Ascribed Status vs. Achieved Status

Paper Summary:

This insightful and well-researched paper examines how one's impression of an individual's social class molds the way in which we interact with that particular individual. This paper focuses on how the initial impressions of our fellow human beings can impact and even determine our expectations of other individuals. From a small number of visual and audio clues, we can guess at whether an individual is successful or not. These same clues tell us whether that particular person is worthy of respect, or revulsion. The writer of this paper details how the status of people, organizations, places and ideas differs depending upon the context. One group may possess a generally negative status, while others may present a negative status only in relation to certain others. This paper also explores the impact of the media on our perception of others. Newspapers and television stations are always bombarding the viewer with images of crime and criminals. They like to show photographs of the alleged victim dressed neatly in a suit and tie, or wearing the robes of an altar boy. Much stronger than these examples of individual cases of a person's status or condition, are those in which the media stereotypes a whole group of people. This paper also discusses how ethnic and minority groups are lumped together in such an easily recognized fashion.

From the Paper:

"Among the other discoveries of this look at "status," was the uncovering of a still-more insidious method of reporting events. In many of the pieces at which we looked, the "judgment" that the reader is invited to make is conceived of as something that happens almost automatically. For example, Mayor Daley's defense of vocational schools does not, in reality, contain anything positive or negative about such a school. Instead, it is the mere offering of the comment that is significant. People have a certain idea about "vocational schools," and the Mayor, as well the Tribune's readers are fully cognizant of the nature of that point-of-view. A more positive way of handling the story might have been for the article to have listed all that the vocational schools would do, rather than introducing at once the idea that "You'll live with it!" Too many times, even the most objective people let slip small comments or phrases that indicate a prejudice one way or the other. Particular words become "code words."

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