Maharashtra HSC Sociology flashcards
Maharashtra HSC Sociology · Build recall with a focused review session.
33 cards. Read the term and the definition here. The deck at the top of this page is optional.
- Sociology
- The systematic, scientific study of human society, social groups, and social interaction, using empirical evidence and theory rather than common sense.
- Auguste Comte
- French thinker who coined the term sociology in 1838 and proposed the law of three stages; regarded as the father of sociology.
- Social fact
- Durkheim's term for external, constraining patterns of behaviour and thought (such as norms and institutions) that exist over and above individual minds.
- Verstehen
- Max Weber's method of interpretive understanding - grasping the subjective meanings actors attach to their own social actions.
- Sanskritisation
- M. N. Srinivas's concept describing lower castes adopting upper-caste rituals, diet, and customs in an attempt to raise their ritual status.
- Society
- A web of social relationships among people who share a territory, culture, and institutions; broader and more abstract than a community.
- Community
- A group of people living in a defined locality and interacting face-to-face, such as a village or neighbourhood; locality-based and relatively small.
- Institution
- An established, normative pattern of behaviour organised around a basic social need, such as family, marriage, education, or religion.
- Status and role
- Status is a position in society; role is the expected behaviour attached to it. Role conflict occurs when expectations of two roles clash.
- Primary group
- A small, intimate, face-to-face group with enduring relationships, such as family or close friends; contrasted with impersonal secondary groups.
- Norms and values
- Norms are shared expectations of behaviour; values are broader ideals about what is desirable. Values guide norms, which guide conduct.
- Joint family
- A family form where parents, their married sons, and grandchildren share a household, property, and often a common kitchen under one authority.
- Kinship
- Relationships based on blood (consanguineal) or marriage (affinal); kinship systems organise descent, inheritance, and marriage rules.
- Sacrament of marriage
- The Hindu view of marriage as a sacred, indissoluble religious duty (samskara) rather than a mere contract; legal divorce now exists under the 1955 Act.
- Cultural lag
- Ogburn's term for the gap that arises when non-material culture such as beliefs and norms fails to keep pace with rapid material or technological change.
- Ethnocentrism
- Judging other cultures by the standards of one's own and treating one's own as superior; contrasted with cultural relativism.
- Socialisation
- The lifelong process by which individuals learn culture, norms, and roles and become functioning members of society, beginning in the family.
- Looking-glass self
- Cooley's idea that the self develops by imagining how others see us, imagining their judgement, and forming self-feeling accordingly.
- Caste
- A hereditary, endogamous, hierarchically ranked social group in India traditionally linked to occupation and notions of purity and pollution.
- Varna and jati
- Varna is the fourfold textual classification of Hindu society; jati is the many actual local endogamous groups. Varna is pan-Indian, jati local.
- Social mobility
- Movement of individuals or groups between social positions; vertical mobility changes rank, horizontal mobility changes group at the same level.
- Dominant caste
- Srinivas's term for a caste that, in a local area, is numerically strong and economically and politically powerful, setting local norms.
- Westernisation
- Adoption of Western institutions, technology, values, and lifestyles in India, especially during colonial rule and after globalisation.
- Modernisation
- A process of adopting rational, scientific, achievement-oriented values and institutions, marked by education, mobility, and industrial urban life.
- Globalisation
- Growing worldwide integration of economies, cultures, and communication, accelerated in India by the 1991 liberalisation reforms and information technology growth.
- Social movement
- Organised collective action seeking to change or resist change in social structures, values, or policies, such as dalit, women's, or environmental movements.
- Dowry
- Property or money given by the bride's family at marriage; prohibited in India by the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961, though practice persists.
- Communalism
- Politicisation of religion in which religious communities are treated as hostile blocs, leading to polarisation and communal violence.
- Disguised unemployment
- A situation where more workers are engaged than needed, so marginal productivity is near zero; common in Indian family agriculture.
- Hypothesis
- A tentative, testable statement about the relationship between two or more variables that research is designed to confirm or reject.
- Reliability and validity
- Reliability is consistency of a measurement across repetitions; validity is whether the instrument actually measures the intended concept.
- Applied sociology
- Use of sociological theory and research methods to address practical problems in policy, social work, health, education, and industry.
- Digital divide
- Unequal access to digital devices, internet, and skills across income, gender, region, and age groups, shaping education and employment opportunities.