Sociologyspeaking topic
The anomic division of labor: in modern society everyone is a specialist but nobody sees the whole. Could extreme specialization be pulling us apart instead of binding us together?
— Émile Durkheim, anomic division of labor
practice with this topic
Set the timer (5-30 min), take 20 seconds of prep if you like, start talking. Jot your thoughts onto the sticky-note board.
similar topics
- Veblen's concept of conspicuous consumption: why do we buy expensive things we do not need, just so others will see them?
- Merton's manifest and latent functions: why does what an institution 'appears' to do differ from what it actually does? What is an exam really for?
- Bourdieu's concept of habitus: are our tastes, our posture, our way of speaking really ours, or a mold that the class we grew up in carved into our bodies?
- Arlie Hochschild's concept of emotional labor: in the service industry, even a smile becomes part of the workload.
- Foucault's concept of biopower: why is the modern state obsessed with managing the population's health, birth rate, and death? When did our bodies become objects of government?