Course Outline for SOC001: Bikol Society and Culture

Department of Social Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences

Ateneo de Naga University

SOC 001: Society and culture with family planning          Consultation hours: TBA

First semester, SY 2014-2015                                                Menandro S. Abanes

Course description and outline

How do we see the world? How do we make sense of it? This course will introduce two disciplines, sociology and anthropology, which will help us in trying to understand humans who inhabit this world and their societies that structure it. We will learn sociological and anthropological perspectives which will locate our experiences of this world within the larger scale of society characterized by social structure and system. Through this course, we will be able to view familiar things in a new light, find new meanings in the old and new ways of doing things, and gain understanding and insight of the rapidly globalizing and changing world.

I.                    The discipline of sociology

A.      Introduction

Ø  Key concepts: sociological imagination, history and biography

Ø  Readings: The promise of sociology by C. Wright Mills (pp. 19-26) and Invitation to sociology by Peter Berger (pp. 3-7) in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

B.      Theoretical perspectives in sociology

Ø  Key concepts: functionalism, conflict theory, symbolic interactionism

Ø  Readings: Doing sociological research (pp. 27-30); The presentation of self by Erving Goffman (pp. 106-115) and The uses of poverty: The poor pay all by Herbert Gans (pp. 314-320) in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

Ø  Requirement: Newspaper clipping that shows any of the perspectives

II.                  The discipline of anthropology

A.      Culture: Why we do what we do

Ø  Key concepts: culture as learned and shared, material and non-material culture, components of culture (gestures, languages, values, etc.)

Ø  Reading: The cultural context of social life (pp. 69-71) and Body ritual among the Nacirema by Horace Miner (pp. 73-77) in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

B.      How culture is studied: Participant observation

Ø  Key concepts: fieldwork, ethnocentrism, cultural relativism

Ø  Reading: Street corner society by William Foote Whyte (pp. 59-67) in in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

III.                Research process and methods

A.      Human inquiry and research model

Ø  Key concepts: research model, surveys, experiments, data-gathering

Ø  Reading: How sociologists do research by James Henslin (pp. 31-42) in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

B.      Practice of research

Ø  Key concepts: theory, inductive, deductive, quantitative, qualitative

Ø  Reading: The role of theory in sociology by Janet Saltzman Chafetz (pp. 15-20) in Readings for introducing sociology (Ed.) Richard Larson and Ronald Knapp

Ø  Requirement: Participant observation on your own social group/neighborhood

IV.                Enculturation/socialization

A.      Social interaction and structure

Ø  Key concepts: agents of socialization, institutions, self-emergence

Ø  Reading: Town fiesta: An anthropologist’s view by Frank Lynch (pp. 219-236) in Philippine society and the individual

Ø  Requirement: A sociological paper written in one’s native language

B.      Family and kinship

Ø  Key concepts: family planning, marriage, kinship

Ø  Reading: The elemental Filipino family by Yen Makabenta http://www.livinginthephilippines.com/philippine_articles/elemental_family.html

C.      Deviance and control

Ø  Key concepts: breaching, norms, rules, labeling, anomie

Ø  Reading: Suicide by Emile Durkheim (pp. 125-131) in Readings for introducing sociology (Ed.) Richard Larson and Ronald Knapp

V.                  Stratification

A.      Sex and gender

Ø  Key concepts: identity, roles, social construction of gender

Ø  Reading: Fraternities and rape on campus by Patricia Martin and Robert Hummer (pp. 353-362)

B.      Class and inequality

Ø  Key concepts: status, power, social mobility, prestige, patron-client relations

Ø  Reading: Big and little people: Social class in the rural Philippines by Frank Lynch (pp. 104-111) in Philippine society and the individual

C.      Categorical differences (ethnicity and religion)

Ø  Key concepts: ethnicity, religion, social distance, trust, identification

Ø  Reading: Ethno-religious groups, identification, trust and social distance in the ethno-religiously stratified Philippines by Menandro Abanes et al. in Research in Social Stratification and Mobility

VI.                Social change

Ø  Key concepts: modernization, globalization, trends

Ø  Readings: The Mcdonaldization of society by George Ritzer (pp. 494-504) in Down to earth sociology (9^th Ed.) by James Henslin

Ø  Requirement: A research paper due on the final examination date

Surging Brooklyn Nets at the start of the 2014 NBA campaign

The Brooklyn Nets just won its 11th straight home game and is now 36-31. Playoff spot is almost assured. Last year, many analysts saw the Nets as a joke and blunder. What made the turnaround and change of fortune for the Nets?

When the 2013-2014 NBA season began, the Brooklyn Nets had a new and rookie coach (Jason Kidd) and several new and yet veteran players in the team line-up (Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, Jason Terry, Andrei Kirilenko, among others). Deron Williams, Joe Johnson and Brook Lopez were retained to keep the core of the team. The new line-up and hiring of new coaching staff cost hundreds of millions of dollars to the Russian team owner and billionaire, Mickail Prokhorov.

Salary cap seems not in Prokhorov's mind. His mind is all set for the championship now. To give you an idea of how the team payroll looks like, the first five (Williams, Johnson, Pierce, Garnett, and Lopez) combined salaries alone has exceeded the salary cap for an NBA team which currently stands at $58.7 million. Thus, the expectations for the 2013-2014 Brooklyn Nets are very high to give the defending champion, Miami Heat, and contender Indiana Pacers a run of their money.

When the 2013-2014 regular season began, the Brooklyn Nets started pathetically. Injuries and adjustments to new teammates were the logical factors in the poor start. The rookie coach, however, got the heaviest punch of blame in the lackluster performance of the team.

After 10-21 win-loss record at the end of 2013, many basketball analysts and enthusiasts counted out Kidd as competent to be a head coach in the game immediately after retiring from playing it. The loudest call at that time was for him to resign or be fired. However, the Nets stuck with him and continued to believe in him.

Then, the new year came. Kidd forgot his necktie and did not wear it during the team's first game of 2014. The Nets won. For the next games, the Nets found its winning ways. Kidd continues not to wear a tie believing that it has a correlation with winning. Now, the Nets is 26-10 this year. It is the best win-loss record in the Eastern Conference from the start of 2014. Kidd is even priming his team to go deep into the post-season and setting his sight to the NBA finals.

If the Nets continue to surge, it may find itself against the best in the Eastern Conference and ultimately against the best in the Western Conference.

Why was Vhong Navarro mauled?

Source: http://www.jennibailey.com/

That is the question!

Both sides have their answer. On one hand, Vhong Navarro cried that it was a set-up. On the other hand, Deniece cried that it was rape. Both sides cried, but one cry seemed to be louder than the other.

Which one?

Let us hear their cries based on the news.

No doubt, Vhong's is the louder one. Being an actor and a resident artist of ABS-CBN network do help in shaping the direction of the investigation and people's opinions. The release of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) report based mainly on the closed-circuit television (CCTV) clips from the Forbeswood Heights in Bonifacio Global City, Taguig City, Metro Manila bolstered Vhong's claim of set-up. Notably, the CCTV clips are spliced to follow the events as they unfolded in two locations of the condominium unit (lobby and elevator). Several times as I watched the CCTV, I noticed that Vhong and Cedric, after they reached the second floor where Deniece's unit is located, got out of the elevator and turned right, while the rest, including Deniece, when they reached the second floor, turned left. Another issue is that the CCTV did not capture the most important event (i.e., set-up or rape) which happened inside the room. Thus, everyone is free to interpret and conclude. However, the CCTV could not provide an answer to our question: Why was Vhong Navarro mauled? Set-up. For what? 1 million pesos. That is equivalent to 125,000 pesos for each of the eight accused of set-up. 125k pesos!

Deniece's version of rape is getting flak from social media users and fans of her Kuya Vhong. Her claim has been prostituted many times. What she has to support her version is the signed police blotter describing briefly the incident that happened on the 22nd of January 2014. The blotter was signed by Vhong Navarro. The police officers who were present there tried to get the side of Vhong several times. But Vhong repeatedly (not once, but several times) declined to counter the claim explicitly written in the blotter. He was quoted saying: "For my family's sake, I'll rather not talk." Another piece that is, to my mind, the most important evidence to bolster her claim is her story. Because of her friendship with her Kuya Vhong and the mauling Vhong got from her friends, she was willing to forego the filing of the case as indicated in the police blotter.

Now, both sides have filed their legal cases. It is up to the court to decide who is telling the truth.

Why was Vhong Navarro mauled? To me, I'd rather be convinced by a story than a CCTV.

Philippines will not reach 100 million in population this year (2014)

The Population Commission (PopCom) of the Philippines declares that the country will hit 100 million in population this year 2014. Below you will see how PopCom counts by the second. As of January 26, 2014 (00:56:29), its counter shows 99,028,209 (just 971,791 short of hitting 100 million). The projected population is based on the 1.98 population growth rate.

THIS IS INACCURATE!!!

The use of 1.98 growth rate to project the population for this year is quite over-extending the numbers. The National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) has projected the growth rate between 2010 and 2015 to be 1.82 percent (1.16 percent lower than what PopCom is using). The trend is going down as the years pass. So we should expect that 2014 must be lower than 1.82 percent.

If you google Philippines population growth rate, there will be a graph that looks like this. The data is from the World Bank. It shows that the Philippines population growth rate is 1.7 percent in 2012. That is lower, as expected, than the 5-year (2010-2015) projection of 1.82 percent. To project our population this year, we will use the 2012 rate of 1.7 percent. Thus, our projected population at the end of 2014 is 98,616,825 (short of 1,383,175). This is closer to the real number of Filipinos.