Changing Patterns of Leisure and Consumption - Essay Example

a) Examine sociological explanations for people’s changing patterns of leisure and consumption since the late twentieth century. Sociologists have recently been arguing about aspects of humanity, especially aspects of daily life that have been overlooked or even taken for granted in the main practices of the discipline. The specific feature that is involved in the area of leisure and consumption has recently drawn out attention because it is perceived to be a component in trends of commodification and consumerism in the late twentieth century (Bramham & Tomlinson 1994). Sociologists have argued that normally forms and levels of consumption differ with the levels of income. However the connection of income to consumption is not wholly simple. The lower class will use up greater fractions of their income on needs and the elite on wants, but the lower class also give excessively to charitable and religious groups (Haworth 2004). The equivalent of the overwhelming selection of products and services introduced in the late twentieth century is the condition that for a significant percentage of consumers some part of their spending is ‘discretionary’ (Haworth 2004). This discretion entails not only brand preferences, or one clothing style or form of diet or residential architecture rather than another. It reaches the entire notion of ‘lifestyle’ (Haworth 2004). Several families will be penny-wise and prudent, saving for their future; others will adopt a lifestyle that exceeds their means. Several families will continue buying things such as summer homes, home workshops, automobiles, and swimming pools—and other will buy experiences such as participation in sports, concerts, plays, or operas. Veblen’s notion of ‘conspicuous consumption’ is very accurate at the turn of the 21st century (Haworth 2004), but not limited anymore to the ‘leisure classes’. A lot more individuals can now take part in this ‘conspicuous consumption’, but the guidelines are greatly changeable. 1(b) Examine how identity is affected by the major social divisions between people in society.  As argued by the basic notion of symbolic interactionism, individuals inhabit a symbolic environment, a designated or categorised dimension of meanings facilitated by the individual capacity for meaningful language or symbols (Vincent 2003). Among the most significant concepts for categorising social life are those that assign social statutes or positions, or socially acknowledged classifications of individuals that denote position in structured social activity or social character (Ellemers, Spears & Doosje 2002). Aside from characterising and positioning individuals in social conditions, social divisions communicate identity or behavioural expectations. The latter are named roles by sociological classical role theory, a tradition applied by identity theory in social psychology (Ellemers et al. 2002). Hence, when individuals use social divisions to identify and acknowledge one another in social circumstances, they bring in role expectations for the behaviour of each other; if they use positions submissively to identify and categorise themselves, they create role expectations or purposes for their personal behaviour (Cote & Levine 2002). Perceived as self-conceptualisations, these reflexively employed positional labels are the emphasis of identity theorists, in which they are called ‘identities’ or ‘role-identities’ (Cote & Levine 2002). The theory of social identity in social psychology raises a comparable identity construct, but underlines identities on the basis of wide-ranging social classifications such as social class, ethnic status, and sex, instead of those related to job-related and other roles in the society’s social structure (Ellemers et al. 2002). In Mead’s and symbolic interactionism’s cognitive tradition, identity theorists define identities as “cognitive responses to oneself [or other] as an object [of consciousness]” (ibid, p. 49). From this point of view, identities have both affective and cognitive characteristics; individuals do not only feel identities, they also think of them. 2(a) Examine how feminist sociological perspectives have contributed to understanding of the family. Encouraging family scholars of the significance of situating their family research within a wider social perspective has been one of the major contributions of feminist sociological perspectives in family studies. This has been shown in family research over the decade in a number of ways. Primarily, there is better understanding of the participation of ‘people of colour’ in family studies (Thompson & Walker 1995).Furthermore, the enlarged focus on ethnic diversity all over the academic curriculum, as well as the emergence of literature and courses concentrated on family multiplicity, has also cultivated, or certainly demanded, new studies of underrepresented racial or ethnic groups (Fox & Murry 2000). Second, there is understanding of the relevance of the issue introduced by Collins’ (1986 as cited in Fox & Murry 2000) explanation of the domination matrix as the setting out of which the life of families is created. Specifically, gender, class, and race are relational groups of domination. To make sense of how family life is organised, each should be investigated in connection to the others, not independently (Fox & Murry 2000). Studies have surfaced that look for the root of diversities in family lifestyle within the structural template created by these three hierarchy axes (Thompson & Walker 1995). Ultimately, practitioners of family studies have contextualised their discipline on family relationships by understanding of the different ways where in close family relationships are influenced by wider social factors, dominant power relations, and governing ideologies (Fox & Murry 2000). Instances involve studies of decisions of men about time management between parent and work responsibilities, decisions about family formation, domestic violence, resource allocation, and division of labour in the family. 2(b) Examine how far the men’s and women’s roles in the household have changed since the mid-19th century. What is apparent from the studies of gender relations in the twentieth century is that children, men, and women pay a great price for adapting to new gender roles in the household and profoundly recognised concepts of gender identity (Kimmel 2000). With only some exceptions, global development organisations still employ a perspective stressing women-in-development instead of developing perspectives of women and men that argue that the wellbeing of women and men are interrelated, and that to support women, it is important as well the acknowledge the roles of men and understand men (Kimmel 2000). Due to the fact that men still govern the public arena, their participation is crucial in transforming institutions. Change is probable to take place when there are associations between women and powerful men within groups. This is more probable to take place as women mobilise and acquire economic control (Goddard 2000). Two basic concerns have to be dealt with, one social and the other economic. Both, impoverished men and women require better access to economic prospects, particularly for gainful self-employment (Goddard 2000). The narrative of revolutionary change in family and gender arenas since the mid-19th century has a thrust of its own and encourages us to think that there is an almost infinite array of suitable choices. It is obvious why such an interpretation interest scholars and researchers who desire to narrate an exciting tale (Adler 1993). However the literature does not substantiate the argument that there has been a radical transformation in attitudes towards sexual values and family patterns. 3 (b) Examine the factors which contribute to child poverty in lone parent families. The greatest impact of single-parenting on children is economic deprivation. The normal pattern for single-parent families in Western societies is to relocate into meagre apartments in unpleasant neighbourhoods because of the shortage of cheap residential areas that will accommodate children (Miller 1992). The outcome is that they frequently abandon their social and support networks at the same time that they are compelled to seek employment or work long hours. For single parents the issue of employment and housing is one of geographic proximity and affordability and access to occupations that offer a living wage (Miller 1992). Furthermore, young mothers confront economic difficulty with the lack of education. As young mothers become adults they usually stay unemployable and unskilled. Child support does not make up for the economic difficulties confronted by single-parent families. Because mothers are granted custody in most cases, fathers are normally obliged to give child support (Mulroy 1988). The income of mothers in single-parent families, increased by transfer payments and child support, is used to sustain the family. Another support source fundamental to the capacity of single parents to handle the demands of home and work is child care (Mulroy 1988). An interruption in child-care agreements can be demanding for any family where in both parents are employed; for the single-parent family, it can generate a difficulty. Single mothers regard childcare as one of the most taxing difficulties in their attempts to sustain their families through waged occupation (Miller 1992). 3(b) Examine the arguments for people’s social and welfare needs being met by a range of public, private and voluntary agencies and service providers, rather than simply by the State. Discussion about the current and future activities of the Welfare State focuses on ideas about the division between public and private institutions and the level of state intervention (Powell & Hewitt 2002). In the private social services the split is threefold. First, a number of services are provided on an informal manner, by informal networks and families. Second, several services are provided on a formal way, by structured bureaucratic institutions (Speak & Graham 2000). Hence, the division is informal or formal—and if the latter, non-statutory or statutory (Powell & Hewitt 2002). Private social services could be inclusionist and integrationist, like those for particular groups such as services for isolated and elderly individuals; they could be intended for fulfilling psychological requirements through counselling to cope with distresses, ambiguities, and anxieties of contemporary life; or they could address advocacy, to widen equality and change or regulate the strictness of provision systems for them to be more sensitive to individual requirements (Powell & Hewitt 2002). In spite of drastic increase in formal social services ever since the creation of the Welfare State, there appears to be no decrease in the need for and employment of unpaid helpers in these formal services (Speak & Graham 2000). In the formation of services it should be emphasised that the requirements which the private social services try to fulfil are found within the society and are not solely the privilege of any one group or class, even though need distribution does differ from one class/group to another, and that in spite of the new argument in family scholarship, it is apparent that the family cannot fulfil all of the responsibilities which are included in the private social services. References Adler, L. International Handbook on Gender Roles. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993. Bramham, P. & A. Tomlinson. Sociology of Leisure: A reader. London: Taylor & Francis, 1994. Cote, J. E. & C.G. Levine. Identity Formation, Agency, and Culture: A Social Psychological Synthesis. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2002. Dornbusch, S.M. & M.H. Strober. Feminism, Children and the New Families. New York: Guilford Press, 1988. Ellemers, N., R. Spears & B. Doosje. ‘Self and Social Identity’, Annual Review of Psychology, 2002, 161+. Fox, G. & V.M. Murry. ‘Gender and Families: Feminist Perspectives and Family Research’, Journal of Marriage and the Family, 2000, 1160+ Goddard, V. Gender, Agency, and Change: Anthropological Perspectives. London: Routledge, 2000. Haworth, J.T. & A.J. Veal. Work and Leisure. New York: Routledge, 2004. Kimmel, M.S. The Gendered Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Miller, N. Single Parents by Choice: A Growing Trend in Family Life. New York: Insight Books, 1992. Mulroy, E.A. Women as Single Parents: Confronting Institutional Barriers in the Courts, the Workplace, and the Housing Market. Westport, CT: Auburn House, 1988. Powell, M. & M. Hewitt. Welfare State and Welfare Change. Philadelphia: Open University Press, 2002. Speak, S. & S. Graham. Service not Included: Social Implications of Private Sector Service Restructuring in Marginalised Neighbourhoods. Bristol, England: Policy Press, 2000. Thompson, L. & A.J. Walker. ‘The Place of Feminism in Family Studies’, Journal of Marriage and the Family, 1995, 847+ Vincent, C. Social Justice, Education and Identity. New York: RoutledgeFalmer, 2003. Read More