Sociology

4-Writing Assignment:  Chapters 8 – 10

Instructions:  Answer each of the following items based on the information presented in the textbook. 

1. Explain how gender socialization impacts professions in science, technology, engineering, and math.

    2. If you were the CEO of an organizationand had just read chapter-8, what would you do to address the glass ceiling/glass escalator in your organization? How would you get your managers to buy into your ideas and put them into practice?

3. Why are female breasts obscene while male breasts are not?  Are there other body parts that are seen differently if they belong to men versus women?  Why do you think this is the case?

4. Imagine you were born into a different racial group (or groups) than the one (or ones) into which you were born. What aspects of your life would be different now? Why?

5. Describe the type of diversity program that gets results for organizations.

6. Changing the way political campaigns are financed is a popular suggestion for limiting the power of the economic elite over American politics. Given what you now know, do you think campaign finance reform would have the desired effect? Explain your position.

7. Capitalism assumes that there will be competition between rival capitalists. Think about how fewer and fewer corporations are controlling more and more of todays economic activity. Do you think that meaningful competition still exists in most of the American economy? How would a lack of sufficient competition change the way capitalists behave?

8. Certain public services in America are funded by tax-payer dollars on a not-for-profit basis. How would your community be different if the police and fire departments were run as for-profit enterprises that required you to pay a subscription in order to call upon them for help?