4 Short answers

Select 4 questions to answer from 8 questions. Your answer must based on Allen's book. 200 words for each answer.

1. Describe a time when you were in a homogeneous social identity group (with people of the same category as yourself), and you had a conversation about people in a different identity group. (Examples: a group of women talking about men or vice versa; a group of heterosexuals talking about gay people; etc.) Explain the circumstances and describe your feelings at the time. Looking back on it, how do you feel about it now?

(Based on Chapter 1, p. 21, question 11)

2. Select one of the dominant ideologies listed below, and explain how you have had personal experience with this ideology and its effects, or else when you have witnessed the effects of this ideology on someone else (e.g., someone in your real world, not a fictional media character).

a) Patriarchy – The belief that (male) men are superior to all women

b) White supremacy – The belief that the “White” race is superior over all others

c) Culture of poverty – The idea that the poor have in-born traits (innate inferiorities) that keep them poor

d) Heteronormativity – The belief that heterosexuality is the only normal sexual orientation

(Based on Chapter 2, p. 39, question #11)

3. Do you think that women and men communicate differently? If so, why? What are some examples of this? Do these differences vary when gender intersects with other social identities such as race, ethnicity, or age?

(Based on Chapter 3, p. 63, question 8)

4. Do you identify with a race or ethnicity that is not a part of your family history (i.e., as far as you know, you have no relatives or ancestors belonging to that race or ethnicity)? Where do you believe this identification comes from? Has your expression of this identification ever annoyed or offended any family members, or anyone else?

(Adapted from Chapter 4, p. 91, question 5)

5. Have you ever “passed” as a member of a social class different than your own? For example, if you come from a low-income background, have you ever made an effort to be perceived as wealthy? Or if you come from wealth, have you ever made an effort to be perceived as low-income or middle class? What was your motivation for doing this? Did you succeed? Why or why not?

(Adapted from Chapter 5, p. 113, question 14)

6. Do you think that workplaces should have policies regarding romantic relationships among employees? If you think the use of such a policy should depend on the type of workplace, explain how you think dating policies should be different at different types of workplaces.

(Adapted from Chapter 6, p. 135, question 7)

7. What do you think of the disability activist perspective that “disability is simply a normal variation of human diversity”? Related to this, how do you feel about the Deaf community’s belief that they represent a linguistic minority?

(From Chapter 7, p. 159, question 5)

8. Have you ever worked with someone from a different age group than yours? What were the positives and negatives of that experience? Did the other person have expectations of you that were based on the norms of his/her own birth cohort? Do you think you had expectations of the other person based on the norms of your birth cohort?

(Adapted from Chapter 8, p. 181, question 9)