marxism and functionalism
Functionalism
Key features
Structuralism Organic analogy
Consensus Functional prerequisites Collective sentiment
The most notable early functionalist was Emile Durkheim. The theory was further developed in the mid 1900’s, particularly by American sociologists such as Talcott Parsons. Functionalists adopt an organic analogy to understand the workings of society. If you want to understand how the human body works you might begin by looking at individual parts such as the heart, lungs, brain etc, however, you will not gain a full understanding of how the body works unless you looked at how they work together and affect one another. This is what functionalists do when looking at society. To understand how something such as the family, education or religion, work in society it must be seen in relation to the whole of society. As functionalists are structuralist they see social relationships as governed and organised by rules and patterns. Values provide the general guidelines for our behaviour and are translated into roles and norms. These roles and norms are interconnected across and within the different institutions in society.
What interconnected roles do we have within the family?
Functionalists focus on the functions, or effects, different parts of the social structure have on each other. They also focus on what contributions an institution makes to the rest of society.
What contributions do you think the following institutions make to society? The Family
The Education system
To work out the functions of different parts of, and institutions within, the social structure functionalists look toward the overall requirements of a society if it is to survive. They call these requirements functional prerequisites.
What functional prerequisites does a society have?
How can the following parts of society meet these prerequisites? The economic system
Religion
Key features
Structuralism Organic analogy
Consensus Functional prerequisites Collective sentiment
The most notable early functionalist was Emile Durkheim. The theory was further developed in the mid 1900’s, particularly by American sociologists such as Talcott Parsons. Functionalists adopt an organic analogy to understand the workings of society. If you want to understand how the human body works you might begin by looking at individual parts such as the heart, lungs, brain etc, however, you will not gain a full understanding of how the body works unless you looked at how they work together and affect one another. This is what functionalists do when looking at society. To understand how something such as the family, education or religion, work in society it must be seen in relation to the whole of society. As functionalists are structuralist they see social relationships as governed and organised by rules and patterns. Values provide the general guidelines for our behaviour and are translated into roles and norms. These roles and norms are interconnected across and within the different institutions in society.
What interconnected roles do we have within the family?
Functionalists focus on the functions, or effects, different parts of the social structure have on each other. They also focus on what contributions an institution makes to the rest of society.
What contributions do you think the following institutions make to society? The Family
The Education system
To work out the functions of different parts of, and institutions within, the social structure functionalists look toward the overall requirements of a society if it is to survive. They call these requirements functional prerequisites.
What functional prerequisites does a society have?
How can the following parts of society meet these prerequisites? The economic system
Religion