View Single Post
  #7  
Old Wednesday, January 15, 2020
aishalam's Avatar
aishalam aishalam is offline
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2017
Posts: 160
Thanks: 7
Thanked 94 Times in 69 Posts
aishalam is on a distinguished road
Default

Quote:
Originally Posted by Johnmac View Post
Grateful
So, for my own sake,i would revise following things that i have learnt from you for my own consumption:-

-A sociologist is aptly concerned about social solidarity, bondings, culture, values,social strata etc.

-A sociologist May influence the society through social institutions. Every institution, beside its primary objectivity has a social influencing role.Media,Schools & Colleges, mosques, family, tribe etc; almost every institution can be a social influencer.

-What are some specific institutions established in Pakistan for social upbringing?

-What are the pressing social issues of Pakistan which may asked in the exam?(since it is expected that paper is full of pressing issues and not theories and definitions)

Your replies and contributions would be appreciated.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Hello, I'm glad my reply could help. In response to your above observations and questions, I have the following inputs to make;

-A sociologist is aptly concerned about social solidarity, bondings, culture, values,social strata etc.
They are but they also deal with other more widespread issues like how climate change is a result of a culture of consumerism that is common in modern society. This pattern of behaviours falls under the scope of study of sociologists, economists and even environmentalists but what can we do about it? Not much really. We can try and influence it but efforts to change human habits don't bear fruit fairly quickly. And then there is the fact that some sociologists believe that sociology should not deal with such controversial issues at all. That the job of a sociologist is only to study HOW and WHAT is happening not HOW TO MAKE IT BETTER. So you see there are different schools of thoughts here but as a baseline you are completely correct.


-A sociologist May influence the society through social institutions. Every institution, beside its primary objectivity has a social influencing role.Media,Schools & Colleges, mosques, family, tribe etc; almost every institution can be a social influencer.

Well true and not true. Sociologists understand the power that these institutions have but they rarely have the authority to influence them directly. They can advice policy makers and governments but rarely can they implement change themselves. For example if sociologists after a long and concentrated study believe that in a certain area pre-school books which depict very specific gender roles (e.g. a banker always being a man and a cook always being a woman) gives rise to generations of people who have a sexist outlook on occupational mobility. Now they've pinpointed the problem but in order to change those textbooks they'll have to campaign and they can do that by making use of various advocacy tools or media (social media or even traditional media), or writing directly to parliamentarians or local government or whoever would be in charge of the educational system at that level. So you see even if sociologists know the problems and know how we can improve the situation they rarely if ever have the power to actively change much and if you would refer to my comments above you'll see that many sociologists believe that that is just how it should be as this is only an academic Field.

-What are some specific institutions established in Pakistan for social upbringing?
Let's go over all the basic ones; families of course but in Pakistan we also have very large and interconnected extended families even if the group isn't living in a joint family system our culture gives a lot of respect to older familial and male roles. Hence these institutions are important for children's socialisation.
Then come schools. We also have madarssas that most kids go to or have religious Quranic teachers that come to our homes to teach. So they are a part of our upbringing too. Then after traditional classrooms, in some areas of Pakistan tutions are also common. Some children join academies or have personal tutors who teach and help with homework so they are integrals parts as well.
Then of course our peer groups; our friends, classmates, neighbours, family friends. We also are nowadays heavily influenced by our online presence on social medias so that is a big part. Government is a social institution that plays a major part since it dictates essentially what kind of education a child will receive and what kind of opportunities will be available to them. I suppose those are the basic ones.

What are the pressing social issues of Pakistan which may asked in the exam?(since it is expected that paper is full of pressing issues and not theories and definitions)
Some issues that I recommend you read up on are gender based violence, religious tolerance/intolerance, the social contract theory (v. V. Important nowadays. It's more philosophy than anything else but gives you a clue as to why and how modern societies and their relationships with governments are formed and maintained), modernisation vs. westernisation, Pakistani culture and it's protection/promotion, regionalism (how to end or at the very least control this from a sociological perspective), population explosion in Pakistan, the actual role of media and it's responsibility etc etc. You can find more issues in a section fo the sociology course that is given by FPSC. It is the second last heading if I remember correctly. Try to prepare those but if I can give you a word of advice even in pressing contemporary topics like these try to get in the theoretical base since this is not a general paper but a specialised one. For example when talking about governments and their responsibility to the public be sure to talk about the social contract theory and those that proposed it. This will fetch you higher marks then if you were just doing it generally.

I hope all of the above helps. Feel free to ask if anything doesn't make sense. I'd be happy to help.
Reply With Quote
The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to aishalam For This Useful Post:
FasiehJ (Saturday, February 01, 2020), Johnmac (Friday, January 17, 2020)