Office Space Sociological Theory

There are five sociological concepts I am going to explain. And I will be using scenes from the Disney movie Pocahontas as examples. The five are: norms, role conflict, values, ethnocentrism and cultural relativism.

The 1998 film, Pleasantville, written, produced, and directed by Gary Ross is a “swell” example of the three perspectives of sociology. Two 1990 teenagers get trapped in the blue-sky world of a 1950’s sitcom. While spending time with the people in the small town of Pleasantville, the teens begin to drastically change the the bland ways of the townspeople and alter their world completely. Throughout these events, viewers can find examples of the functionalist perspective, interactionist perspective, and conflict perspective.

Sociology is defined as a “systematic study of human society” (Macionis 583). The 1989 film Dead Poets Society features multiple sociological themes and issues. The main themes shown in this film are deviance and role conflict. These themes do not apply to every character, some characters even show neither of these theme, but with the main characters there is multiple examples provided through their lives.

Everyone in the world has a theory about why something happens or how it happens, but in sociology there are many different types of theories that often contradict each other. Theory is defined as “a statement of how and why specific facts are related” (Macionis, 2013). Most theories explain why people act in certain ways and explains why a person in a group may act different than someone that is alone. When building sociological theories most sociologist ask their selves two different questions: “What issues should we study?” and “How should we connect the facts?” (Macionis, 2013). By answering these questions the sociologist is led to a road map, or a theoretical approach. Theoretical approach is described as “a basic image of society that

In the film Green Mile, different sociological theories and concepts can be useful in considering how societies rule our behaviors in life within different cultural places and times. A theory developed by sociologist Emile Durkheim known as the functionalist perspective profoundly applies through out the film. Concepts that are also seen in the film includes: human agency, norms, folkways, mores, and master status with a few theories and concepts of deviance.

Before we get into the analysis, let’s take a moment to define the sociological theory that is so prominent in this film. Structural Functionalism is the functions that society is given, to function as a whole. In order for society to work, we need people to be leaders, protectors, farmers etc. to have all jobs in society to be covered. Viewed from a macro sociological perspective, these smaller functions work to goal of a greater whole. If we did not have garbage men, we would not have anywhere to put our waste at the end of the week. If we didn’t have companies that put

In the movie “Breakfast Club” five high school students are punished with an 8 hour Saturday detention. In the beginning, they introduce each of the characters as the criminal, the athlete, the princess, the brain, and the basket case. All five students are from different groups of social status and think they all have nothing in common, but soon realize they have more things in common than expected. This movie can be seen through Structure-Functionalism, one out of three core theories. Structural functionalism view society as a system of co-dependent part that work together to ensure survival, meaning each structure has a certain function or purpose to be in society.

Working in today’s society has changed in the last few decades. The economy and technology are the main reasons for this change. The type of job and environment where one works has also changed. The fact that many people work from home via the internet has drastically changed the workforce and the environment surrounding it. With this change have come new demands, expectations, and opportunities for employers. Everyone deals with these demands differently, affecting the employee’s quality of life and job satisfaction. Though the job and office types and locations have changed over the years the need for job satisfaction has not. In today’s economy the job is not as stable as it used to be. One must be prepared for changes in the future.

Give examples of how the Behaviour and actions of individuals could affect others within the workplace.

The TV series, which I have chosen, and believe to be one of the best examples of interpersonal communication behavior, is the American television comedy series called The Office. This outrageously hilarious comedy TV series portrays the everyday lives of office employees located in Scranton, Pennsylvania, a branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin paper company and is filmed in a documentary type style by a team of film crew members. The plot of this TV series revolves around documenting the lives, interactions, and interpersonal relationships of the manager, Michael Scott, and the employees that he manages, which include Jim Halpert, who is a sales representative and prankster, Pam Beesly, who is a receptionist, and Dwight Schrute, who is a high-ranking salesman devoid of social skills, as well as Stanley Hudson, Kevin Malone, and many other minor characters who play the roles of office workers, working in a variety of positions throughout the office.

Life Outside the Cubicle by Jen Beck Seymour was such a fantastic read for me that I just couldn’t put it down! I absolutely loved Jen’s story of her finding what truly matters in life to her and her husband Greg. Jen’s life altering change by dropping everything she’s ever known and moving abroad to Costa Rica is inspiring, uplifting, and maybe above all BRAVE!!!

I think it is important to group these two categories together because of the impact they have on each other. An interesting idea that the documentary proposes is the notion of passive acceptance in employment, where people avoid questioning the goal of the work and ignore the bigger picture. It even went so far as to compare people’s complacency in the workplace with symptoms of Stockholm syndrome. Stockholm syndrome is a victim’s way of trying to increase their chances of survival by empathizing and sympathizing with their captor to hopefully gain their favor. In this example, the documentary proposes the safest way to survive and find success within the workplace is to accept the ideology of the corporate world. I found myself disagreeing with this idea originally as comparing workplace complacency to Stockholm syndrome seemed extreme to me. I still don’t fully agree with it; however, as the documentary focused on the concept of obedience I found myself better understanding what they

Sociology is the scientific study of being behavior in human groups (Schaefer). There are very many examples of sociology in the movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower, but I view alienation, deviance, and gender roles to be the most prominent. This movie is about the struggles of a teenage boy named Charlie’s freshman year of high school. Charlie is seen as a social outcast and he just barely makes it through the year with the help of his best friends Sam and Patrick. Throughout the movie Charlie experiences most of the basic struggles of starting high school and some. This movie is very relateable since it gives a more realistic view of high school for some people. Charlie , and the audience, learns the importance of love and friendship in growing up in today’s society.

Sociology takes place everywhere at every waking moment. It is an omnipresent being that lives alongside every one of us. Whether you are in the poorest slums of the world begging for food or living in a new york city penthouse raking in $10 million a year, you are affected by an assortment of sociological theories. As the study of human interaction and the relationship between people and the society in which they live, sociology is prevalent in everyday interaction as well the media; especially movies. Whether it’s a drama, horror, comedy, romance, or action movie, every conflict displays a different theory of sociology. One widely known movie has been analyzed for it’s variety of sociological theories. Fight club depicts theories such as

When asking a child what they want to be when the grow up, they will most likely tell you a doctor, teacher or some other public service occupation. They have the ideal that a career helping people is the best job a person could have. When those same kids get into high school their ideals become even greater (this really only applies to middle-upper class). They want to be artist, musicians, actors, or free lance writers who travel the world for the next big story. In college the ideals of the student are usually pushed to the back burner so that there is room for reality. Peter’s character in the movie Office Space is an example of the ultimate idealist. Throughout the movie we are shown his