Saint Anthony Academy

Batuan, Bohol, Philippines

Member: Bohol Association of Catholic Schools ( BACS)
Catholic Education Association of the Philippines (CEAP)
DISCIPLINES AND IDEAS IN THE APPLIED SOCIAL SCIENCES 11
ACTIVITY NO. 4
(Week 5)
Topic: Basic Concepts and Principles of Structural-Functionalism
Competency: Analyze the basic concepts and principles of the major social science theories.
Objective: *Identify the basic concepts and principles of structural functionalism as
sociological
perspective.
*Determine the basic concepts and principles of Marxism.
*Identify the basic concepts and principles of Symbolic Interactionism
Concept Notes:
STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM
 Develop by Herbert Spencer and Emile Durkheim
 It sees society as a system, a set of interconnected parts which together form a whole. There is a
relationship between all these parts and agents of socialization and together they all contribute to the
maintenance of society as a whole.
 Just like a living organism, a human body’s parts and organs perform very specific task to sustain itself.
Applied to society, the organic analogy of society follows the same logic of a complex organism whose
parts are highly differentiated yet work interdependently.
Focus of Structural Functionalism
1. The organization of society and the relationships between broad social units, such as institutions. The group
is the unit of analysis. A group could be a crowd of people in a movie theater, or the members of a family
sitting around the dinner table, what some call “small groups”.
2. Structural functionalism, or, simply, functionalism, is a framework for building theory that sees society as a
complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability. Two theorists, Herbert
Spencer and Robert Merton, were major contributors to this perspective. Important concepts in
functionalism include social structure, social functions, manifest functions, and latent functions.
3. It asserts that our lives are guided by social structures, which are relatively stable patterns of social
behavior. Social structures give shape to our lives - for example, in families, the community, and through
religious organizations.
Advantages of Structural Functionalism
1. Provides a wide-ranging explanation for many social phenomena
2. Has guided a great deal of valuable research
3. Has contributed useful concepts to the field
Disadvantages of Structural Functionalism
1. An ideal model of society rather than an empirically derived one
2. Operational definitions are hard to come by

MARXISM
 A system of economic, social, and political philosophy based on ideas that view social change in terms
of economic factors. A central tenet is that the means of production is the economic base that influences
or determines the political life.
 Develop by Karl Marx in the 19th century.
 In Marxist theory, the capitalist mode of production consists of two main economic parts: the
substructure and superstructure.
 In a capitalist society, the ruling class, or the bourgeoisie, owns the mean of production, such as
machines or tools that can be used to produce valuable objects. The working class, or the proletariat,
only possess their own labour power, which they sell to the ruling class in the form of wage labor to
survive. This relations of production—employer—employee relations, the technical division of labor,
and property relations—form the base of society or, in Marxist terms, the substructure. From this
material substructure, the superstructure emerges. The superstructure includes the ideas, philosophies
and cultural of a society.
 In a capitalist society, the ruling class promotes its own ideologist and values as the norm for the entire
society, and values are accepted by the working class.
 A temporary status qou could be achieved by employing various methods of social control—consciously
and unconsciously—by the bourgeoisie in various aspect of social life. Eventually, however, Marx
believed the capitalist economic order would erode, through its own internal conflict; this would lead to
revolutionary consciousness and the development of egalitarian communist society, in this communist
society, the state would own the means of production, and it would equally distribute resources to all
citizens. The means of production would be shared by all members of society, and social satisfaction
would be abolished.
SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM
 believes that the society is not static entity that appears before the individual but on the contrary, it is the
individual that carry out the leading role.
 focus on the interpretation (social meaning) that is given to behavior, and on the way such interpretation
helps to construct the social world, the identities of people, and, ultimately how they behave.
 The theory consists of three core principles: meaning, language and thought.
These core principles lead to conclusions about the creation of a person’s self and socialization into a
larger community (Griffin, 1997).
Three core principles:
1. Meaning states that humans act toward people and things according to the meanings that give to those
people or things. Symbolic Interactionism holds the principal of meaning to be the central aspect of human
behavior.
2. Language gives humans a means by which to negotiate meaning through symbols. Humans identify
meaning in speech acts with others.
3. Thought modifies each individual’s interpretation of symbols. Thought is a mental conversation that
requires different points of view.
Example:
A certain boy (Jeremy) and a girl (Kim) broke up last year. When Jeremy received an email from Kim to
go out, he agreed and they went to a bar. However, both had different interpretation or meaning to that
invitation. Jeremy went out as friends while Kim went out as with the meaning of ‘potential boyfriend’. The
language of communication was also misunderstood. Kim wanted to have a romantic night while Jeremy
wanted to have a talk in a bar. This is perhaps caused by the nonverbal element of emails. The third
miscommunication is under thought. When Jeremy replied quickly, Kim thought that they were going out to a
romantic place instead Jeremy went out just as ‘friends’. They both used an internal dialogue to interpret the
situation and to make a perception of the evening.
 DISCIPLINES AND IDEAS IN THE APPLIED SOCIAL SCIENCES 11
ACTIVITY NO. 4

Name:___________________________ Year & Section:___________________________

Date:______________________________ Score: __________________

ACTIVITIES
A. Direction: Answer the following questions. (25 pts)
1.How important the idea of the structuralist-functionalist system?
2. How does the society work under the principle of structural functionalism?
3. Do you think that there is a great inequality between the rich and the poor in our country? Justify your
position
4. What is the importance of Symbolic interactionism?
5. How does Symbolic Interactionism influence family decisions?

B. Direction: Write True if the statement is correct and False if it is not. (5 pts)
____1. Karl Marx is considered as the Father of Conflict Theory.
____2. Marx thought that it is only through breaking the domination by means of a revolution that conflict
in the society could be resolved.
____3. According to Marx, power in the society lies in the hands of the greatest: politically,
economically, and socially.
____4. Marxism developed by Karl Marx in 18th century.
____5. According to Marx, all human civilization is about conflict.