Student
Instructor
Course
Date
Discussion: The Everyday World as Problematic
Smith contends that the everyday world is problematic because social relations influence human beings’ behavior patterns. Ultimately, these relations spawn into institutions, groups of relations that form a chunk of the ruling apparatus. Because they are organized to serve a particular purpose, these institutions coordinate the exchange of information between a generalized institution and personal experiences. Therefore, smith claims that social relations have a grip on our behavior.
Smith insists that a feminist approach to sociology has been sorely missing and badly needed to understand modern society because women’s experiences are rich grounds for feminist knowledge (Smith 122). I agree with her because by basing social work into women’s everyday experiences, sociologists can get new answers. Indeed, women have been objectified and overlooked by sociology, categorizing them as the ‘other.’ Because since the beginning of history, women have been seen as the caregivers in society, men have been dedicating their energy to thinking on intellectual concepts that the society consider more important and valuable. Thus, the activities of women are invisible and considered natural. Women’s activities are not seen as part of human history and culture. Hence, if sociologists use a feminist approach, they can be able to ask tangible questions like how such activities have been assigned to women and the outcomes of social institutions like the family, economy, education, and government.
There is a lot in common between the conflict approach and the feminist perspective. The major similarity is that the two approaches deal with stratification and inequality in society. Stratification is the classification or arrangement of something into various categories. Also, the two perspectives seek to offer remedies to inequalities in society. The two differ in that the conflict theory broadly focuses on the unequal distribution of resources and power, whereas the feminist perspective explores the power and its relationship with gender.
Work Cited
Smith, Dorothy E. The everyday world as problematic: A feminist sociology. University of Toronto Press, 1987.