Provide an overview of the role of race and gender in determining social status in American society.
Explain the difference between individual discrimination, institutionalized discrimination, and reverse discrimination.
Interview the two people you identified in Working Ahead for M2A2—Identify Two People. Do they differ in their race, gender, and class? Focus on the following in your interviews:
Using a sociological perspective, that is thinking critically, determine how the two people you interviewed have been affected by their ascribed traits. In other words, be objective and ask questions about race, class, gender, and age.
Ask probing questions about each person’s educational opportunities and career choices.
Inquire about their inherited social status, and how their own personal social status differs (or not) from their parents’ social status.
Ask if they see themselves as having experienced any form of discrimination.
Ask what they see as solutions to discrimination and social disparities based on race, gender, or discrimination.
Compare each person’s responses to your own observations; do you observe anything that he or she does not?
What differences do you observe between the ascribed traits versus achieved (or earned) traits?
Summarize your findings by explaining whether race, gender, and any form of discrimination have played a role in the social status of your interviewees.
Include in your summary ideas for reducing any form of discrimination in determining someone’s social status.
Write a 2–3-page paper in Word format.
“These are my Two People I Interviewed”
Rufus Moore Interview Questions
Male Heterosexual
African American
Middle Class
1. What is your understanding of diversity and why is it important to have this position?
2. How would you define diversity and why is diversity important to you as a Middle Class African American?
3. Do you think inequality exist at your place of employment?
4. How does social context influence your perceptions of race, gender, and social class?
5. Do you think you have been passed for a promotion due to your race and age?
6. Is there disadvantages of being a minority when it comes to competing for a job you are qualified for?
7. If you were a non-minority do you think your financial goals would be easier to attain than if you were a minority?
Catherine Boston Interview Questions
Female Lesbian
Caucasian
Upper Middle Class
1. Do you think you are discriminated at work because of your social gender?
2. How does your sexuality relate to home, work, and family?
3. How does inequality manifest itself in your place of employment?
4. What challenges do you face as a lesbian woman when you exhibit masculine behavior?
5. How does the stereotypical image of rich homosexuals really represent the real experience of homosexual men and women of various racial, ethnic, and class backgrounds?
6. Why do vast differences in wages exist for gay men versus lesbian women?
7. Do you think you have more advantages in your career field as an educated Upper Middle Class lesbian woman then if you were non-educated?