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Conceptual Linking: Textual Material

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California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: December 10, 2001
Latest Update: December 10, 2001
E-Mail jeannecurran@habermas.org

Final Exam

Journal entry by Corinne Oshiro

Copyright: Jeanne Curran, Susan R. Takata, and Corinne Oshiro: December 2001.
"Fair use" encouraged.

This is an interesting dilemma because I don't give final exams. I consider them structurally violent. But this is an exam constructed by Corinne, chosen from one of our texts, Elliott's Contemporary Social Theory. It certainly does give a measure of learning. Corinne, I will intersperse my comments when I finish the reports of learning list so that I can post it for all my students.

The real dilemma is that this measure of learning has no conceptual link with the class, especially because of September 11 and its aftermath, and its effects on our class. We moved out of the text and discussed theory related to the war, its precipitating events, and its effect on all of us globally. I hope your answers reflect the context of the class.

I recognize that the class demands a computer. But that is a measure of the advances in technology today. More when I have a chance to peruse your submission. jeanne

On Monday, December 10, 2001, Corinne Oshiro wrote:

Subject: Final Exam : 3 concepts learned

Jeanne,

The 3 concepts that I've learned in the SOC 555 class are as follows:

  1. INTERSUBJECTIVE RECOGNITION article by Axel Honneth "Patterns of Intersubjective Recognition: Love, Rights and Solidarity" from Contemporary Social Theory text by Elliott.

    Honneth states that "through emotional relationships to other persons, children learn to seem themselves as independent subjects." The article by Honneth says that it is through emotional attachment during infancy that creates a person's sense of self-esteem. If you were denied adequate attention, care, and love during this critical period, your self-esteem if affected for the rest of your life. This is supported by the following statement. "A growing number of patients suffered from mental illnesses that could be traced to interpersonal disturbances in the process of the child's detachment." Pg. 185-186.

    People with mental illness have detached themselves from the world and if they allowed themselves to be included in society, they would be more productive and have emotional well-being. Although I am not a mental health professional, I do have first-hand experience because my sister-in-law has paranoid schizophrenia and depression. Persons who suffer with mental illness have self-loathing and that is the reason the majority of them are substance abusers. "Emotional confidence... constitutes the psychological precondition for the development of all further attitudes of self-respect." Pg. 193.

  2. GENDER PERSONALITY article by Nancy Chodorow " Gender Personality and the Reproduction of Mothering" from Contemporary Social Theory text by Elliott. Chodorow states that "women's mothering as a feature of social structure requires an explanation in terms of social structure." According to Chodorow, although women biologically have the capacity to bear children, they do not instinctually know how to mother, that is a socially learned quality. Since most people were cared for by their mothers, it becomes ingrained in the psyche that females are supposed to be the nurturers, whereas males are the providers. "Finally, it produces women who turn their energies toward nurturing and caring for children- in turn reproducing the sexual and familial division of labor in which women mother."

  3. EPISTEMOLOGY OF RACE article by Sander L. Gilman "Sigmund Freud and the Epistemology of Race" from Contemporary Social Theory by Elliott.

    In Freud's 1886 discussion of the inheritance of the psychological attributes of race, he ascribed to biology and social environment. Throughout the article Freud only comments on the Jewish population, which is limiting. To study race, Freud should have studied several. In today's modern society, there is too much emphasis on race. It is a concept that is still misunderstood. "Just as every Jew has a Christian complex, so every Negro has a white complex...As a rule the colored man would give anything to change his skin, and the white man hates to admit that he has been touched by a black."

    . . . .