Exam 7: Social Class: the Structure of Inequality

An individual might be trying to gain ________ if they take adult education classes, attend lectures and concerts, or travel to Europe.

What term describes the unequal distribution of wealth, power, or prestige among members of a society?

What is Mother Teresa an example of, given that she was a person with tremendous power and prestige yet she was very poor?

What is realistic about so-called Cinderella stories like the film Pretty Woman, in which a low-status woman marries a wealthy, powerful man?

How do law enforcement policies make the poor less visible?

What is a society called if social mobility is highly restricted by formal or informal rules like those of a caste system?

Observers determine someone's socioeconomic status when meeting them for the first time by their

What is the relationship between the American Dream and the social class system by which the United States is stratified?

What do sociologists call it when large numbers of people move up or down the social class ladder as a result of changes to society as a whole?

An accountant with a college degree and a license from the state accounting board works for the Department of Defense as a senior auditor. He makes about $100,000 per year and will soon retire with benefits and a pension. To what class would you expect him to belong?

Social mobility that occurs over the course of an individual's lifetime is called ________ mobility.

Most people describe themselves as belonging to the middle class, but in reality, only about 30% of Americans are part of the middle class. Describe the typical occupations, lifestyles, and earnings of people from each of the major social classes of the United States. What do sociologists consider to be problematic about these measures?

________ is a system of stratification commonly used in modern capitalist societies.

Many people became instant millionaires during the so-called dot-com boom of the late 1990s, although we usually think of social mobility as a result of individual effort. This is an example of

Which is true of social mobility in a caste system?

In House of Yes, a play by Wendy MacLeod, the character Marty brings his fiancée Lesly to meet his family. She comes from a different social class, which leads to miscommunication and difficult interactions among Lesly, Marty, and Marty's two siblings. According to Pierre Bourdieu, Lesly not having enough ________ could cause the strained relations.

In the United States, the federal poverty line is calculated using food costs based on the cheapest possible diet that can still provide basic nutrition. What sort of measure of poverty is this?

In what ways does the digital divide contribute to social inequality?