Sociation Today Fall/Winter 2015

Sociation Today®

ISSN 1542-6300


The Official Journal of the
North Carolina Sociological Association

A Peer-Reviewed
Refereed Web-Based 
Publication


  Spring/Summer 2016
Volume 14, Issue 1



  Abstracts of Articles for the Spring/Summer 2016 Issue of
Sociation Today
  1. From East of Eden to the Pyramids: White-Collar Crime in the North Carolina Context: The 2016 Presidential Address
    by Steven E. Gunkel
      White collar-crime remains pervasive and costly, imposing devastating burdens on individuals and communities.  Despite these costs, neither the general public nor political leaders adequately acknowledge the problem that corporate crime represents.  The mismatch reflected in our limited awareness of white-collar crime despite its exorbitant costs motivates this address. The analysis of corporate crime which I will provide is guided by a threefold purpose.  First, I will examine two recent cases of white-collar crime in North Carolina: the Duke Energy coal ash spill, an environmental crime that ranks among the worst such cases, and the ZeekRewards Ponzi scheme, an economic crime also of vast proportions.  Second, I situate these cases with respect to consequences, typologies, and sanctioning of white-collar crime; and finally, I trace productive paths for moving forward with our understanding and control of white-collar crime.
  2. Ideology or Insanity?  Media Portrayal of Ted Kaczynski and Tim McVeigh
    by Matthew P. Sheptoski
      Standing at the intersection of mass media and the medicalization of deviance, this research explored mainstream media coverage of two convicted murderers, Timothy McVeigh and Ted Kaczynski. Were their criminal actions explained as emanating from psychological abnormality and mental illness or political and ideological motivation? Qualitative analysis indicates that McVeigh’s crimes were more frequently attributed to political and ideological motivation,
      despite compelling reasons to at least raise the possibility that his actions may have been caused
      by psychological abnormality, if not mental illness. His crimes were not defined as emanating
      from psychological abnormality and mental illness. Kaczynski’s crimes, on the other hand, were more frequently attributed to psychological abnormality and mental illness; he was not portrayed
      as a politically or ideologically motivated actor, despite compelling reasons to define him as such. McVeigh acted  'in the service of ideology', whereas Kaczynski's actions were the result of individual psychological abnormality: he acted in the service of ‘an inner psychological need’ (Johnston, 1995). The media served a social control function in defining him as crazy, removing his critique of industrial society from serious intellectual and public consideration.
  3. Building Consensus in Contested Spaces: Lessons for Post-Ferguson America from Inner-City Boston
    by Geniece Crawford
      Studies on high risk communities reveal that effective relationships between community members and law enforcement require collaboration and consensus. However, building those relationships can be challenging when suspicion and distrust of law enforcement form the basis of police-community relations.  In this analysis of a proposed controversial crime initiative in Boston, I examine how community leaders attempt to legitimize Boston law enforcement was limited by a lack of transparency and deliberative consensus. Drawing upon ethnographic data and qualitative interviews, this paper finds that public perception of law enforcement agencies, community leadership and divergent definitions of social justice ultimately resulted in a failed initiative. This study serves as a model of weakened consensus, as well as a cautionary tale for other large cities grappling with the task of mending fractured police-community relations.
  4. Riding the Storm Out: The Great Recession and Latino Population Growth in North Carolina’s Micropolitan Areas
    by Ana-María González Wahl, Steven E. Gunkel and Saylor R. Breckenridge
      This paper examines the impact of the Great Recession on employment and, in turn, Latino population growth in North Carolina’s micropolitan areas.  In the 1990s, these localities became “new Latino destinations”, marking a historic shift that took immigrants, in particular, from “city to country”.   The impact of the most recent recession on Latino population growth in these smaller towns remains unclear.  Most studies that examine the consequences of this crisis for Latino population trends offer national level generalizations or focus on metropolitan areas.  These studies report a “flattening out” of the record growth rates reported in the last decade of the 20th century.  Shifting the focus to micropolitan areas, this analysis depends on three data sources to track the economic crisis, and, in turn, Latino population trends in these places. Using data drawn from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau County Business Patterns, we find that micropolitan areas were hit harder by the recession than was the state or nation.  We distinguish the impacts for two sets of micropolitan areas.  Localities that depended heavily on manufacturing and those that did not reported, overall, similar declines in employment.   Both suffered extraordinary job losses in the two key sectors in which Latinos are typically concentrated:  manufacturing in localities that depended heavily on that sector and construction in other localities.  Despite these job losses, the Latino population more than doubled in these micropolitan areas from 2000 to 2010.   These growth rates were lower than in the previous decade but outpaced the growth rate reported statewide as well as nationwide.  This growth was particularly significant in those localities in which either or both the non-Hispanic white population or non-Hispanic black population declined.  Taken together, these population trends further transformed the racial/ethnic landscape of micropolitan areas and solidified the significance of the Latino population in these localities, despite the recession.  
  5. The Death of the Ideal in Education:  Weber, Bourdieu, Baudrillard, and the American Dream
    by Brenda K. Savage and M. N. Barringer
      The American Dream implies that all Americans have a uniform chance for advancement and prosperity through strenuous effort and merit, and this idyllic vision is continually reproduced and upheld through the United States education system.  Despite its successful perpetuation of the American Dream, however, education has not been able to facilitate the universal realization of success through hard work, revealing the Dream to be an inconsistent, if not empty, promise. In this paper, we theoretically propose that the educational system should cease intentional promotion of the Dream as a national ideology given its inequitable probability for individuals with limited resources and opportunities based on their social and economic positions.
  6. Here for the Mrs. Degree: Women's College Major Choice and Marital Status
    by Kathryn A. Huggins
      The stereotype of the Mrs. Degree alleges that some women attending college choose an “easy” or “less useful” major, often identified as those majors with a less explicit career path, under the assumption that they will not need to use this degree in a career. Instead, these women use their college years to find a husband, whom they expect to marry shortly after graduation, so that they can be housewives. This stereotype emerged in the 1950s when women started attending college in larger numbers, and it did develop out of an actual phenomenon.  However,  using a recent nationally-representative sample it is found that the myth is false.  It is not true today.

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The Editorial Board of Sociation Today
Editorial Board:
Editor:
George H. Conklin,
 North Carolina
 Central University
 Emeritus

Robert Wortham,
 Associate Editor,
 North Carolina
 Central University

Board:
Rebecca Adams,
 UNC-Greensboro

Bob Davis,
 North Carolina
 Agricultural and
 Technical State
 University

Catherine Harris,
 Wake Forest
 University

Ella Keller,
 Fayetteville
 State University

Ken Land,
 Duke University

Steve McNamee,
 UNC-Wilmington

Miles Simpson,
 North Carolina
 Central University

William Smith,
 N.C. State University