Social Status

Social Status and Social Roles

Every human being is part of a community, these societies vary, so the individual must adapt to the culture and norms to be part of it. The social structure is necessary for society to have an order and organization are important because it gives a clue to people about the kind of behavior that society expects from them, makes individuals belonging to a specific company know what to expect the each other, making predictable. Social status and roles are part of this structure.

At first instance for the individual to be part of this society needs to comply with a role or social status, it is common that fulfill multiple roles and social status, for example, a woman can be a mother for some children, aunt or cousin for others. Many people confuse the meaning of status with role, but both are different. According to R. Linton (1936) "status simply defined as a position in a social system, child or parent: such as. Status Refers to what a person is, whereas the notion of role closely linked refers to the behavior expected of people in a status ". That is, the social role is the role that plays in society, while social status is the importance given to this role within society. Consequently, these roles may vary or change over time. For example: formerly was not well seen that women have a job and leave home to work, it was just a housewife, suffered from discrimination because they got the same job opportunity that the man or the same pay, and it was not socially accepted . Currently this situation change, in most cultures and there is no expectation that women comply with that role of housewife, is acceptable to leave work and generally women have the same rights as men.

However, individuals can occupy many positions, also depending on your lifestyle, education or vocation. The more people occupy roles; most conflicts are presented in wanting to try to balance time, money and energy to meet all functions. Social stratification is a method by which society classifies individuals by a hierarchy of positions, is conditioned by several indicators such as income, employment, education, lifestyle, etc. Depending on the category to which they belong are situated individuals in a group that meets the same level, usually these people interact with group members themselves very little with higher or lower status. For example: the members of royalty did not interact or mixing with the plebeians and slaves, everyone was meeting with people of the same social status. Another example was the segregation in the United States, where white people got a "white privilege" refers to the advantages enjoyed by people due to its white, did not share any relationship or services to people of color. People of color were treated as slaves and did not obtain any rights, were considered objects, today these actions are considered unconstitutional. Racism is present when racial groups assert their beliefs and they are superior to other groups.

Pursuant to as described above, these variables are crucial in determining individual inequality. Many times it happens by social and cultural pressures that people can suffer, as their sexual behavior, gender, race, sexual orientation. Sexual identity is the way the individual expresses sexual values, attitudes, feelings and beliefs you have. When a person or group differs from these beliefs is unjust or unequal to other individuals so and there is an acceptance of social class, educational level, gender, sexual orientation or race, acting in a discriminatory manner. According to Georg Simmel (1977), humane society’s differentiation positions of power, wealth and prestige is not part of a primary natural logic, but are associated with the way they have developed different forms of organization, why inequality must be understood as a phenomenon of historical and cultural character.

In conclusion, social structures are important

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