INTERVIEWER: TELL ME ABOUT YOURSELF.

INTERVIEWEE:
INTERVIEWER: WHY DO YOU WANT TO WORK AT OUR COMPANY
INTERVIEWEE: Sir, I want to work in your company as I feel it's very important to
work in an organization where I can showcase my talent and skills which I have
developed over years. Your company can provide me ample opportunities and can
provide a strong platform to make myself a better employee and help in our
company's growth. In addition I'm lazy enough to switch between companies so I
think your company is apt for me to work for years with hard work and dedication.

(sie ist schn)

Major Stratification Systems

1) Caste System a closed system based on ascribed status (birth)
- Nothing can be done to affect mobility and there are no chances of changing ones
social position
- Such societies also recognize ritual pollution (i.e., certain types of interaction
between people of different castes are prohibited because they tend to contaminate
members of the higher caste)
- Such a system promotes endogamy (i.e., marriage within ones own caste)
There are five castes in India:
1) priests, scholars, and their descendents
2) nobility, warriors, and their descendents
3) merchants and skilled artisans (or their descendents)
4) unskilled laborers
5) outcasts or untouchables
2) Slavery System the ownership of some people by others
- Contrary to popular assumption, slavery was not usually based on racism, but on
one of three other factors:

a) Debt
b) Crime
c) War and conquest
- The conditions of slavery have varied widely around the world:
a) In some cases, slavery was temporary
b) Slavery was not necessarily inheritable
c) Slaves were not necessarily powerless and poor
3) Estate System the stratification system of medieval Europe, consisting of three
groups or estates:
a) Nobility the wealthy and powerful families that ruled the country and owned the
land; the nobility did no farming or any other workhaving an occupation was
considered beneath their dignity
b) Clergy the Roman Catholic Church was a political power at this time, owning
vast tracts of land and collecting taxes from commoners; the church sold offices,
and the wealthy could buy positions
c) Serfs the commoners, including farmers, carpenters, harnessmakers, and
servants. It was extremely rare for a person to move out of this estate.
4) Class System an open system of stratification based primarily on economic and
occupational roles
- Boundaries between classes are not clear-cut
- It is possible for individuals to rise above or fall below the position of their parents,
and to marry someone of another class
- Individuals tend to have some control over their class position
The American Class Structure:
Upper or Capitalist Class
Upper Middle Class
Middle Class
Working Class
Working Poor
Underclass (e.g., the Homeless)
Measuring Social Class
Karl Marx defined class as all people who share a common relationship to the
means of production (e.g., land, factories, machines, tools, raw materials, labor)

 Marx argued that there are two fundamental social classes:

1) the bourgeoisie those who own the means of production (the capitalist class)
2) the proletariat those who do not own the means of production and are thus
compelled to work for the capitalists
- These classes have opposite interests and thus their relationship is characterized
by inequality, exploitation, and conflict
Max Weber held that class consisted of three interrelated components:
1) Wealth, or economic status
2) Power, or political status
3) Prestige, or social status
- An individual may rank highly on one dimension of class membership, but lower on
the other two; however, these dimensions tend to be tightly correlated (positively)
1) Wealth consists of property and income. Property comes in many forms, such as
buildings, land, animals, machinery, cars, stocks, bonds, businesses, and bank
accounts. Income is money received as wages, rents, interest, royalties, or the
proceeds from a business.
- Large differences of income and wealth have existed as long as these data have
been collected. Wealth is highly concentrated. The majority of wealth, 68 percent, is
owned by only 10 percent of the nations families. The super-rich, the richest 1
percent of U.S. families, are worth more than the entire bottom 90 percent of
Americans. This unequal distribution of income and wealth has been remarkably
stable; the changes that do occur indicate growing inequality.
- Also, there have been persistent differences in income and wealth between men
and women, the young and old, and white and non-white Americans.
2) Power the ability to carry out ones will despite resistance
- Power is also concentrated in the hands of the few. It has been observed that a
democratic faade serves as an powerful ideology for the elites, concealing the
real source of power in the United States.
- C. Wright Mills coined the term power elite to refer to those top people in U.S.
corporations, military, and politics who make the nations major decisions. This elite
group wields extraordinary power; they are like-minded individuals who belong to
the same private clubs, vacation at the same exclusive resorts, and attend the

same prestigious schools.

3) Prestige respect or social honor
- People give certain occupations more prestige than others. Positions with more
prestige share four elements:
a) They pay more.
b) They require more education.
c) They entail more abstract thought.
d) They offer greater autonomy (freedom, or self-direction)
- White collar occupations are disproportionately more prestigious than blue collar
occupations. Also, positions at the top are disproportionately occupied by men and
whites, while those toward the bottom are occupied disproportionately by women
and minorities.
How do Elites Maintain Stratification?
- While elites may use coercion and force to maintain privilege, these are not
effective tactics because they breed hostility and nourish rebellion; instead, elites
use other techniques:
1) Controlling Ideas Ideologies are used to get people to want to do what the
ruling elite desires, even though it is not necessarily in their best interest (e.g.,
scientific racism, the divine right of kings, a fair days pay for a fair days work)
2) Controlling Information Elites control information in dictatorships through the
use of force and imprisoning editors and reporters for printing critical reports. In
democracies, elites accomplish the same purpose by manipulating the media
though the selective release of information.
3) Technology Various monitoring devices help the elite monitor citizens activities
without their knowledge that they are being shadowed.
4) Social Networks Members of the elite move in a circle of power that multiplies
their opportunities. Contacts with people of similar backgrounds, interests, and
goals all the elite to pass privileges from one generation to the next.
Functionalist Perspective of Stratification
Social stratification is universal, thus necessary for the smooth, orderly
functioning of society (particularly, industrial societies with a complex division of
labor).

 Social stratification (specifically, unequal rewards) functions to motivate people to

fill functionally important positions and perform functionally necessary roles in
society.
Criticism of the Functionalist Theories:
How do you measure the importance of a position?
Is the relationship between the importance of a position and its rewards as
straightforward as the theory suggests?
Why isnt society a meritocracy? That is, why are many positions not awarded on
the basis of merit?
Is inequality actually functional for society?
Conflict Theory of Stratification
Social stratification is universal, yet is avoidable, unnecessary, and not functional
for society.
Stratification is created and maintained by classes and powerful groups in order to
protect and enhance their interests; focuses on competition over scarce societal
resources (e.g., power, wealth, and prestige).
Stratification is useful to only some people and groups; inequality is not inevitable,
nor does it promote the optimal functioning of society.
Concepts in Social Stratification
Status Consistency is the degree of consistency of a persons social standing
across various dimensions of social inequality.
Status Inconsistency refers to an inconsistent social standing or mismatch across
various dimensions of social inequality.
Social Mobility refers to changes in peoples position in a system of stratification,
especially occupational change (and corresponding changes in income).
--Intergenerational Mobility and Intragenerational/Career Mobility
The Consequences of Social Class
Life Chances
Physical and Mental Health
Family Life

Political Participation and Affiliation

Education
Treatment by the Criminal Justice System
The Hidden Injuries of Class

Global Stratification
High Income Countries (Most industrialized nations)
Middle Income Countries (Industrializing nations)
Low Income Countries (The least industrialized nations)
Modernization Theory
Dependency Theory
Global Stratification and the Status of Females
- In every society in the world, gender is a basis for social stratification. While it is
not the sole basis for stratifying people, it cuts across all systems of stratification.
Further, these distinctions always favor males. Consider, for example:
- In every society in the world, mens earnings and higher than womens. Most
sweatshop workers are women and girls.
- Women are vastly underrepresented in positions of political and economic power.
- Of the 885 million adults who are illiterate, two-thirds are women.
- Two-thirds of the 13 million school-age children who receive no education are girls.
- Between 100-200 million females have undergone painful female genital
mutilation.
- Hundreds of thousands of female children across the world are forced into
prostitution.