Hollywood could do better in terms of diversity. But it might be surprising that diversity in all aspects of filmmaking pays off, literally. A recent article from NPR discusses Darnell Hunt‘s annual Hollywood Diversity Report. The report finds a “mixed bag” for people of color attaining key roles in the industry. People of color are incredibly underrepresented in positions like talent scouts, directors, and lead roles.  This underrepresentation is especially disconcerting when nearly half of the U.S. population is comprised of people of color, and yet the industry remains predominantly White and male.

Hunt and his team also found that diverse films and TV did extremely well in 2016, and that people of color were the top consumers of ticket sales for many major films that year. In other words, more diversity may mean more monetary payoff. Hunt points to Black Panther as a groundbreaking example in the industry.

“[Black Panther] smashed all of the Hollywood myths that you can’t have a black lead, that you can’t have a predominantly black cast and [have] the film do well. It’s an example of what can be done if the industry is true to the nature of the market. But it’s too early to tell if Black Panther will change business practices or it’s an outlier. We argue it demonstrates what’s possible beyond standard Hollywood practices.”

In short, the success of diverse films should not be underestimated, and it seems to be in Hollywood’s best interest to increase diversity both on screen and behind the camera.

Many of us are familiar with the “white flight” of the 1950s, as droves of White families moved from major cities to the surrounding suburbs. While we might like to believe that white flight is a relic of the past, a recent article in the Pacific Standard highlights recent research by sociologist Samuel Kye showing that white flight remains a reality in many American neighborhoods. Using Census data, Kye found evidence of white flight — losing at least 25% of its White population — in more than 10% of suburban neighborhoods between 2000 and 2010.

While this demographic shift could reflect property values and economic concerns, Kye’s findings suggest that class is not driving these trends. When compared to poorer communities, middle class neighborhoods are actually more likely to experience white flight. As Kye outlines,

“Race not only remains salient in middle-class neighborhoods…but motivates white flight to an even greater degree relative to those same effects in poorer neighborhoods… White flight eventually becomes more likely in middle-class neighborhoods when the presence of Hispanics and Asians exceeds 25 percent and 21 percent, respectively. Middle-class neighborhoods appear to be less reliable routes for the residential integration of Hispanics and Asians.”

Kye’s research demonstrates that despite growing diversity in many rural and urban communities across the United States, white flight will remain a persistent challenge to racial and ethnic integration within neighborhoods — and overall racial and ethnic equality. Kye concludes,

“…racially integrated neighborhoods represent key sites where sustained exposure and contact may continue to erode longstanding divisions, and improve levels of intergroup cooperation and trust.”

Much of the media’s coverage of the Me Too movement focuses on high-profile cases of sexual harassment, as well as gender inequality in white-collar workplaces. Sexual Harassment and other forms of gender inequality are also problems — perhaps even more so — for male-dominated, blue-collar workplaces. A recent article in The New York Times highlights gendered discrimination in workplaces like mines, car factories, and construction sites. 

Sociologist Abigail Saguy argues that men often perceive less-feminine or lesbian women as “not fully women” and therefore as less threatening. On the other hand, men tend to harass more-feminine women more. And women who play along with sexist banter, still face negative labels, like “slut.” Saguy elaborates,

“Sexual harassment is often a way in which the men reaffirm women’s femininity, and [put them] back in their place…. At the same time, women will play up their femininity and flirt a little bit and play along with some of the stereotypes… to be accepted.”

For men in low-paying and dangerous jobs, these affirmations to their masculinity become key rewards, and challenges to their masculinity may heighten discrimination towards women.

“Even if they have to tolerate bad working conditions, the compensation is they were real men… then women were moving into these occupations, so what does that mean? If women can do the job, maybe it’s not so masculine after all.”

We know that a college degree can often help ensure employment, creating pathways to better opportunities and resources in someone’s career and even one’s personal health. A recent article in The Washington Post shows that the health benefits of higher education are more nuanced than scholars originally believed. Drawing from the work of sociologists Andrew J. Cherlin and Jennifer Karas Montez, the article demonstrates that location, race and ethnicity, and even expectations all shape the relationship between a college degree and health.

College degree attainment is related to many health benefits, including longevity. In recent years, White Americans without college degrees faced increasing mortality rates, while Black and Hispanic Americans showed overall advancements in their longevity, even among those without a degree. Andrew Cherlin argues that expectations are particularly important for understanding why there are clear racial differences in the link between degrees and health benefits. As the article outlines,

“It wasn’t long ago that white working-class Americans could count on leading a comfortable life with just a high-school degree. Middle-aged men and women, the very group falling ill and dying, are the first generation without that guarantee. They compare themselves with their parents and find their lives falling short. For black and Hispanic Americans, if you haven’t got as much to hope for, you might just have less to lose.”

Geography and economic differences add more complexity to unpacking the causes of health disparities. Living without a degree in areas that are heavily impacted by economic shifts and with inadequate medical resources like the rural United States can further exacerbate health problems. As Jennifer Karas Montez suggests, tackling these issues on a large scale is even more difficult given that public policies are created at state and local levels. In short, the relationship between health and college attainment is complex. Having a college degree does not directly translate into health benefits and vice versa — those without a college degree are not fated to poor health.