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b. The microsociological perspective is more useful because it explains how individuals shape and
create large-scale social institutions.
c. Both are useful and any study that uses only one or the other will be unable to explain anything
useful about society.
d. Both are useful in different ways because they each provide different types of information about the
same object of study.
ANS: D DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 14–16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Applying

7. Which of the following statements best characterizes microsociology?


a. It is an approach that examines interactions between individuals and how those interactions reflect
larger societal patterns.
b. It is an approach that examines institutional interactions that occur over time.
c. It is an approach that quantifies data about social structures so they can be analyzed statistically.
d. It is an approach that focuses exclusively on gender and power as they manifest themselves
socially.
ANS: A DIF: Moderate REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

8. Researcher Pam Fishman studied the conversations of heterosexual couples to determine how power is created and maintained
through everyday, face-to-face interactions. How would you describe her approach?
a. macrosociological
b. historical
c. microsociological
d. comparative
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

9. Sociologists assert that there is a close relationship between the individual and society. How does Pam Fishman’s research on gender
and power in heterosexual couples characterize this relationship?
a. Fishman’s data show how macro-level phenomena like gender and power manifest themselves in
everyday interactions.
b. It doesn’t because Fishman’s data only show how individuals act.
c. Fishman’s data show that micro-level and macro-level phenomena are largely independent of each
other.
d. Fishman’s research shows that there is no relationship between the individual and society.
ANS: A DIF: Difficult REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Remembering

10. Which of the following statements best describes the approach taken by macrosociologists?
a. Macrosociology concentrates on the way large social institutions are created through individual
interactions.
b. Macrosociology examines large-scale social structure to see how it affects individual lives.
c. Macrosociology focuses on creating a beginner’s mind in contrast to microsociology, which uses an
expert’s mind.
d. Unlike microsociology, macrosociology focuses on creating scientific knowledge of the world,
rather than practical knowledge.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 15–16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

11. Researcher Christine Williams looked at patterns of occupational sex segregation by examining the ways large-scale social structures
create the constraints within which individuals live their lives. Her work would be characterized as what kind of sociology?
a. microsociology
b. symbolic interactionist
c. Chicago School
d. macrosociology
ANS: D DIF: Difficult REF: Page 16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding
12. Macrosociology and microsociology approach the study of society from different perspectives. How does the discipline of sociology
deal with these two very different approaches?
a. Most sociologists are macrosociologists; microsociologists are only a small minority.
b. These two perspectives are on a continuum with each other and sociologists can adopt the
perspective most useful for a particular problem.
c. Although the field is fairly evenly split between these two perspectives, almost every sociologist
feels strongly that his or her perspective is the correct one.
d. Microsociology used to dominate the field, but more recently macrosociology has become the
dominant perspective.
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 14–16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

13. Regardless of their various approaches to social phenomena, what are all sociologists trying to do?
a. illuminate the connection between the individual and society
b. explain why poverty and inequality still exist
c. compare the present with the past
d. understand how our society is different from other cultures and other times
ANS: A DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 10–13
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Understanding

14. According to C. Wright Mills, what one quality of mind do all great sociologists possess?
a. open-mindedness
b. sociological imagination
c. praxis
d. attention to detail
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 13
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Applying

15. What is the sociological imagination?


a. a characteristic of society that ensures people remain ignorant of the connections between their
lives and social change
b. a particular way of understanding the criminal mind such as that of a serial killer
c. the ability to understand the connections between biography and history or the self and the world
d. the sociological approach that assumes individual decisions and interactions are independent of
larger social institutions
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 13
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Remembering

16. Why did C. Wright Mills think that it is important for everyone, even people who will never take a sociology class, to develop a
sociological imagination?
a. It will help create more jobs for sociologists.
b. Many people are unaware of the connections between their own lives and the larger course of
history.
c. The sociological perspective is innately understood by nearly everyone, but we rarely acknowledge
it.
d. It will encourage growth in the field of microsociology.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 13
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Analyzing

17. Why would culture shock be a useful state of mind for a sociologist?
a. It makes us unable to function even in simple, everyday ways.
b. It requires us to travel, which helps us grow as human beings.
c. It shows us that people in foreign cultures have a way of life that seems strange to us.
d. It makes us realize we lack an understanding of our surroundings so we can perceive what is right
in front of us.
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 12
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Understanding
18. In order to verify what the everyday actor might just accept or assume to be true, the social analyst must take the perspective of the
a. social worker.
b. native.
c. stranger.
d. insider.
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 9
OBJ: 1.1 Practical vs. Scientific Knowledge MSC: Remembering

19. Taking the sociological approach to everyday life has strengths and weaknesses. One of the weaknesses of this approach is that it
a. accepts many things as true that cannot be verified or confirmed.
b. labors to grasp things that everyday actors understand implicitly.
c. is a practical approach, rather than a scientific approach.
d. requires one to travel in order to feel culture shock.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 9
OBJ: 1.1 Practical vs. Scientific Knowledge MSC: Understanding

20. When it comes to understanding everyday life, one of the weaknesses of being an everyday actor is that you
a. are forced to see everything from the perspective of a stranger.
b. must labor to grasp even simple, common occurrences.
c. can only see things from a historical perspective.
d. make assumptions and fail to investigate or verify those assumptions.
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 9
OBJ: 1.1 Practical vs. Scientific Knowledge MSC: Understanding

21. Many everyday cultural practices such as greeting a friend, giving someone flowers, or using the thumbs-up sign seem like natural
ways of acting. Why does having an awareness of how these practices vary across cultures demonstrate a healthy sociological
imagination?
a. It reminds us that everyday interactions are connected to larger societies and norms.
b. It helps us economically when we do business in different countries.
c. It lets us understand how immigrants perceive America when they move here.
d. It shows us that cultures are not as different as we sometimes think they are.
ANS: A DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 12–14
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Understanding

22. Together and in groups, people organize their lives and social interactions to produce a real and meaningful world. Sociologists can
study this because
a. they are interested in all aspects of human psychology.
b. people organize their lives in patterned ways.
c. sociology understands the importance of human psychology.
d. we often assign characteristics to an entire group based on experience with a single group member.
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Page 9 OBJ: 1.2 What Is Sociology?
MSC: Remembering

23. Why are there disagreements among sociologists about how to define sociology?
a. Society is always changing.
b. Sociologists are trained to be everyday actors.
c. There is no disagreement among sociologists about how to define the discipline.
d. Sociology encompasses a large intellectual territory.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 9–10 OBJ: 1.2 What Is Sociology?
MSC: Applying

24. Metaphorically, what part of sociology is a zoom lens on a camera most like?
a. qualitative research
b. microsociology
c. quantitative research
d. macrosociology
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Applying

25. Researcher Pam Fishman noticed that, within heterosexual couples, women are more likely than men to use questions in conversation.
Why is this finding sociologically important?
a. Questions are more likely used by the partner with less power, so Fishman’s research connects
social structures and individual behaviors.
b. Fishman’s research on conversation styles shows a biological basis for larger social structures.
c. Asking questions is important in maintaining a healthy relationship, as demonstrated by Fishman’s
research.
d. Questions are more likely to be used by the partner who is kinder and emotional, so Fishman’s
research helps explain gender roles.
ANS: A DIF: Difficult REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Analyzing

26. A reality television show called Wife Swap exchanged the mothers from two very different families and filmed the result as the
participants are exposed to radically different ways of life. Although the television network was simply trying to be entertaining, the
show also demonstrates the sociological principle of
a. the sociological imagination.
b. globalization.
c. quantitative methods.
d. culture shock.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 11–12
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Applying

27. Which best describes the research goals of sociologists who use a macrosociological approach and the research goals of sociologists
who use a microsociological approach?
a. Sociologists using a microsociological approach focus only on local concerns.
b. Sociologists using a macrosociological approach are much more likely to be worried about
globalization.
c. No matter what approach they take, all sociologists aim to illuminate the connection between the
individual and society.
d. Regardless of which method they use, the research goal of all sociologists is to prove that
individuals are ultimately in control of their own destinies.
ANS: C DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 14–16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

28. Many Marxist sociologists assume that large-scale economic structures are the most important factors in shaping people’s lives. This
assumption is an example of
a. microsociology.
b. macrosociology.
c. rationalization.
d. symbolic interactionism.
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 15–16
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

29. Where should you start if you possess a sociological imagination and you are asked to study unemployment rates in a city with fifty
million people, of which, fifteen million are unemployed?
a. You should consider the economic and political structures of the society.
b. You should consider the work ethic of the average citizen.
c. You should worry about the intelligence level of the workers who have lost their jobs.
d. You should ask the people who are unemployed how much they want to work.
ANS: A DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 13, 15
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Understanding

30. The divorce rate has steadily increased over time and now more than a quarter of all marriages end within the first four years. What
sort of factors would C. Wright Mills suggest investigating to explain this increase?
a. religious
b. personal
c. structural
d. psychological
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Pages 12–15
OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Applying

31. You are looking over the courses that are offered at your school and you see a class called “The Sociology of Media and Popular
Culture.” You don’t think you need this course because you listen to lots of music, watch a wide variety of television, and often go to
the movies. What would a sociologist tell you?
a. You are a specialist in mass media.
b. You should try to watch media from other cultures to really understand popular culture.
c. You should take classes in film studies instead.
d. You only have “reciped,” or practical knowledge.
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 9
OBJ: 1.1 Practical vs. Scientific Knowledge MSC: Applying

32. There is a close relationship between sociology and the other social sciences. Given how much overlap there is between these fields,
why does sociology still exist as a separate discipline?
a. All the other fields are more specialized, but sociology is a field that considers a huge intellectual
territory.
b. Sociology does not use historical context, which other social sciences do.
c. Sociology departments are an academic tradition and would be difficult to disband.
d. Political science and economics are more politically conservative and sociology provides a liberal
counterbalance.
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 10 OBJ: 1.2 What Is Sociology?
MSC: Applying

33. What could you determine about Pam Fishman if you didn’t know anything about her except that she studied conversation patterns?
a. She is a conflict theorist.
b. She is a macrosociologist.
c. She is a structural functionalist.
d. She is a microsociologist.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 14
OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Applying

34. Why might Karl Marx and Émile Durkheim be placed far apart on sociology’s family tree?
a. Marx’s work is no longer considered very important.
b. Durkheim was more of a psychologist than a sociologist.
c. The theoretical approaches they founded are very different.
d. Durkheim was French whereas Marx was German.
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 21–25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

35. Unlike earlier religious traditions that attempted to determine the ultimate cause or source of reality, Auguste Comte developed
positivism in order to
a. explain how class conflict drove social change.
b. argue that symbolic interactions between individuals were the basis for social life.
c. justify a particular kind of social system based on hierarchy and privilege.
d. identify laws that describe the behavior of a particular reality.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 18 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

36. What is a paradigm?


a. an abstract proposition that explains the social world and makes predictions about the future
b. a set of assumptions, theories, and perspectives that makes up a way of understanding social reality
c. the theory that sense perceptions are the only valid source of knowledge
d. the application of the theory of evolution and the notion of “survival of the fittest” to the study of
society
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 16 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

37. What historical events convinced Auguste Comte that society needed to be guided by thinkers who understood social laws?
a. the American Civil War and the battle over slavery
b. globalization and the rise of international trade and commerce
c. the French Revolution and the instability that followed it
d. the age of exploration and the expansion of European powers into Africa
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 18 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

38. Harriet Martineau supported many ideas that were radical for her time including
a. the liberation of French colonies in Africa.
b. international communism and socialism.
c. labor unions and the abolition of slavery.
d. the French Revolution and the abolition of the monarchy.
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 18 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

39. What was probably Harriet Martineau’s MOST important contribution to the development of sociology as a discipline?
a. her theory of alienation
b. her translation of the work of Auguste Comte into English
c. her work on an early theory of symbolic interactionism
d. her struggle for women’s rights
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 18 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

40. Who coined the phrase “the survival of the fittest”?


a. Charles Darwin
b. Karl Marx
c. Émile Durkheim
d. Herbert Spencer
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 18–19 OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree
MSC: Remembering

41. What economic system emerged during the Industrial Revolution?


a. communism
b. humanitarianism
c. globalization
d. capitalism
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 22
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

42. Émile Durkheim suggested that in traditional societies, people were bound through mechanical solidarity. What was the basis of these
sorts of bonds?
a. interdependence and the division of labor
b. shared traditions and similar experiences
c. a strong ruler who exercised absolute control over the population
d. anomie
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 19
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

43. On any given day, you probably depend on many strangers to provide electricity, water, natural gas, weather forecasts, and other
services. According to Émile Durkheim, this interdependence gives rise to
a. mechanical solidarity.
b. class consciousness.
c. organic solidarity.
d. pragmatism.
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 19
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

44. Émile Durkheim’s study on suicide found that suicide rates went up when the economy slumped, but they also increased when the
economy boomed. Which of Durkheim’s concepts explains why both positive and negative economic conditions could increase
suicide rates?
a. alienation
b. anomie
c. mechanical solidarity
d. organic solidarity
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Page 20
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

45. According to Émile Durkheim, industrialized societies function via organic solidarity. What is the basis for organic solidarity?
a. religion and tradition
b. shared experiences and similar beliefs
c. globalization, mass communications, and technology
d. difference, interdependence, and individual rights
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 19
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

46. Durkheim theorized that the rapidly changing conditions of modern life lead to anomie. What is anomie?
a. normlessness or a loss of connections to the social world
b. anger and disillusionment with progress
c. the transfer of destructive urges to socially useful activities
d. a kind of social solidarity based on interdependence
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 20
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

47. In The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Émile Durkheim argued that religion was a powerful source of social solidarity because
a. religion established authorities who had control over entire societies.
b. different religions were constantly appearing and disappearing.
c. there were many arguments about which religion represented the truth.
d. religion reinforced collective bonds and cultivated shared moral values.
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 20
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

48. According to the theoretical position developed by Karl Marx, what is the engine of social change?
a. conflict between social groups
b. exploration beyond the boundaries of a given society
c. development of technology
d. shared moral values
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 22
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

49. According to Karl Marx, the most important factor in social life is a person’s
a. race or ethnicity.
b. religious beliefs.
c. relationship to the means of production.
d. level of education.
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 22
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

50. What does Marx see as the primary tool for the oppression of the lower social classes in modern society?
a. increasing power of the police state
b. religious authorities
c. aristocracy
d. industrial capitalism
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 22
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

51. What term did Karl Marx use to describe the fact that most of the population accepts inequality even when it does not benefit them
personally?
a. class consciousness
b. existentialism
c. ethnomethodology
d. false consciousness
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

52. The ________ of white supremacy in the United States was a system of beliefs and attitudes that maintained the status quo of racism.
a. praxis
b. antithesis
c. false consciousness
d. ideology
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

53. What was Marx criticizing when he said that religion is “the opiate of the masses”?
a. the way religion defines what is sacred and what is profane
b. the way religion increases anomie among the working class
c. the use of religion by the ruling class to oppress the working class
d. the way individuals use religion to support their actions
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

54. After studying the indigenous peoples of Australia, ________ concluded that any form of religion is united in its definition of what is
considered to be ________ and ________.
a. Talcott Parsons; manifest functions; latent functions
b. Émile Durkheim; sacred; profane
c. Karl Max; manifest functions; latent functions
d. Robert Merton; sacred; profane
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Page 19
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

55. According to Karl Marx, how could a belief in heaven as a reward for earthly suffering serve the interests of the ruling class?
a. by keeping the lower classes from demanding better treatment in this life
b. by distracting the lower classes with fantastic spectacles
c. by using the church as a means to extract economic resources from the poor
d. by keeping working classes busy with religious activities and with no time to organize
ANS: A DIF: Moderate REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

56. What did Karl Marx think the lower classes needed to develop in order to end their oppression?
a. a critical theory of gender
b. a stronger sense of verstehen
c. class consciousness
d. false consciousness
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

57. According to Karl Marx, how is class consciousness, or revolutionary consciousness, developed?
a. by a eurocentric party leading a violent revolution
b. through a religious awakening
c. by achieving perfect industrial production so that most workers are unemployed
d. by the lower classes recognizing how society works and challenging those in power
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

58. Karl Marx’s thought intellectuals should engage in praxis, meaning that they should
a. constantly practice and develop the craft of social analysis.
b. not just theorize about the world but change it.
c. evaluate ideas based on their usefulness in everyday life.
d. analyze and give meaning to every action.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 24
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

59. In 2007, the richest 1 percent of the American population owned 35 percent of the country’s wealth and the bottom 80 percent of the
population owned 14 percent. Karl Marx would call this
a. alienation.
b. bourgeoisie.
c. social inequality.
d. organic solidarity.
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 23–24
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

60. In eighteenth-century Great Britain, a series of Enclosure Acts were established by Parliament that broke up small farms, forced many
small farmers to move to large cities in search of wage labor, and increased agricultural profits for landowners. Of what large-scale
social system was this a part?
a. socialism
b. agrarian utopianism
c. feudalism
d. capitalism
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

61. If someone has no way to make money but to sell his or her own labor, then he or she must be a member of what social group?
a. bureaucrats
b. proletariat
c. bourgeoisie
d. capitalists
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 22
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

62. The Egg McMuffin is a vastly more efficient version of eggs Benedict. Egg McMuffins are cheaper, ready almost instantly at drive-
through windows, and can be eaten with one hand while driving. However, they do not improve on the taste of or experience eating
eggs Benedict. Max Weber might have described the Egg McMuffin as the ________ of breakfast.
a. iron cage
b. alienation
c. praxis
d. rationalization
ANS: D DIF: Difficult REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

63. Max Weber believed that as the Industrial Revolution progressed, society became increasingly rationalized. How did he define
rationalization?
a. an increasing number of rules that limit personal freedom
b. an increasing emphasis on verstehen, or the attempt to understand others’ experiences
c. the application of psychology to the economy to understand how to increase productivity
d. the application of economic logic to all aspects of social life
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

64. Max Weber believed that modern industrialized societies were characterized by which of the following institutions?
a. churches
b. central governments
c. bureaucracies
d. prisons
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

65. What did Max Weber mean when he said that modern people are trapped in an “iron cage”?
a. Most aspects of life are increasingly controlled by rigid rules and rationalization.
b. More and more people live under totalitarian dictators and therefore lose their basic rights and
freedoms.
c. Increasingly, modern society has more laws and it uses them to put more people in prison.
d. The conditions of modern life create a psychic prison that leaves most people discontent with
civilization.
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

66. Max Weber helped lay the groundwork for sociologists who would develop symbolic interactionism as a theory because he believed
that a social scientist should approach the study of human action
a. through a theoretical lens that emphasizes disenchantment and bureaucracy.
b. from a value-free point of view.
c. with verstehen (understanding), which emphasizes empathy with individuals’ experiences.
d. through psychoanalysis and the work of Sigmund Freud.
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

67. What did W. E. B. Du Bois have in common with Harriet Martineau?


a. Both made careers of studying race and racism.
b. Both were from the American South.
c. Both saw symbolic interactionism as the most promising aspect of social theory.
d. Both were intrigued by America’s democratic promise, but disappointed in its hypocritical
injustices.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 18, 28
OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree | 1.7 Microsociological Theory
MSC: Applying

68. Jane Addams was an early advocate of applied sociology. This means that she did not just do research but that she also
a. reported illegal activities to the proper authorities.
b. examined the historical origins of the phenomena she researched.
c. addressed social problems through hands-on activity in the communities she researched.
d. compared the communities she studied to communities from other cultures.
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Page 28
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Remembering

69. What is the term used to describe sociological research that is intended to solve social problems, such as the research done by Jane
Addams?
a. practical sociology
b. postmodern sociology
c. moral sociology
d. applied sociology
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 28
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Remembering

70. Although she made contributions to sociology, Jane Addams is perhaps best remembered for her embrace of praxis, which means that
she
a. was a pragmatist.
b. acted on her intellectual convictions in practical ways.
c. applied dialectics to her understanding of history.
d. embraced conflict theory.
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 28
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Applying

71. What school of social theory believes that society is a stable system of structures, which contribute to the equilibrium of the whole?
a. symbolic interactionism
b. dramaturgy
c. structural functionalism
d. conflict theory
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 19–21
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

72. Critical race theory is associated with which of the major theoretical perspectives or schools of thought in sociology?
a. structural functionalism
b. conflict theory
c. functional theory
d. symbolic interactionism
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 24
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

73. Structural functionalist theory is concerned with the ways in which structures contribute to the stability of society. What is a structure?
a. a social institution that is stable over time and helps meet the needs of society
b. any aspect of society that generates conflict or change
c. a class hierarchy
d. an informal agreement between people over a wide geographical area
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 20
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

74. According to Robert Merton, which of these statements about manifest functions is true?
a. Manifest functions usually have something to do with social conflict and change.
b. Manifest functions are intended and obvious.
c. Manifest functions are designed to alleviate inequality.
d. Manifest functions are designed to critique the social system that produced them.
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Page 21
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

75. Which of the following is a latent function of the educational system in the United States?
a. teaching reading and writing
b. keeping children out of trouble while parents are at work
c. preparing a modern workforce to use technology
d. teaching new immigrants about American values and history
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 21
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

76. Which of the following is the most serious critique of structural functionalism?
a. It tends to argue that intellectuals should act on what they believe.
b. It overemphasizes the importance of the economy.
c. It fails to provide a universal social theory.
d. It tends to argue that any social feature that exists must serve a function.
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Page 21
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Understanding

77. Which of the following theories views society as a whole unit made up of interrelated parts that work together?
a. structural functionalism
b. conflict theory
c. symbolic interactionism
d. postmodernism
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 19
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

78. Some Marxists believe that conflict between small merchants and the nobility led to the creation of modern capitalism, which was
distinct from either of the opposing forces. What would Marx call this model of historical change?
a. a critical model
b. a dialectical model
c. a class consciousness model
d. a nihilist model
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Page 23
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

79. In his Theses on Feuerbach, Karl Marx argued that “the philosophers have only interpreted the world, the point is to change it.” What
Marxist principle is defined by this quote?
a. verstehen
b. rationalization
c. praxis
d. conflict
ANS: C DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 24–25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

80. Which of the following theories focuses on how our behaviors are dependent on the ways we interpret, make sense of, and define
ourselves, others, and social situations?
a. conflict theory
b. symbolic interactionism
c. pragmatism
d. structural functionalism
ANS: B DIF: Easy REF: Pages 25–29
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Remembering

81. Which social theory focuses on micro-level interactions?


a. symbolic interactionism
b. structural functionalism
c. conflict theory
d. pragmatism
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 29
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Remembering

82. According to symbolic interactionism, what is the relationship between the self and society?
a. The development of a sense of self is guided by society.
b. The self is shaped by society, but society is also shaped by the self.
c. Both the self and society are created by the course of history.
d. Both the self and society are shaped by larger external forces.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 25–29
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Understanding

83. The theory of symbolic interactionism was developed by


a. the Chicago School of sociology.
b. the French positivists.
c. structural functionalists.
d. queer theorists.
ANS: A DIF: Moderate REF: Page 28
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Remembering
84. Symbolic interactionism argues that people act toward things on the basis of their meaning. According to this perspective, how does
meaning arise?
a. Meaning is inherent in objects and actions.
b. Meaning is learned through the study of philosophy and history.
c. Meaning is negotiated through interaction with others.
d. Meaning is learned through the study of science and nature.
ANS: C DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 25–29
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Applying

85. A dishonest judge must pretend to be an honest judge, but even an honest judge must play the role of “honest judge” for an audience
in order to interact and work with others effectively. This performance is an example of what theoretical perspective?
a. structural functionalism
b. dramaturgy
c. ethnomethodology
d. conflict theory
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Page 30
OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory MSC: Applying

86. What is the link between feminist theory and conflict theory?
a. They both see the economy as central to the functioning of society.
b. They both seek to not only understand inequality but also to remedy it.
c. They both see gender as the most important aspect of social identity.
d. They both were developed at about the same time.
ANS: B DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 21–22, 24–25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

87. Why is the term “queer” used to describe queer theory?


a. It emphasizes that some people are born with a fixed orientation and cannot change it.
b. It emphasizes the importance of difference and rejects a single gay or lesbian identity.
c. It is an easily definable category.
d. It has a long history of use within the gay and lesbian community.
ANS: B DIF: Difficult REF: Page 24
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Applying

88. What is a sociologist’s theoretical perspective if he or she argues we have seen the “dissolution of master narratives or
metanarratives”?
a. feminist theory
b. conflict theory
c. structural functionalism
d. postmodernism
ANS: D DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 23–24
OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches MSC: Applying

89. The application of economic logic to human activity is known as


a. Weberian theory.
b. critical theory.
c. class consciousness.
d. social Darwinism.
ANS: A DIF: Easy REF: Page 25
OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

90. Sarah believes that thanks to the ability of science and technology to create progress, problems will be solved and life will improve.
Sarah would best be described as a
a. Marxist.
b. positivist.
c. modernist.
d. postmodernist.
ANS: C DIF: Easy REF: Page 33
OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches MSC: Applying

91. Postmodernists are interested in ________, or taking apart and examining stories and theories.
a. dramaturgy
b. praxis
c. antitheses
d. deconstruction
ANS: D DIF: Easy REF: Page 33
OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches MSC: Remembering

TRUE/FALSE

1. C. Wright Mills described a process by which biography (individual lives) and history (larger social forces) are related. He argued that
this process works in two ways: individual lives influence society, while society also influences individuals.

ANS: T DIF: Easy REF: Page 13


OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Remembering

2. A sociologist’s responsibility is to question everything the everyday person would take for granted.

ANS: T DIF: Easy REF: Pages 9–10


OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Remembering

3. There is only one correct theoretical explanation for any particular social phenomenon.

ANS: F DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 14–16


OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Remembering

4. The writings of Émile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Max Weber were deeply influenced by their life experiences.

ANS: T DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 19, 22, 24


OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Remembering

SHORT ANSWER

1. Émile Durkheim’s pioneering study Suicide used statistical data to look for correlations between demographic variables and suicide.
In what ways is his work compatible with Auguste Comte’s ideas about how society should be studied?

ANS:
When he conducted his infamous suicide study in 1897, Durkheim used Comte’s theory of positivism in the manner Comte intended.
Positivism was a concrete form of social research that suggested social life could be studied in a manner comparable to the hard
sciences.

DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 18–19


OBJ: 1.5 Sociology’s Family Tree | 1.6 Macrosociological Theory
MSC: Applying

2. In what ways does queer theory suggest that no category of sexual identity is fundamentally deviant or normal?

ANS:
According to queer theory, sexuality is a social construct. Therefore, it is fluid and is viewed differently according to the social
structure of the time period. Because these views are constantly changing, conventional dichotomies of gay and straight are limited in
defining human sexual preferences and sexual involvement.

DIF: Easy REF: Page 24 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Remembering

3. How is hip-hop music an example of a postmodern art form?


ANS:
Hip-hop uses several genres of music, such as reggae and rock, and it overlays beats and words to create new sounds from old,
established musical forms.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 33–34 OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches
MSC: Applying

4. According to conflict theory, how do most major social institutions remain integrated into the economy and therefore reinforce the
class structure?

ANS:
Conflict theorists believe that the capitalist system of for-profit businesses causes mass poverty and class division. Karl Marx argued
that capitalism, which emerged during the Industrial Revolution, enabled the owners of the means of production (the bourgeoisie) to
exploit the masses of workers (the proletariat), creating an inherently unequal system of social class. Also, false consciousness can
lead oppressed people to accept inequality and not challenge their position in the class structure.

DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 21–24 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Applying

5. Why do structural functionalists argue that dysfunction tends to create social change?

ANS:
When one structure of society encounters a disruption, there is a ripple effect across all social structures. This leads to the need for
social change so that social systems may restore balance. For example, if a country goes to war, there will be a deficit in the economy.
As a result, money available for education decreases as tax dollars are given to the military; soldiers die, resulting in single-parent,
single-income households; and people begin to struggle with their religious beliefs, reducing involvement in the volunteer structure of
communities. The system will fight for equilibrium and will eventually function, albeit in a different manner than it did before the war.

DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 20–21 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Applying

6. How does taking the sociological perspective enable sociologists to understand human life in society?

ANS:
Taking the sociological perspective enables sociologists to view the world through a beginner’s mind. By eliminating their personal
experiences, opinions, and biases, they are able to learn about the familiar world in new ways.

DIF: Easy REF: Page 10 OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective


MSC: Remembering

7. What are we failing to see, according to C. Wright Mills, when we think of our personal problems as character flaws?

ANS:
Mills argued that we need to view our personal problems through the larger perspective of how they are related to the social structure
in which we live and the historical context of our society.

DIF: Moderate REF: Page 13 OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective


MSC: Applying

8. What are the advantages of midrange theory?

ANS:
Midrange theory merges micro and macro levels of analysis. This approach to theorizing makes sociological research more feasible
because it does not simply rely on the polarities of small- and large-scale analyses.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 33–34 OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches
MSC: Remembering

9. According to Erving Goffman’s theory of dramaturgy, why might you dress differently for a date than you would for a sociology
class?

ANS:
Goffman believed that the self is created through our interactions with other people and how we present ourselves changes depending
on the social context. Because a sociology class is an informal social setting, you can wear casual attire without paying heed to your
hair and/or makeup. On the other hand, your clothing and grooming choices for a date would be significantly different. In this case,
you would want to a make a good impression, so you would present yourself in a way that emphasizes your positive personal qualities.

DIF: Easy REF: Page 29 OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory


MSC: Applying

10. Describe the three main theoretical perspectives of macrosociology and name at least one theorist for each perspective.

ANS:
Conflict theory, which emphasizes social inequality as the basic characteristic of society, developed out of the work of Karl Marx.
Structural functionalism looks at society as a unified whole that needs separate structures to function. Robert Merton, a well-known
sociologist who developed strain theory, would be considered a structural functionalist. Weberian theory, which derives its name from
Max Weber, studied the process of rationalization and bureaucracies.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 19–25 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Remembering

ESSAY

1. The sociological perspective, as a way of thinking about the world, includes the concepts of sociological imagination from C. Wright
Mills, beginner’s mind from Bernard McGrane, and culture shock from anthropology. Define each concept in your own words and
then explain what all three of these concepts have in common.

ANS:
Social imagination is about looking for connections between the personal and the social. Beginner’s mind is a technique for ignoring
old knowledge in order to find new ways of seeing the world. Culture shock is a way of seeing things as if we had never seen them
before. All three concepts advocate ways of thinking that help us clear away preconceptions that may be blocking us from seeing and
understanding things that are directly in front of us. They all help us achieve a sociological perspective.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 10–13 OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective
MSC: Understanding

2. Consider the contrast between practical knowledge and scientific knowledge. Describe an activity or social phenomenon of which you
have practical knowledge and then list the steps you might take to develop scientific knowledge of it. Describe how your knowledge
might change as you develop this scientific approach to the subject and demonstrate that you understand the difference between the
two types of knowledge.

ANS:
Any answer should demonstrate knowledge of some everyday activity the student can use in a functional way but about which he or
she does not have completely coherent, excruciatingly clear, consistent, or complete knowledge. Examples of ways to develop
scientific knowledge could include schools, bookstores, libraries, or some other source of learning.

DIF: Moderate REF: Page 9 OBJ: 1.1 Practical vs. Scientific Knowledge
MSC: Remembering

3. Sociologists often have to decide if they are going to adopt a microsociological or macrosociological approach in any given project.
Explain how these perspectives differ, paying special attention to the different assumptions about how society works that are
contained within each perspective. In other words, considering the starting point of each perspective, what do they seek to reveal?

ANS:
Microsociology focuses on the interactions between individuals, whereas macrosociology examines large-scale social structures.
Microsociologists tend to think that individual-level interactions create the larger patterns, processes, and institutions of society.
Macrosociologists tend to assume that large social structures create the context and conditions within which individuals act.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 14–16


OBJ: 1.4 Levels of Analysis: Micro- and Macrosociology MSC: Understanding

4. Compare and contrast conflict theory with structural functionalism. Pay special attention to the way each theory treats the origin of
social change.
ANS:
Structural functionalism begins with the study of structures identified as social institutions. Any answer should emphasize that society
is a stable, ordered system of interrelated parts or structures and that each structure has a function that contributes to the continued
stability or equilibrium of the whole.
Conflict theory treats social conflict as the basis of society and suggests that disagreements over values and beliefs actually reflect
struggles over resources and power. Conflict theory emphasizes a materialist view of society based on the economy, a critical stance
toward the status quo, and a dynamic model of historical change. Conflict theorists see social change as the inevitable consequence of
the struggle over resources.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 19–24 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Analyzing

5. Symbolic interactionism is a micro-level approach to sociology. It sees face-to-face interactions as the building blocks of larger social
institutions. Describe how individuals interacting with each other can produce larger social institutions. Pick an example and describe
how specific social acts can, when repeated by many people, create large-scale social structures.

ANS:
The textbook uses the example of the meaning of a tree to demonstrate the relationship between “meaning” and “interaction.” The key
point is that society and the self are twinborn—social structures that only exist because they are created through individual action.

DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 25–30 OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory


MSC: Analyzing

6. According to symbolic interactionism, describe how meaningful reality is created.

ANS:
The textbook uses the example of how a tree can mean different things to different people in different social situations. We act toward
things on the basis of their meaning, which is not inherent in the things themselves but is negotiated through interaction and can
change or be modified over time. This demonstrates that meaningful reality is created through interaction.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 25–30 OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory


MSC: Applying

7. Classical sociological theory arose in the nineteenth century in the aftermath of the American and French revolutions and during the
Industrial Revolution. Summarize how the theories of Karl Marx, Émile Durkheim, and Max Weber all reflect a concern for the
consequences of modern life.

ANS:
The textbook describes several concepts from each theorist that relate directly to the problems of modern life. Marx focused on the
alienation and social inequality created by the rise of urban capitalism and on how false consciousness and ideology contributed to the
oppression of the working classes. Weber was concerned about how the shift to a modern industrialized society resulted in
disenchantment with the world as well as the “iron cage” of bureaucratic rules. Durkheim theorized that anomie, or normlessness
resulting from social disconnection, was a consequence of the transition from mechanical solidarity to organic solidarity.

DIF: Moderate REF: Pages 19–20, 21–23, 24–25


OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory MSC: Analyzing

8. Structural functionalism attempts to explain the social world by examining social structures, which perform functions that contribute
to the stability of society as a whole. What are some of the types of functions that social structures can perform?

ANS:
The textbook examines two ways of categorizing functions. First, Talcott Parsons proposed that social structures can fulfill such
functions as helping us adapt to our environment and providing us with opportunities to realize goals. They also contribute to the
equilibrium of society by increasing social cohesion and maintaining cultural patterns. Second, Robert Merton theorized that functions
performed by social structures can be either manifest (intended) or latent (unintended).

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 19–21 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Remembering

9. According to Karl Marx, what is the relationship between the economy and other parts of society including intellectual, religious, and
political life?
ANS:
Marx argued that because the ruling class controls the economy, it controls the rest of society as well. Therefore, he argued that the
dominant ideology justifies and benefits those who own the means of production, religion is used by the ruling class to create false
consciousness and perpetuate oppression of the working class, and the prevailing ideas are the ideas of the ruling class. Answers might
also explain the distinction between false consciousness (a denial of the truth about the real circumstances in which one lives) and
class consciousness, which is an understanding of the economic exploitation inherent in capitalism.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 21–23 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Analyzing

10. Describe the sociological theories that developed from symbolic interactionism. What do they have in common and how do they
further the perspective?

ANS:
There are three offshoots of symbolic interactionism described in the textbook: Erving Goffman’s theory of dramaturgy, Harold
Garfinkel’s theory of ethnomethodology, and the theory of conversation analysis. Each theory emphasizes “social acts rather than
social facts,” demonstrating that larger social institutions are constantly made and remade through individual actions and interactions.
They expand on the original ideas of symbolic interactionists by reinforcing specific aspects of culture as meaningful and important in
the formation of society.

DIF: Moderate REF: Page 29 OBJ: 1.7 Microsociological Theory


MSC: Remembering

11. Describe the main features of postmodern social theory and explain both positive and negative reactions to postmodernism.

ANS:
In postmodern theory, social reality is diverse, pluralistic, and constantly in flux. In postmodernism, there are no absolutes—no claims
to truth, reason, right, order, or stability. Everything is therefore relative—fragmented, temporary, situational, provisional, and
contingent. Postmodernists believe that certainty is illusory and they prefer to explore the possibilities created by fluidity, complexity,
multidimensionality, and even nonsense. They propose that there is no constant or universal human truth from which we can know or
interpret the meaning of existence.
For proponents, postmodernism can be celebrated as a liberating influence that can rescue us from the stifling effects of rationality,
essentialism, and tradition. For opponents, it can be condemned as a detrimental influence that can imprison us in a world of relativity,
nihilism, and chaos.

DIF: Easy REF: Pages 33–34 OBJ: 1.8 New Theoretical Approaches
MSC: Understanding

12. If you were feeling very generous to shoe manufacturers, you might argue that the manifest function of the production of newer and
more expensive athletic shoes is to increase athletic performance. For a moment, let’s not be generous. Explain another manifest
function of the appearance of new athletic shoes and at least two latent functions.

ANS:
A manifest function is the obvious, intended function of a social structure, whereas a latent function is the less obvious and sometimes
unintentional function. In this case, the obvious manifest function would be to increase revenue for makers of athletic apparel. The
latent functions might include increased jealousy and competition among teenagers, violence and muggings in order to obtain shoes,
teenage boys showing increased fashion consciousness, and the creation of a subculture that bonds over its interest in shoes.

DIF: Difficult REF: Page 21 OBJ: 1.6 Macrosociological Theory


MSC: Applying

13. Identify and describe the most essential elements of the theories of the classical sociological thinkers—Marx, Durkheim, and Weber.
How do their visions of modernity differ?

ANS:
Marx’s conflict theory centers on alienation (the sense of dissatisfaction workers feel when they are producing goods that are
controlled by someone else). Durkheim’s theory of structural functionalism focuses on anomie (the loss of norms and purpose that
results from weaker social ties and an increased pace of change). Weberian theory emphasizes that modern industrialized society
controls our lives through rigid rules and rationalization, trapping us in a so-called iron cage of bureaucracy.

DIF: Difficult REF: Pages 19–20, 21–23, 24–25


OBJ: 1.3 The Sociological Perspective MSC: Analyzing
Another random document with
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CHAPTER I.
THE “GROUP MIND”
A DEFINITION AND A DESCRIPTION
The causes of intolerance rest, not in what men say but in what
they do. The reasons alleged for dislike or suspicion of the Jew are
valuable merely for showing a state of mind in the anti-Semite
himself, not for revealing the actual reasons for his attitude. For that
reason I shall disregard these reasons very largely in searching for
the causes of anti-Semitism in America. Instead, I shall turn to the
field of social study to find out how groups of men act toward one
another, and why and under what circumstances intolerance is one
of their by-products. I shall apply to the phenomena of group life the
method of behaviorism, now being adopted by sociology from its
original field of psychology, in such definitions as that of E. C.
3
Lindeman: “Sociology is the science of collective behavior.”

1.
The prevailing view of students of society seems now to be that
society is a natural phenomenon on the mental plane. Human
society is not now regarded, as by Buckle, as a reflection of
environment, even though the importance of physical background
and racial constitution must be recognized. As Charles A. Ellwood
4
says, “Society is a group of psychically interacting individuals.” “The
5
essential element in the social process is the psychical element.”
That is to say, mental material—instincts, emotions, feeling, and
ideas—are the plane on which groups of individuals combine into
social structures, operate in social functions, develop to social
progress. Relations between individuals (except for the limited
biological function) are mental relations, carried on through physical
media such as postures, speech and writing.
These mental interactions of human beings are not an artificial
construct from primitive egoism by the social contract or any other
method. William MacDougall is almost alone in holding that the
social sentiments are derived from the self-regarding ones through
the operation of the tender emotion and the parental instinct.
6
Hobhouse says: “The conception of a primitive egoism on which
sociality is somehow overlaid is without foundation in either biology
or psychology.” John Dewey puts this view most forcibly:
7
The fact is that the life, the experience, of the individual man, is
already saturated, thoroughly interpenetrated, with social inheritance
and references.... Education, language, and other means of
communication are infinitely more important categories of knowledge
than any of those exploited by absolutists. And as soon as the
methodological battle of instrumentalism is won ... the two services
that will stand to the credit of instrumentalism will be calling attention
first to the connection of intelligence with a genuine future, and
second, to the social constitution of personal, even of private
experience, above all of any experience that has assumed the
knowledge form.
And Ellwood adds—expressing here the general opinion of both
sociologists and modern social philosophers—“All human
consciousness is socially conditioned.... This is as true of the racially
inherited aspects of consciousness—the feeling-instincts—as it is of
the acquired traits.” Man is a social animal and his sociality is one of
the few unescapable things about him. He is born in some kind of a
social group; he gets the most of his ideas from his association with
others; his whole development is a give-and-take in which the take is
from the first, and often remains, the greater element.
But the recognition of this fact does not bind us to any one
explanation of it. We do not need to accept the “consciousness of
kind” of Giddings, the “herd instinct” of Trotter, or the “imitation” of
Tarde,—in fact, we may very well consider that there is no one
principle to explain so universal and complex a phenomenon; that
these terms and others like them are in no sense explanations, but
merely different words for the same fact, that man is a naturally
gregarious or social being. We may rather turn to the more
generalized modes of expressing this conception, the group mind or
general will, as developed by Durkheim, Wundt and in our day by
Baldwin, MacDougall, and others.

2.
Before attacking this problem directly, I must clear away several
misconceptions of the “group mind,” which I cannot accept as a part
of this theory. First, this thesis need not exclude the operation of
physical and biological forces on social groups, any more than it
excludes their operation on any individual, who is also a
psychological unit. Society may well be a unit, just as the individual
is, in a world of varying forces—climate, birth rates, and the like.
Second, a theory of group mind may be empirical, and need not
necessarily rest on an idealistic conception of the Volksgeist. By
adopting the historical method, rather than the statistical, relying on
values to indicate our problem rather than trying to express it in
terms of natural science, we shall find ourselves treating the theory
of the group in a realistic and empirical way, eschewing the
dogmatism of applying a priori principles to human material, and the
equal fallacy of considering minds in the same terms as chemical
8
elements.
Third, a modern social psychology need not be a literal
transcription of Durkheim or Wundt, relying on an antiquated
psychology for its analogies and its basic conceptions. A theory of
group mind today must recognize that personality is not always a
unity, that it is never a complete unity; the vast field of the
unconscious in mental life has just been opened to view. Both of
these conceptions apply to the mental life of men in great masses as
truly as when alone. Neither the individual nor the group is
something hard, fixed and static; neither can be summed up as a
group of faculties or a system of ideas. Both individual and group
9
must be conceived in process, to take the words of Lindemann, as
“the total equipment with which man responds to his environment, all
that enters into behavior from the side of human nature.”
Some views of group mind are vitiated for our present purpose by
the narrow limits they impose, or by the one-sided way in which they
arrive at their definitions. This applies especially to those who use
the mob as the typical group and consider “crowd-mindedness” (to
use Everett Dean Martin’s term) as a synonym of sociality. The
crowd, the herd, the mob are various terms for an exceptional type of
group of human beings, bound together by physical presence,
transformed by a powerful emotion, launched finally into unified and
10
often violent action. But as Baldwin says: “The mind of the crowd
is essentially a temporary, unorganized, ineffective thing.... The mob
is a by-product of society, it is the exaggeration of the normal.”
Finally, the group mind need not be expressed entirely in terms of
instinctive adaptation, any more than the mind of the individual;
either may have many types, may be instinctive or impulsive or
rational, may have a growing sense of rationality and a growing
power of independent, deliberate action. In opposition to
MacDougall, with his elaborate system of instincts and sentiments,
we may place the vast majority of students of the problem, Cooley,
Platt, Ellwood, Baldwin, and so on. Even when the members of a
group all use reason to a very high degree, they still constitute a
group if they have organization and some method of reaching a
general decision, as in a congress, a national association of
scientists, or a business corporation.
Obviously, human beings form many kinds of groups, and there
would then, on an empirical basis, be many varieties of group minds.
Individuals fall into many classes, as we all know, primitive and
cultured, ignorant and educated, the infant, the child and the adult,
the moron and the genius. So with the group. There are large and
small groups, from families to nations; temporary and permanent
ones, from the theatre audience to the church; simple and complex,
from town meeting to a Federal union, comprising states, counties,
cities and townships; unorganized and organized; groups founded on
physical presence, like a baseball team, and international bodies of
scientists or philosophers who may form “a school of thought” but
may never hold a meeting. The study of these various types is not
only interesting in itself; it may help us in formulating the principle of
the mind of the group as a whole. To begin with the definition of the
primitive group by Franz Boaz:
11
There are a number of primitive hordes to whom every stranger
not a member of the horde is an enemy, and where it is right to
damage the enemy to the best of one’s power and ability, and if
possible to kill him. This custom is based largely on the idea of the
solidarity of the horde, and on the feeling that it is the duty of every
member of the horde to destroy all possible enemies.... The feeling of
the fellowship in the horde corresponds to the feeling of unity in the
tribe, to a recognition of bonds established by a neighborhood of
habitat, and further on to the feeling of fellowship among members of
nations.
12
“He who is not with me is against me,” said Jesus for the religious
group. How far we have proceeded from the horde in our civilized
nations, and how near we are to it still in the essential character of
the mind of the group!

3.
Does the group mind exist? Not as a super-consciousness,
external to the individuals composing it—that view has been
discarded long ago. But as a category which is needed to explain
many phenomena, and which we can then proceed to study and
explain in greater detail, a term with pragmatic value, such as “life” or
“mind.” “Life” is no longer used as a principle of explanation, as a
vital principle which is infused into dead matter, but life exists, for all
that, and we can see its effects and study them. “Mind” is not
something separate and distinct from the body in which it dwells or
from the world in which it acts, but we know that mind is a useful and
necessary category in which to include a whole phase of living being,
especially of human life. “Group Mind” is the same sort of category
as these. Just as mind inheres in the neurones and is coincident with
the chemical changes in them, and yet cannot be summed up by
chemical changes; so group mind inheres in the brains, of individuals
and is coincident with individual ideas and acts, yet cannot be
summed up as so many individual responses but as the unified
response of a group of persons at once.
Morris Ginsberg, in his Psychology of Society, opposes any type
of group theory, as he sees only individuals in a social environment;
he holds that the group may have unity of content but not of process,
of ideas and ideals but not of mind. Floyd H. Allport speaks of “The
13
group fallacy,” “the error of substituting the group as a whole as a
principle of explanation in place of the individuals in the group,” to
14
which Emory S. Bogardus replies in his discussion that “if there is
a group fallacy, there is also an individual fallacy.”
On the other hand, so radical a behaviorist as E. C. Lindeman
15
remarks, “The group is a plurality of individuals, but what the group
16
does is not plural but singular.” “From the purely descriptive point
of view, the group becomes a new quality.” Dr. M. M. Davis puts it
17
this way: “Millions of brain cells are co-ordinated to think as one
brain. Psychology tries to tell how. Millions of brains co-ordinate
themselves and function in many ways as one brain. The how of that
marvel is for sociology.” Giddings calls the group mind “the concert
of thought, emotion and will” of individual minds. Cooley says:
18
“The unity of the social mind consists not in agreement but in
organization.” Ellwood phrases it somewhat differently:
19
The only unity we have in society is a unity of process. The
individual consciousness is unified both structurally and functionally....
There is a collective mental life, but no social mind in the same sense
in which there is an individual mind.
Dr. Baldwin sums up his view in the last sentences of the Social
and Ethical Interpretations:
20
Society is the form of natural organization which ethical
personalities come into in their growth. Ethical personality is the form
of natural development which individuals grow into who live in social
relationships. The true analogy, then, is not that which likens it to a
physiological organism, but rather that which likens it to a
psychological organization.
And so, if this were primarily a historical study, I might go over
many similar and differing theories, which consider the group as a
unity on the mental plane, that is, in one sense or another, as a
group mind.
The material is still being collected for this study, the essential
points of view still being defined, and such important factors as
instinct and intelligence are still being redefined with the rapid
progress of science today. As several of the terms cited above
suggest, the difference between the individual as a mind and the
group of individuals as a mind is always given and must always be
given in terms of structure. In the words of Lindeman:
21
The individual may be viewed as an integration of functioning
organs, and the group merely an integration of functions.... There can
be nothing organic about society or a group; there can be only a
series of relations, the results of specific responses to specific
situations.
Not to cite more opinions on a point on which there seems general
agreement, we may take it for granted that the chief, perhaps the
only difference historically pointed out between the mind of one man
and of a group of men is that the man has a brain and a nervous
system, while the group has neither, but operates apparently through
the brains and nervous systems of its members. But in their
functioning, in their activities, the mind of the man and of the nation
or other group are so similar as to be almost indistinguishable.
Of course, this distinction depends, finally, on the definition of
mind which we are prepared to accept. Dennes gives an adequate
summary and criticism of Durkheim, for instance, who considered
collective mind to consist of the collective ideas or representations of
a society; and of Wundt, who considered mind an integration of
processes, not of ideas, and therefore sought for the group mind in
the collective results of group mental process, in speech, religion
and custom. But Dennes himself seems confused by the need of
defining mind without regard to bodily structure. He says:
22
“Individual minds or persons have or produce bodies as well as
objective mental products. But social groups are not minds and have
no bodies. They are associations of minds.” MacDougall defines
23
mind as “An organized system of mental or purposive forces,” and
continues, “In the sense so defined, every highly organized human
society may be properly said to possess a group mind.” While
MacDougall’s definition seems circular in nature, it still recognizes
that a functional definition of mind can make no distinction of
structure, whether any particular mind is associated with one or
24
many bodies. Lindeman calls mind “the total equipment with which
man responds to his environment”, which seems more than one can
accept, for “total equipment” would include hands and feet, as well
as mind. A more precise statement of the same general tenor
appears in Dr. Singer’s Mind as Behavior:
25
Consciousness is not something inferred from behavior; it is
behavior. Or, more accurately, our belief in consciousness is an
expectation of probable behavior based on an observation of actual
behavior, a belief to be confirmed or refuted by more observation, as
any other belief in a fact is to be tried out.
Thus, any functional definition of mind that has no reference to brain
or nervous system, must apply and does apply in the group of
persons in exactly the same sense as to the single individual. If there
is “unified behavior,” if there is “organized system of purposes,” if
there is “response to environment,” then we have mind, whether the
behavior, response, or purpose dwell in one or two or many bodies.
One question remains, and a most perplexing one. How can one
distinguish between a group mind and a group purpose, or the
accidental coincidence of many minds and many purposes? A flock
of migrating birds has no group mind—each bird would travel south
at the same time and the same rate of speed, were there no flock at
all. Or still lower forms, such as unicellular organisms, may move
simultaneously to warmer waters. On the other extreme, the hordes
of Huns led by Attila had a group purpose in their migration; the
leader gave the word, and the followers leaped together to their
horses’ backs to ride from Asia into Europe. But when a half million
negroes migrate from the southern to the northern states in a few
years, coming family by family, as the opportunity affords, yet with a
steady tendency of drift, is that a group mind or the accidental
agreement of many individuals? Is it mind or minds? And the same
problem is present in a declaration of war, or the victory of a foot-ball
team, or the adoption of a new fashion of clothes. When does the
group act and when the individual members? When do we have the
mind of all, when the mind of each?
To this crucial problem I must present one qualification and one
answer. The qualification is: the group never acts except through its
constituent individuals, any more than the mind acts without its brain
cells and bodily organs. The difference between the act of all and the
act of each is not a complete disjunction but a difference of
emphasis, of interpretation, of purpose. When the army marches,
every soldier goes ahead; when the nation elects its president, the
millions of voters cast their ballots; when the church adopts a creed
or reforms its ritual, the many believers experience a change in their
faith and their hope. Not that group opinion need be unanimous; it is
rather a mode of general consent by which unified action can arise
out of conflicting opinions, by which many individuals are absorbed
into a group mind. Thus in many, perhaps in most cases we cannot
say definitely: this is group mind, not personal preference, or this is
individual action, and the group has nothing to do with it. The
problem is much like that which faced Kant in defining moral action,
when the demands of the universal law may often coincide with
personal preference, perhaps even with the greatest and most
appealing happiness.
And our answer may be similar to his. Kant turned to the test
case. We know we have morality, said he, when duty and pleasure
are opposed, and the man obeys the voice of duty. Similarly, we can
say: we know that we have group mind and purpose when the
pleasure of the individual is opposed to the will of the group, and the
individual gives up his purpose for that of the army, the nation, the
church. When the soldier or the martyr gives up his urge for self-
preservation and offers his body to the bullets of the enemy or the
stake of the persecutor, then we know that he has abdicated his
individuality and is acting only as a member of the greater whole.
Lindeman, whose study is based on observation of farmers’ co-
operative societies, presents a contrary view:
26
It was formerly asserted that the chief significance of a group
consisted in the fact that the individuals comprising it had sacrificed
certain individual prerogatives, rights, privileges, etc., in order to
achieve the larger collective end. But it could not be discovered that
the farmers who became members of the co-operative associations
had done anything of the sort. On the contrary, they were chiefly
interested in enhancing their own individual interests; they desired a
larger income from the sale of their products and the co-operative
movement promised exactly this.
If this were true, these associations would constitute merely a set of
books, not a group of persons. But we see further on in the same
book that the co-operative associations demanded loyalty even at
the cost of whim or momentary interest; they enforced their contracts
with the farmer by which he agreed to sell only through the
association. If he got tired of waiting for his money, or if a dealer
placed a financial premium on disloyalty, still he was expected to be
loyal to the group. Finally, the group had to take cognizance of other
aspects of the human life of its members besides the sale of their
cotton or tobacco; it built up personal and social groupings for the
entire family; it became a truly unified group mind, through the slow
process of integration of individuals and of local groups, resting on a
basis of personal friendship. Thus, even in an interest group, a true
group mind is developed through participation and sacrifice.

4.
We are now ready to define group mind in the sense in which it
will be understood in this essay. A group mind is the common
purpose of two or more persons, which they accept as their own
purpose. The mode of this acceptance or identification is in behavior,
which includes the reasons given by the individuals—their
rationalizations—as well as their overt acts. The test of this in any
particular case is the test of sacrifice, whether the man acts as a
self-preserving being, an individual pacifist, or as a citizen and
soldier, a member of a group at war; whether the church member
acts as an individual thinker, or subordinates his judgment to the
interpretation and the practice of the church; whether the son acts as
a loyal son, a member of the family, to his own hurt, or goes off to
marry against his parents’ will, leaving them perhaps to suffer want. I
have purposely taken examples where opinion may be divided, as it
is not my purpose to attach moral right or wrong to either group
loyalty or individual freedom; either may be right under given
circumstances, or judged by certain standards.
The group mind may be conscious, as a deliberative assembly; or
instinctive and unconscious, as the racial group or the partly
hypnotized mob. The ancient Israelite identified himself with his
people; he did not even expect personal immortality, but desired
sons to carry on his name so that his family and his people might be
immortal. Parents are willing sacrifices for their children, but
sacrifices nevertheless. The patriot volunteers for dangerous duty
consciously, or leaps over the parapet in the blind enthusiasm of a
charge; whether conscious or unconscious of the meaning of his act,
he acts as a soldier, not a self-seeking person. The varieties of the
group mind are almost innumerable. The group mind may be as
instinctive and unorganized as a religious revival, as natural as a
nation with its bonds of language, land, custom and government, as
artificial as a military company without even a name, with only a
number, and yet with a definite morale, a tradition, a personality of its
own. The theater audience has a group mind, while the restaurant
crowd has not; for it is an axiom in the theater that each audience
has a character of its own, that only a full house really abandons
itself at a comedy, while even a smaller crowd may be carried away
by a tragedy, and so on; the individual abandons his own judgment
and his inhibitions at least in part, to react to the performance as a
member of the group.
According to this definition, the individual also may have a group
mind, as his diverse purposes are summed up in one supreme
purpose, or as he has inner conflicts, the far-sighted against the
narrow view, the better ideal against the worse. The reasons or
motives which animate the various members of a group mind need
not always be the same; they may range from deliberate choice to
compulsion by public opinion or the blind following of herd instinct,
the desire to “run with the crowd,” to “be on the band wagon.” There
is always a margin of unassimilated purpose in either the individual
or the group; neither mind ever quite attains perfect unity. Durkheim
makes the pregnant suggestion, (not without its critics, it is true,) that
the most unified mind was that of the primitive horde, where unity
was achieved by identity; while developed societies achieve unity
through organization and division of function, thus including the most
diverse elements in a genuine unity of co-operation and purpose.
The group mind, then, is an empirical fact, which can be
perceived in many practical ways. The intellectual content, the
emotional coloring, group habits which we call custom, group ideas
which we call tradition, group organization by which a consensus of
opinion is ascertained for the purpose of unified action—all are
characteristics of the group mind, just as the parallel factors of ideas,
emotion, and will are the phases into which we analyze the mind of
the individual. There is a difference in every one of these factors
between the group mind of America and of China, between that of
ancient Greece and of medieval Italy. And the difference lies not only
in factors such as language, religion and history, which are
constitutive to the group, but external to the individual. It lies also in
subtler matters of opinion, of emotions, which seem to be within the
individual and yet must be absorbed from the environment, because
they differ so strikingly from group to group. I shall go carefully into
the reasons further on which impel me to consider that the Jewish
people possess a group mind, even though they have no common
government, language or land, and have even many divisions on
questions of faith and religious practice. Here it is sufficient to note
that the Jewish people act as one under attack; that a pogrom in
Russia arouses the very different Jews of France, England and
America to a feeling of unity and acts of relief and of defense. Labor
and capital are becoming “class conscious” in opposition to each
other; that is, group minds are in process of formation. The group
mind appears in the behavior of the group through its constituent
individuals, whether the group be a static one, dominated by the
fixed habits of custom, or a dynamic one, with a great wave of
progress; for behavior includes both custom and progress.
One more point comes properly under the definition of the group
mind—the wide-spread conception of a general will, or more
precisely a common will. According to the viewpoint of this study, the
general will is no mystical entity, overpowering the wills of the
individuals; nor is it an arithmetical average, in which personal
opinions cancel each other out. Neither of these theories covers a
willing mind. The group will is a resultant, not an average; one
element in it is tradition, another is leadership, a third is the
interaction of the various sub-groups. In the final result, the negative
element is often actually erased, the wavering members accept the
winning opinion as a whole, and the consequent group action is a
unity, almost a unanimity of response. After war is declared the
peace party practically disappears. In less clear-cut issues, we see
the workings of compromise, which again appears in the behavior of
the group as a whole.
Group consciousness exists when the individuals identify
themselves with the group, not merely accepting its purpose but
losing their own purposes in it. Consciousness implies also
intelligence, as it does in the individual; it may co-exist with a high
emotional tone but must have a rational element as well. MacDougall
utters a view in consonance with that held here when he says:
27
It is the extension of the self-regarding sentiment of each
member to the group as a whole that binds the group together and
renders it a collective individual capable of collective volition.
28
But when he holds that groups are self-conscious according to the
degree that the idea of them is present in the minds of the individuals
composing them, then we must agree with Dennes that:
29
to say that a group mind possesses self-consciousness in the
sense that its nature is consciously apprehended, by individual minds
distinct from it, is the utterance of a contradiction.
It will then be necessary to posit group consciousness as we posit
individual consciousness, not distributively but collectively. We have
group mind and group will when the group acts as one or behaves
as one; but we have group consciousness when the group thinks as
one. Not that this action can possibly take place outside of the
individual minds; MacDougall is undoubtedly right in his citation of E.
30
Barker: “There is no group mind existing apart from the minds of
the members of the group; the group mind exists only in the minds of
its members. But nevertheless it exists.” Yet the group mind must
include the individual minds in a unified purpose, to which they
relinquish their own wills, willingly or with a struggle, whose ideas are
their ideas, whose consciousness is, to a certain extent at least, their
consciousness. If it is possible, in ordinary speech, to recognize that
a man acts now personally, again as a churchman, a citizen, or a
committee member, it should be possible to accept this fact as a part
of our theory and to embody it as one phase of the theory itself. The
individual and the group are not mutually exclusive; neither exists
without the other; the group is a part of the individual mind as much
as the individual is a part of the group mind.
CHAPTER II.
GROUPS IN CONTACT

1.
Theoretically, the individual might be independent of other
individuals and of groups as well. He might be his own alter, so that
through the active and reflective standpoints working on each other
the individual himself might constitute a group mind, and might
31
produce many, if not all, the characteristic products of the group.
But practically in society, the exact opposite is invariably the case.
According to Baldwin’s dialectic of the individual development:
32 33
“The sense of self always involves a sense of the other.” “The
real self is always the bipolar self, the social self.” Empirically, not
only are civilization, history and government the products of social
heredity; the individual himself as we have him owes his mental
content, many of his feeling and motor responses, and his ultimate
ideals, to the group in which he was born and has developed. On
this basis the ancient conflict between the isolated individual and the
group domination becomes unimportant, if not meaningless from the
empirical point of view. As Joseph K. Hart remarks:
34
Membership in the group establishes in the members a set of
habits which are the personal counterpart of the customs of the group;
the group is not outside and around him; it is inside him; what is
custom in the group has become habit in him.
Why, then, the eternal conflict between the individual and the
group? Why does a Schiller or an Ibsen proclaim, “The strongest
man is he who stands most alone”? Why do we have the group
portrayed so often as the oppressor, the individual as the hero,
genius, and martyr to the conventional ideas of the mass? Because
the group has more fixed habits than the individual, or at least than
the exceptional individual; because in most individuals the group
factor is the dominant one by preference, and the struggle against it
is both rare and mild; because, finally, the group mind does involve a
sacrifice of the individual purpose on many occasions, and these are
the test cases of the strength of the group itself. There are really two
types of individuals who stand out from the group—the genius, or
social discoverer; the criminal, or social rebel. Platt suggests that
35
“Man has never become entirely socialized”; his biological heredity
always lags behind the social heredity of the group and leaves a
residuum of conflict. Baldwin gives a broader theory, which may
36
include this: “The individual is the particularizing social force;
society is the generalizing social force.” That is, the individual
produces variations, which are then stamped out by social
disapproval, or generalized by social acceptance. The genius thinks
for the race; the mass of individuals have their thinking done for
them by the prepared reactions of the group. Without the social
group the individual would be as unformed mentally, as helpless
ethically, as is the single bee without the hive. In Baldwin’s words:
37
“A man is a social outcome rather than a social unit.”
All this by the way; if I were to take up the problem of the
individual and group, it would occupy this entire study. I merely want
to show its bearing on the central thesis here brought forward, which
concerns the relation between group and group, rather than that
between individual and group.

2.
The problem of group and sub-group can be approached either
descriptively or genetically. If we take the former angle, we see every
large group divided indefinitely into small, conflicting, overlapping,
and infinitely various sub-groups. Much of the complexity of our
society consists in this overlapping, by which the individual belongs
to many groups at once, so that his mind cannot attain complete
unity, and none of his groups can possess him wholly. A man
belongs to a family, a city, a profession, a church, a school alumni
body, a nation and an international peace society. In addition, he
may join a labor union, a chamber of commerce, or a half dozen
fraternal orders. His mind is a perfect maze of group attitudes; he
shifts from one group to another as interests or contiguity impel him.
In the same way, a large group such as a political party includes
members from different sections of the country, different economic
strata, different churches, and so on. The group mind, as a category
in this situation, is purely a functional unity, which works in and
through its individual members and through its smaller groups of
38
individuals in exactly the same way. I quote Dr. Singer: “My world
is highly organized—groups within groups, and groups within these,”
for that is the scientific, realistic view of the social world.
Various classifications of groups have been devised by students
of the problem, useful for their different purposes. Cooley speaks of
primary and secondary groups, those in which men and women are
born and grow, and the larger integrations into which the smaller,
39
more natural groups enter. Miller prefers “Vertical and horizontal
groups,” the former being the natural divisions which include all
classes, such as the nation; the latter a caste or class grouping.
Hayes calls them personal and impersonal groups, apparently
meaning much the same as Professor Cooley by the terms primary
and secondary. Probably the most useful mode of classification is
the genetic, beginning with the family, and then expanding according
to the particular situation in view—in the primitive group to the clan,
tribe and confederacy; in the civilized to the school, the interest
group, the religious affiliation, the political nation, the international
ideals and bonds of union.
Whatever be the more or less arbitrary mode of classification, we
see that, except for the supposititious primitive horde, groups are
never single nor simple. They resemble rather the physical organism
or the mind of the individual, either of which is necessarily complex.
Group minds exist and grow by progressive integration of the lesser
into the greater, from the individual up to the greatest possible
bodies of human beings.
The group mind comes into being only through contact with other
groups. We may go so far as to conclude that there must be two
groups in order that there may be one group. If an isolated island
possessed a few people so unorganized that they felt no difference
of groupings among themselves, then there would be no sense of a
total group, either. Under those circumstances that would be attained
only in case of an invasion by people from without the land, or a
rebellion within, when group unity of the islanders would at once
appear. If my previous identification of mind in the individual and the
group is exact, not merely an analogy, then this follows from
Baldwin’s genetic study of the individual. The mind of the individual
grows by constant reference to the alter—for in the thought of the
child the ego and alter are one—and even in the highest reaches of
moral judgment there remains an element of social approval, of what
would be the judgment of the ideal group or the ideal comrade.
40
“We do right by habitually imitating a larger self whose injunctions
run counter to the tendencies of our particular selves.”
To quote a few applications of this viewpoint to particular
problems: Sumner applies it to the primitive horde:
41
The relationship of comradeship and peace in the we-group and
that of hostility and war toward others-group are correlative. War and
peace have reacted on each other and developed each other, one
within the group, the other in the inter-group relation. Loyalty to the
group, sacrifice for it, hatred and contempt for outsiders, brotherhood
within, warlikeness without—all grow together, common products of
the same situation.
In Ellwoods’s words:
42
While the stimuli afforded by the struggle with the physical
environment are conceivably sufficient to bring about the highest
degree of coordination, unity and solidarity in the larger human social
groups, yet historically they have not done so. Rather, it has been the
stimuli arising from the conflict and competition of one human group
with another which has chiefly developed conscious social solidarity in
the larger human group.
Dr. George E. Vincent wrote:
43
Conflict, competition, rivalry, are the chief causes which bring
human beings into groups, and largely determine what goes on within
them.
44
It is in conflict or competition with other nations that a country
becomes a vivid unity to the members of its constituent groups. It is
rivalry which brings out the sense of team work, the social
consciousness.
“Races, Nations and Classes,” a recent work by Dr. Herbert A. Miller,
presents a series of studies of social relations in terms of group
conflicts, group oppression and group revolt, as these exist in
various crucial situations today.
Most of the treatments of the subject calmly assume that the other
group with which contact is established must necessarily be parallel
and competing with the first group. But in empirical situations that is
not always, perhaps not often the case. We may become conscious
of our American unity in war with an external foe, but we may
become equally conscious of it in inter-state relations; because an
inter-state conflict may bring us to the superior federal power; or in
the division of powers between state and nation, or in the strong
hand of the federal government reaching out to detect groups of law-
breakers within the constituent states. That is, the two groups need
not be parallel and exclusive; they may overlap, or one may enclose
the other entirely. I can become conscious of my international Jewish
loyalty in contrast to the Christian church, which also is international;
or I may become conscious of it through the overlapping with my
American citizenship; or even through contrast with a family loyalty,
which might conceivably be enhanced by disregarding the
membership in the Jewish people, with its frequent disabilities. The
first is a case of two separate groups; the second, two overlapping
ones; the third, where one is a sub-group of the other. In this sense it
is conceivable, though not usual, for the individual with his own
“group mind” to serve as a contrast to the group in which he is
included. For in every one of these instances there has been actual
or potential relinquishment of purpose into the larger group which
includes the smaller, or into the one which overlaps and conflicts with
the other; and in the case of two parallel groups there is a conflict
and contrast of purposes, hence of group mind itself.

3.
The mode of group contacts has practically always been viewed
in terms of conflict and competition. In contrast to this, I present the
view that there are two modes of group contact—competition and
imitation. Competition strengthens and unites each competing group.
Imitation brings the different groups together into an overgroup. The
two together constitute the social process (if we allow for the element
of individual initiative and leadership, which hardly comes within the
special topic of this study).
The classic presentation of group struggle is by Gumplowitz, in
his “Rassenkampf,” where he took Gobineau’s rather crude theory of
races and applied it to history and sociology, including also groups
smaller and of different origin than the races themselves. To present
Gumplowitz’s view in his own words:
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History and the present day present us with a picture of almost
unbroken warfare of tribe against tribe, people against people, state
against state, nation against nation.
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Every greater ethnic or social element strives to subdue to its
purposes every weaker group which lies within its sphere of influence
or near it.
This is his “social law of nature,” which he compares to the law of
gravitation in its certainty. War is therefore necessary for civilized as
for primitive societies, and any talk of ideals or of peace is but self-
deception, if it be not deliberate masking of warlike intentions. The
race theory of Gobineau has gone on until it is one of the important
factors in American group oppositions today. And surprisingly
enough, the conflict theory of Gumplowitz comes back also from time
to time. In “Survival or Extinction,” a new work by Elisha M.
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Friedman, I find this sentence: “The absorption of a scattered
minority people is the inexorable law of History. Can the Jews hope
to escape it?” This on the basis of Gumplowitz, whose treatment of

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