CREATIVE VISUALIZATION INSOCIOLOGY - 1

O, SAVE THE KING!

Chess and Social Conflict

by Trisha Sanico, SA21, Section I

Black and white. Chess, seen as a fight between two opposing kingdoms, reflects the clash between groups in society. The photo above showing a white king standing on top of two black rooks emphasizes how one race in society can be more favored than another race. Ever wonder why the white pieces always get the first move? The same photo also illustrates gender conflict. The white queen, for instance, seems to bow down to the white king – a situation that depicts a patriarchal structure. The strategy in chess of protecting the king further deepens the patriarchal image. The queen, for example, may be the most versatile chess piece but it will go to the death, so to speak, to save the king from being captured by the opposing force. Like slaves to men, women subordinate and even sacrifice themselves to men. Thus, using the social conflict approach, then, one can see that the old-time favorite game is more than just a battle of wits but a symbolic struggle for dominance where one group, using whatever resources it can muster, seeks to overpower the other and show us, again and again, that the more powerful always reigns supreme.

Note: After a session on the Sociological Perspective, I asked my class in the introductory course to visualize a concept or theoretical approach using readily available materials. (We earlier practiced on Lego-like blocks.) Students were to take a photograph of their work and write a paragraph discussing their creation. Here are two submissions, shown in two separate blogs. This is the first, the other one follows.
-Ricky Abad

CREATIVE VISUALIZATION IN SOCIOLOGY- 2

OBJECTIVITY VISUALIZED

by Karen Ann Labsan, SA21, Section I

Objectivity in social science research means conducting research with personal neutrality or with minimal or no influence from one's opinions and groundless ideas. The table tennis racket represents the sociologist as if s/he is wrapped in a white sheet to cover or eliminate biased thoughts and be colored only by different hues and shades that represent the facts and the theory(-ies) used to interpret those facts. The racket is not entirely plain and white for it is nearly impossible to be precisely a hundred percent objective. But it goes with saying that these colors represent data and theory both of which should be least affected by unjustifiable and/or irrelevant common-sense assumptions.

Note: Here's a second submission of the creative visualization exercise in the introductory course.

- Ricky Abad

WOE TO THE RESERVE ARMY OF LABOR!

by Ricardo Abad

The July 1 issue of The New York Times, Economy Section, reports that while American factory owners have been slowly adding jobs to the US economy since the start of the year, the situation gives little relief to the two million workers who have been laid off since the end of 2007. The reason: factory owners are now looking for workers with higher aptitude and technical skills, and only a tiny fraction of laid off workers qualify for these new positions. It’s no longer a question, the Times item adds, of laying off workers and replacing them with cheap labor from abroad. It’s now finding better-qualified workers who will be paid more dollars per hour.

The capitalist game plan has apparently changed. Capitalists no longer take advantage of a reserve army of laid off workers that can be hired at lower rates. These workers have become inutile. The technological sophistication of manufacturing now demands high-skilled technicians to operate, maintain, and improve on new machines to stay competitive at the profit game. The hiring rate for these skilled technicians are higher, of course, and that means greater capital outlay for labor, but the larger sum of salaries will probably pittance compared to the profits to be earned from their labor.

But woe to the reserve army of labor! Already disadvantaged by being the first to be laid off when the recession began, they are now doubly disadvantaged by a new manufacturing order that renders their labor unwanted. One long-term effect will be greater poverty for the unemployed, and eventually, a larger divide between the poor and the rich.

Marx may not have foreseen this double whammy. But he was right on the nose about inequalities growing wider under capitalism. Why I read somewhere that in England, the class gaps in life expectancies have increased in recent years. Looks like Marx is still getting empirical support in the age of high technology.

For The New York Times piece that stimulated this blog, see http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/02/business/economy/02manufacturing.html