culture

As the election edges ever closer, the question of how support for such a polarizing figure like Donald Trump even became possible is on many people’s minds.

An article in The New Yorker examines sociologist Arlie Russell Hochschild’s new book “Strangers in their Own Land,” for answers to this Trump phenomenon. Hochschild set out to understand the emotional root of the Tea Party movement and the Trump euphoria. Hochschild spent five years conducting research in rural parts of Southern Louisiana, where the vast majority of the population are poor, uneducated, and white.  She found that Tea Party supporters often described American society with a single narrative of “cheaters” and individuals who “do not want to work.” The New Yorker describes this narrative, below:

“The line-cutters were African-Americans, promoted by affirmative action, she writes, but also ‘women, immigrants, refugees, public-sector workers—where will it end? Your money is running through a liberal sympathy sieve you don’t control or agree with.'”

Hochschild writes that Trump fuels this perspective, shaming “virtually every line-cutting group” as people who are just eating away at government handouts, but then failing to mention that blue-collar white men benefit from food stamps and Medicaid. 

“‘In this feint’—by making it seem that white people who accept welfare are only taking advantage of what everyone else gets—’Trump solves a white male problem of pride.'”

Want to avoid the left-swipe? According to Tinder sociologist, Jessica Carbino, the best way to secure a right-swipe is to include a profile picture that does not cover your face. In an article with Yahoo! Beauty, Carbino explains why you will want to avoid the sunglasses for your online dating profile.

In a process known as “thin-slicing,” we make judgements about the personality characteristics of others by examining their facial features. People often make these judgments unconsciously, but these initial impressions appear to be very important. Studies demonstrate that we can accurately predict the trustworthiness, extroversion, and even aggressiveness of an individual in a single-second view of their photo. Carbino says,

“[Making these evaluations] helps us categorize our life when we’re walking down the street. We’re trying to assess if somebody is like us, dangerous, what have you. In dating, it’s: Is this person compatible with us?” 

Online dating has its benefits, but it has specific challenges that come with it as well – you need to convey to your potential suitors who you are in a brief moment in time and with a single picture. So, if you want to be successful at Tinder and other types of online dating, show your true self and your future date can do the rest!

Bring on the sweaters and pumpkin spice lattes!  The time of year has finally arrived where jackets and boots become wardrobe staples and changing leaves capture the imagination. What exactly is it about the autumn season that people love? Kathryn Lively, professor of sociology at Dartmouth College, might have the answer.

In a recent Huffington Post article, Lively explains that people view fall as comforting. From a sociological perspective, individual’s emotions are tied to the meaning we give ourselves, others, and times of year.  For example, the emotional connection towards Thanksgiving and football season symbolizes what many believe the autumn represents. This coming together of joy and creating memories provides special meaning to this season. But perhaps the biggest reason for our infatuation with fall is that we have been socially conditioned to enjoy fall since we were children. The fall represents a temporal landmark where a clean slate can begin and new routines begin. As Lively explains,

“We’re conditioned from a very early age that the autumn comes with all these exciting things…As children, we come to associate fall with going back to school, new school supplies, seeing friends. It’s exciting, for most. We still respond to this pattern that we experienced for eighteen years.”

Whatever the case may be, enjoy the fall season, but remember to brace yourself – winter is coming.

While the gender gap in time spent on household chores is slowly declining, ideas about women as the primary caretaker of the home and caregiver for the children is still very present. These ideas in turn influence how men and women feel about parenting. A recent Huffington Post article features a new study that found mothers report more stress and fatigue than fathers. The researchers attribute this to the division of parenting tasks — married mothers are more likely to mange basic childcare tasks and are more likely to be alone with children, while married fathers are more often in charge of children’s play and leisure activities. Moreover, even when moms have leisure time, they are more likely to be interrupted or to report multitasking during this time.

According to sociologist Ann Meier,

“Having data systematically collected from thousands of parents allows us to confirm what parents have known for years — that parenting is meaningful but also stressful and tiring. Many mothers will recognize their experiences of interrupted sleep and daily feeding and bathing. Hopefully, many dads will see that their partners will likely be happier if they trade some of their leisure time with kids for more of the ‘work’ of parenting.”

It’s no question that the nomination of Donald Trump has caused a highly publicized divide in the Republican Party, but that divide may have taken roots decades ago. A recent Washington Post article by Josh Pacewicz explains that intra-party contention began as a conflict between establishment Republicans and party activists. As far back as the 1970s, Republican Party leaders became increasingly partisan on major issues, with establishment Republicans showing more interest in business than in hot button issues. When the corporate mergers of the 1980s forced businessmen to focus more on economic development, the door was left open for party activists to start exerting their influence on the party.

In his 2006 interviews with Americans living in the Rust Belt, Pacewicz found that the Republican Party was at war with itself: the business community versus the activists. One local businessman and big-time GOP donor interviewed said “the GOP has repositioned itself to a fault. [Those] of us in the middle don’t know what to do; [we’re] so disgusted.” An activist he interviewed, on the other hand, explained that instead of just being a donor, she was willing to go out and knock on doors and make phone calls. As she put it “Why should all the tickets [to political events] go to these Country Club Republicans?” As Pacewicz says,

“A full accounting of Trump’s rise needs historical context. And it was a long-brewing conflict between establishment Republicans and party activists — eventually won by the activists — that laid the groundwork for the current foment within the GOP.”

But we won’t tell The Donald that.

Professors of sociology often struggle to introduce sociological concepts in new and thought-provoking ways to their students. According to a recent article in Bowling Green Daily News, Professor Bertena Varney is tackling this issue in an unconventional way and using the Harry Potter series to engage her students with various sociological topics. In her “Inequality in Society” class at Southern Kentucky Community and Technological College, Varney sorts students into the houses of Hogwarts and each day a specific house leads class discussion on social issues. For example, the students apply the Harry Potter terminology of “muggles” and “squibs” to a discussion of the disabled and mentally challenged.

Not only do the students use Harry Potter to understand concepts, but they also engage in community service, tutoring, and social media in order to compete for the house cup, which awards the winning house fifty points of extra credit at the end of the semester. Varney also views this immersion structure as providing students with future skills outside of the classroom, saying:

“Once you get them thinking about other people besides themselves, they take off. It teaches them a lot of social skills and problem solving … [and] it’s easier for students to find out how they can work together to make the world a better place. ”

When professors use magical teaching methods like Varney, students are so entranced by the material that anti-cheating spells are no longer necessary!  

Social media continues to be a pioneer of new social trends and reshaping society through its ability to connect individuals across cultures and geographies. One of the latest trends involves the process of mourning through social media.

University of Washington recently covered Nina Cesare and Jennifer Branstad‘s new research, presented for the first time at this summer’s annual sociology meetings, that finds that people who use Twitter to mourn a death do so more publicly than compared to other social media sites, like Facebook, where mourning is more private. They explain,

“While posts about death on Facebook, for example, tend to be more personal and involve people who knew the deceased … Twitter users may not know the dead person, tend to tweet both personal and general comments about the deceased, and sometimes tie the death to broader social issues — for example, mental illness or suicide.”

The researchers describe this change as an opening up of the public conversation surrounding death and mourning and an expansion of the “inner circle” that typically mourns the death of a loved one. Cesare explains,

“…I think the ability of Twitter to open the mourning community outside of the intimate sphere is a big contribution, and creating this space where people can come together and talk about death is something new.”

Summer is wedding season, but according to sociologists Julie Brines and Brian Serafini, late summer may also be divorce season. New York Magazine recently featured new findings that indicate divorce may follow seasonal trends. Brines’ and Serafini’s analysis of several U.S. states, including Washington, Ohio, Minnesota, Florida, and Arizona, shows that divorce filings were at their highest in March and August. The researchers believe that these trends may reflect a “last-ditch effort” by couples to repair their relationships during holiday seasons. According to a University of Washington press release,

“Troubled couples may see the holidays as a time to mend relationships and start anew: We’ll have a happy Christmas together as a family or take the kids for a nice camping trip, the thinking goes, and things will be better.”

As a result, divorce rates seem to be highest when the holiday spirit has passed. The approaching school year may also push couples to file for divorce before September, further accounting for the August peak.

Many are sure to remember the historic peace talks between Israeli Prime Minister Rabin and Palestine leader Yasser Arafat in 1993, negotiations which were facilitated by the White House. The iconic pictures of a smiling Rabin, Arafat, and then-president Bill Clinton were facilitated by secret talks in Oslo, Norway, and the story of these negotiations are the subject of the new play Oslo, which is set to appear on Broadway next spring. As described in an article on The Voice of America, the talks were actually set in motion by sociologist Terje Rød-Larsen and his wife Mona Juul, a foreign-service officer. The play captures the unique story of these talks, where Rød-Larsen and Juul facilitated a new kind of negotiation. Rød-Larsen describes below:

“We did it in a way, exactly the opposite way of what it was done in Washington. We did not put proposals on the table. We said we would facilitate, bring the parties together, be go-between, assist them in any way, saying ‘It’s your problem, you have to resolve it yourself. We don’t want to push anything on you.’ And number two, we set up the delegations, should never exceed three persons on each side, because trust is dependent on personal relationships and to build personal relationships. And then we also insisted that they should live in the same house. They should have all meals together; breakfast, lunch and dinner. When there were breaks they could go for walks together, etc. They had to live together.”

The play captures the intertwined nature of the personal and the political, while highlighting the effectiveness of such methods. Of course, the play isn’t some dry paper; the actors have described making the play as a “wild improvisation” and it’s being called a great thriller. Playwright J.T Rogers’ Oslo has sold out at the Lincoln Center, and is sure to be a hit on Broadway, meaning the story of this little sociological experiment is far from curtains.

Online dating has grown substantially in both acceptability and use in the past few years. But because it is still relatively new, Tinder sociologist Jessica Carbino says the norms regarding online dating interactions are “very much still being negotiated.” What’s at the top of the list for women? Calling out the harassment they experience from many of their male suitors. 

Women are starting to speak out about their experiences of harassment from men on online dating sites. To combat these uncomfortable advances, some women are coming together to publicly shame men who harass them. Fast Company recently featured an article showcasing women’s attempts. One woman created an Instagram account called Bye Felipe; she compiled screenshots of online chats that captured uncomfortable messages women receive from men online. Many of the conversations include unwarranted aggression from men, especially after women ignore or reject their advances. Bye Felipe and similar blogs are not the only responses either. Another response is the creation of woman-friendly dating sites. Whitney Wolfe, former executive at Tinder, co-founded Bumble, which specifically lets women make the first move.

So why do men act this way on online dating? Carbino suggests that men’s aggressive advances and behavior may be connected to broader socializing patterns. “We do know that when individuals are removed from interactions where they’re in the presence of others, they may act differently — sometimes more boldly given the relative lack of social accountability,” says Carbino. However, as she’s quick to point out, the same has always been true in the offline world. Apps like Tinder, she notes, provide people with a way to “have a larger degree of contact” with that world.

See other ways women are calling out online dating harassment here.