Chapter 1- Determining deviance

Defining Deviance
• “Deviance” is a highly contested concept, reflecting the “problem of definition” (e.g., dictionary
definitions, individual definitions, “nuts, sluts, and perverts”)
o Deviance = people disagree, they can disagree on what it means and what is/isn't deviance
o There is no universal or standard accepted way of defining deviance
o One definition says straying from accepted norms but how far do you have to stray – some
unanswered questions
o Individual definitions= we have our own definition and understanding, these definitions are
highly subjective cause they're based on our own beliefs and values, impossible to generalize
o Nuts sluts and perverts were early used to describe the types of deviance out there
• Traditionally, we have distinguished between objective and subjective definitions; however, this
dichotomy has given way to perspectives that combine elements of both
o Used to be a difference between subjective and objective but now the line that separated them
is blurry
o Objective approaches focus on the act of deviance; deviance is defined by a common
characteristic; we know it when we see it
• Objectivist think we can define deviance based on a specific quality or characteristic
§ Key think they want to understand is why, focus on act of deviance and goal of
explaining why
§ Claim the presence of certain characteristics defines deviance; behaviors or
people with those characteristics are deviant and those lacking such
characteristics are normal
o Subjective approaches focus on the perceptions of and reactions to deviance; deviance is not
associated with a particular characteristic but is socially defined; we are taught what is
deviant
• Subjectivist focus on reactions to deviance, deviance is something that is socially
defined (social construct), we must be taught what's deviant someone must tell us
§ Key question is why are some things, but not others seen as deviant and why do
we respond in the way that we do
§ Claim that there is no shared, observable characteristic that can clearly tell us
who or what is deviant in Canadian society
The Objective/Subjective Dichotomy
• Objectivism: Deviance as an Act
 o Something that people do or are
• Statistical rarity – something is deviant if it is rare
• Statistical rarity doesn’t capture everything
o But how do we define “rare”?
o Also, some behaviors, beliefs, or characteristics are not rare but are still considered deviant
o Conversely, many behaviors, beliefs, or characteristics are rare but not considered deviant
o Behaviors that aren’t rare but still deviant: underage drinking, lying, speeding, tattoos, sex
before marriage
o Behaviors that are rare but not deviant: left-handed people, cultural clothing in western
societies, high IQ
• Harm – something is deviant if it causes harm (e.g., physical,emotional, social, or ontological)
o But perceptions of harm vary over time
o Perceptions of harm are also subjective
o Sometimes reactions cause more harm than the
deviance itself
o Crime cause physical, emotional and social hard (ruins the equilibrium of society)
• Emotional hard could be emotional abuse or to yourself would be repeatedly dating
someone with addictions
o Ontological: something that poses as a threat to our perception of the world (beliefs systems
that don’t align with the dominant worldview)
o People will make the distinction between harm to self and to others
• Live and let live= what people do to themselves is no one's business except theirs
• Some people disagree and argue by harming yourself you’re harming others like your
family or if you’re addicted to drugs, taxpayers must pay more
o We criminalize issues about public health like drug use, we stigmatize people and thats very
difficult to overcome
o Criminalization costs us a lot of money
• When locking people up, that costs us a lot of money and doesn’t solve the underlying
problem of addiction
• It creates social harm; we pit society against people who have addictions (us vs them
mentality)
• Results in loathing
• = reactions are worse than the act itself
• Reefer madness video
 o They associate marijuana with murder, rape, suicide and insanity
• Societal reaction
o Something is deviant if society reacts negatively
• But why some things and not others?
• Also, how strong a reaction and how many negative reactions must there be?
• Some people's reactions count more than others
• And policymaking is often based on something other than societal opinion
• This type of reaction can involve anger or punishment of some kind
• Tells us nothing about how strong our reaction needs to be
§ At what degree is a negative reaction strong enough to require it to be deviant
o The reactions of politicians, social workers, religious leaders, scientists carry more weight
that reactions of the working class, students, children or people dealing with mental illness
• Ex. when marijuana was being legalized and conservatives were in power it didn’t
matter what the people wanted because the politicians were making the rules
o Some people favor the death penalty but Canada abolished it and we continued that not
because the public wanted us to get rid of it but it was politicians that decided Canada had no
business taking the lives of others, so they voted for it to be gone not the people
o

(cont’d) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
•
•
• Normative violation
o Something is deviant if it violates a norm (absolutist views have given way to more relativist
views)
• It goes against generally accepted standards
• Now we see more of a relativist view
§ Context matters, everything is relative
§ Our norms change culture to culture and overtime
§ Culturally and historically specific
§ Absolutist will argue incest is deviant, the relativist will saw if we look at some
other culture’s incest isn't deviant and its actually considered normative, its
expected behavior
 § Absolutist believe that norms and values emerge from God and what is
considered wrong should be wrong everywhere
§ Relativists will think you're only deviant if you're going against the norms in
your culture at that particular point in time
§ Not all norms are created equally
• But not all norms are the same (ex. folkways vs. mores vs. laws)
§ Folkways
• Informal norms
• They're communicated with us casually through socializing in our culture
• We learn these things informally
• More specifically they refer to everyday customs
• Examples: standards of dress; if a man were to go to an interview for
a bank manager, he would show up in a suit cause that’s what is
expected
• Example: respecting people's personal space or issues of hygiene
• Folkways are the norms and expectations we have to live up to and if we
go against them the “punishments” aren’t serious, you’ll probably be
mocked or considered strange
§ Mores
• Norms with a bit more force/importance
• When they're violated the reactions are a bit strong
• That’s because when we violate mores, we are more likely to be seen as a
threat to society
• Example: interracial marriage not too long ago would be seen as a
threat
• You could be fired for violation or expelled or excommunicated from
church or shunned by your community
• Institutional punishment
• There is a moral dimension associated here that we don’t see with folkways
§ Laws
• Formal norms
• Example: Laws contained in our criminal code
• Laws deal with issues a society feels are really important
 • Laws in Canada that are consistent with a lot of country have to do
with theft, assault, murder
• We can label norms as pre-scripted or pro-scripted
§ "Pre" norms specify what we should do
• Example: pay taxes, wait in line at the store, hold the door for people
who follow behind, stop at a red light
§ "Pro" norms are framed in ways that specify what we shouldn’t do
• Example: Don’t take something that doesn’t belong to you, don’t lie
on the witness stand
• And where do these norms come from? (ex. consensus vs. conflict vs. interactionist
views)
§ Consensus
• A position that assumes that the rules that govern our society come from a
consensus
• People agree that this is a norm that has value
• People who violate norms are pretty much responded to in the same way
• People who commit murder are all treated the same cause we
as a society agree that murder is wrong
§ Conflict
• Laws are not so much based on a consensus rather laws are really a tool
that are used by societies elite to protect and promote their own interests
• Laws that apply to those who are homeless, laws that prevent
street things; these are laws created by those who are powerful
• These people use their power to control that behavior
• Laws in theory should eb applied equally to everyone but that’s not what
really happens
• The poor, minority groups are more likely to be caught and
punished
§ Interactionist
• Yes, it is societies elites who determine our rules and laws but they're
doing it on the basis of the interests of different interest groups
• They're not creating these rules for their own interest (like conflict) but
they’re going it on the basis of what other groups thin is important
 • Religious groups might lobby government to enact laws that
they see need to be changed that have value or police people
might do the same
• Any particular interest group essentially
• The concept of norms implies consensus (ex. high-consensus deviance vs. low-
consensus deviance)
§ High
• Points to those acts of deviance in which we generally agree
• Example: theft, assault, murder
§ Low
• Less agreement about these
• Less likely to be reflected in law
• Example: body modification, porn, gambling, adultery
• And what about situational variations?
§ The state has the authority to take the life of certain individuals, self-defense,
assisted death
• Subjectivism: deviance as a label
o We cannot recognize deviance when we see it, we have to be taught through socialization
o There is not trait shared by all deviant people
o Dominant moral codes serve as the foundation for determining deviance; power dynamics are
key to understanding where the codes come from
• Key concept is the idea of what is called dominant moral codes (the foundation)
• Lists of right vs wrong, good vs evil, moral vs immoral
• These dominant moral codes are specific to time and place (culture and to the time
period)
o You have to consider the issue of power; you are trying to understand these codes cause the
reality is those who have power are in a much better position to determine what's acceptable
and what's not
o These dominant moral codes reflect processes of social construction
• Something is deviant only because its defined that way
• Its created by the society in which we exist
• It doesn’t just exist its created and constructed
• Context specific
• Not universal
o There are different degrees to which people believe these norms and expectations are
constructed
o Objectivist focused on the act of deviance, subjectivist say that deviance is a label that is
applied to people and behaviors
o Social constructionism refers to the perspective proposing that social characteristics are
creations or artifacts of a particular society at a specific time in history, just as objects are
artifacts of that society
o What is of sociological significance is not the individual behavior or characteristic itself but
• Its place in the social order
• The roles assigned to people who exhibit that behavior or characteristic
• The meanings attached to that behavior or characteristic
o Codes emerge from processes of social construction- something is deviant only because it has
been defined as such
• Definitions of deviance are, therefore, context specific
• Radical/strict constructionism
§ Argues everything in constructed and nothing just is
§ Its created by the group in construction
§ There is no objective
§ We can’t generalize
• Soft/contextual constructionism
§ There are limits on the degree of construction happening
§ There in fact is a degree of objective reality
• Example: argued from a soft perspective would be said that it is a universal
phenomenon cause people engaged in it from past to present what varies
across time and cultures what is constructed or created are the these
specific of body modification practices and some forms and cultures get
defined as normative while others get defined as deviant these things
change overtime
• Ones considered normative: ear piercings, circumcision, hair cutting
• Ones considered deviant: neck or face tattoo, voluntary amputation, self-
harm markings
• Normal considered then but not now: brass coils used to illusion of longer
neck
• Levels of social construction:
 § Individuals
• Own identities, concepts of self, and ways of understanding our own
existence in the world affect the path of social construction
• About our individual experience sand how they influence our
understanding
§ Interactional
• Our interactions with other people influence the way we think and feel
about others, thereby determining the role that each of us plays in social
construction
§ Institutional
• The structures of our society, such as government, the education system,
and religion that affect social construction
• Rules that have been formalized by some institution
§ Sociocultural
• Beliefs, ideologies, values and systems of meaning have an influence on
the path of social construction
• Broader cultural values
• Students confuse institutional with sociocultural when we talk about
institutional it’s about concrete rules while sociocultural and broader social
values
§ Global
• Connect us with different cultures and way of life
• Contemporary understandings of deviance transcend this dichotomy and incorporate
elements of both
§ Absolute moral order vs. Radical construction
• People fall somewhere between the 2 (objective and subjective)
• People who study deviance can argue both
• If we go to extreme objective end, we have an idea that it’s an absolutist view and there
are universal norms they're fixed or permanent that there is a moral order, no matter
where or when they are deviant
• If we see the extreme subjectivist end, we see that everything is created or constructed
there is no reality
• As another position within subjectivism that’s softer is closer to the middle but still on
the subjective end
(cont’d) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Studying deviance

• Understanding an act of deviance requires us to situate it within the larger context in which it
occurs (i.e., how it came to be perceived and responded to as deviant); the study of deviance is,
therefore, as much about rulemaking as it is about rule-breaking
Important to keep in mind that the study of deviance if rule making and breaking
When it comes to the rule making process of creating deviance the process of moral entrepreneurs
is important these are people who have perceived something is a problem and get the rest of us to
accept this point of view they’re working to define deviance and find out what should be done
about it

• Moral entrepreneurs are those who seek to define something or someone as deviant and dictate the
appropriate response
o Politicians
• Politicians have the authority to create our laws and establish policy
• Other groups lobby politicians so they will enact laws or policy that will reflect their
own particular interests
• Ultimate power has been vested in modern state systems
• They have powers to invoke, revoke and determine the enforcement of legislation and
social policy

o Scientists
• Scientists tend to have a lot of authority they have a lot of credibility cause what they
say matters and influences how we see things
• Able to effectively make claims that influence society's moral codes
• Claims made by scientists are backed down by the domain that is granted perhaps the
highest level of credibility in our society
• When scientists proclaim truths, many of us will believe those claims simply because
scientists say so
o Religious institutions
• Exhibit laws like homophobia
• Abortion laws
 • Central role in the creation of the dominant moral codes that determine deviance and
normality
• Belief systems provide people with moral codes that subsequently affect the role
individuals play in larger social processes

o Media
• Tools used by other entrepreneurs to get the message out there
• Central battleground in the struggles over moral codes
• Moral entrepreneur itself in terms of the choices made about what will and will not be
included on a particular program or in a particular commercial segment

o Commercial enterprise
• Media is a commercial enterprise
§ Tells us how to act
• Also operates outside the media
• Big business is powerful in getting politicians to make laws that support their interests
• Most components of the media itself are commercial enterprises driven by a profit
motive

• The social typing process refers to the process by which a person, behavior, or characteristic is
deviantized
• Process through which someone or something get labelled as deviant

• Description = the label or category

o Label is placed on an individual because of an observed or presumed behavior or
characteristic

o Exact nature of the label depends on the culture in question

o Confusion comes between description and evaluation
o Description is a label or category being created and then applied to individuals or groups not
just about a particular individual but a particular type of individual so like goth or hippie
o Think of description as a noun to describe a person or a group like calling disabled people nut
jobs
o It evolves into the next element which is evaluations

• Evaluation = the judgment or assumptions

o A judgment is attached to the individual by virtue of the label that was previously attached or
the category that individual was placed in under the description component
 o Evaluations are judgements are made about people who are subjects to that label
o This would be like calling a disabled person a danger or a threat
o This is like an adjective

• Prescription = the social control (sanctions)

o Processes of social control or regulation emerge

o Because of the label that has been given and the resulting judgment that occurs, the individual
is treated in a particular way- a way she or he would not be treated if the initial label had not
been applied

o Individuals are made subject to a range of social treatments designed to regulate or control
their deviance
o Prescription involves efforts of social control
o Reflects our response to deviance
o This comes in the form of sanctions: responses to behavior or situations, sanctions can be
positive like rewards or negatives like punishments
o When we are talking about deviance its negative sanctions, Designed to convey disapproval,
punish the deviant, depending on the importance of norm violated the sanction could vary
from a dirty look to capital punishment and everything in between
o These negative sanctions are designed to control or minimize objectional looking behavior
o Different forms of social control:

§ Informal vs. Formal

§ Formal:
o Formal institutions
o Getting fired for excessive absenteeism
o Put on probation for driving under the influence
o Teacher giving is student detention
o Processing at some type of an organizational or institutional level
§ Informal:
o Reflected in informal interactions with each other
o Responses of parents, family members, friends, acquaintances, or complete
strangers
o Emerges at the level of patterns of informal social interaction

§ Retroactive vs. Preventative

 § Retroactive:
o After the fact
o After the activity has taken place
o Treating a known deviant in a certain way
§ Preventative:
o Trying to socialize children so they will become normal when they’re older
and to prevent them from becoming deviant
o Trying to prevent deviance in the first place- through socialization

§ Regulation of others vs. Regulation of the self (self-control)

§ Regulation of others:
o Those in authority like parents, teachers, police officers
§ Regulation of self
o Most of us have actually internalized societies rules because they have
been communicated to use quote effectively
o We don t do it because we fear consequences, but we do it because we
believe in and value this behavior
o We see these rules as valid and important