DEVIANCE!!!!!!!

Chapter 8 discusses Deviance and Social Control. Deviance is behavior that does not conform to basic cultural norms and expectations. Boundaries between normal and deviant are rarely understood or clear because people often disagree about where the line should actually be drawn. Maybe the way i define deviance might not be the same way someone else defines it.  


Examples of deviances of my everyday life.

1.Wearing footwear is mostly accepted here in the United States. If you were to wear footwear in an South Asian home, that is an act of deviance. In my house, shoes are not to be worn after you enter through that door. Now that I think about it, my parents would yell at me if I didn’t take off my shoes after I came from outside because they think my shoes are dirty. This is a shared belief within the community.

2. In my country or most muslim country, you eat with your hands.  Its not really accepted here in the united states. Almost everyone here eat with fork and spoon but back home, that will be considered a disrespect to your religion if there’s nothing wrong with your hands and your still eating with fork besides your hands. I don’t know if anyone else feels like this but, I find it way easier eating with my hands, maybe because I been eating with my hands my whole life, but its so easy and to me the food tastes ten times better. This 'act' is not normal here in America, but if I was back home, it would be completely normal. This proves that our culture and location has a lot to do with what is considered 'normal'. This also proves that the boundaries between normal and deviant are rarely clear. I also think this directly relates to differential association theory. For an outsider looking in, they would be able to see that I usually eat with my hands because that’s what I learned from my family.

3. )  Its so depressing In some countries, there is a lot of prostitution, child sex trafficking going on. Prostituting a daughter in America would be a deviant act in the United State but a way of life for some non-industrialized nations.  America does not allow that nonsense. In some countries, and some part many parents will actually give up their children to prostitution in order to help make money for the rest of the family.


4) Sometime when I walk into a restaurant, I see some guys picking their nose, now that’s just nasty but he thinks no ones sees it. I  mean it might be right to do it in your house, or not but not outside, especially not in a restaurant where people eats. this can be related to loner deviance, where the individual commits this act without the social support of another person.

5) Another deviance act is example in my house, my father is very religious, so if someone came to my house and doesn’t go pray especially the mans, or even my own brother, he will not talk to them, or be very mad at them, but if you see other family from the same country as me, their fathers are not that religious so there father doesn’t get mad if they pray or not, as in American people they pray when they want to, thy don’t have no timing for it.

6) This country is a multi-cultural, so with all the nationality all around, I m not surprised with all the deviances here. Its not surprising, because every culture looks t everything in a different way, so as I might see something being deviant, someone else might not, as same goes for, some things some culture does that American still don’t accept.

Positive Functions of the Undeserving Poor: Uses of the Underclass in America by Herbert J. Gans. Gan's article talks about  how poverty causes people to behave in deviant ways and commit deviant acts. He is saying that based on your social class of being poor, this causes you to act the way you act. In my opinion, although I can see why people will make this stereotype, I do not necessarily agree with it. There is no proof for it and frankly, there can be many factors as to why a person behaves the way that they do.