Wednesday, May 8. 2013

Today's schedule is B-AG-A-D-C

B Block Social Studies 11 - Today is it...we're in the library for the last day for you to work on your "Complete Idiot's Guide to Fascist Dictatorship" project (due Friday). I really don't want you to get caught up in the minutia of details. The important thing here is to see the big picture and understand how the dictators in the 30's came to power and then held on to power. Naomi Wolf wrote an article in the Guardian newspaper back in 2007 that outlined some steps:

1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy
2. Create a gulag
3. Develop a thug caste
4. Set up an internal surveillance system
5. Harass citizens' groups
6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release
7. Target key individuals
8. Control the press
9. Dissent equals treason
10. Suspend the rule of law

Wolf argued that these steps existed in the United States and that is certainly a debatable proposition however the steps she identified are a scripted pattern. Start with economic and social turmoil, throw in some perceived lawlessness and humiliation, then add a national threat and the conditions are ripe for a charasmatic personality to promise a golden path to either a renewed past of halcyon days or a bright future. So look for the common threads between the three dictators. Look at their methods of gaining power. Who did they seek for help? How did they convince people of their ideas? Once they got power how did they keep it? Remember the word totalitarian? Big Ideas folks.

D Block Criminology 12 - Today is day two of our week reviewing crime theories.I'll give you time at the start of class to work on yesterday's questions about Choice and Trait theories. After, we'll cover both Social Structure and Social Process theories today.

Social Structure Theories (Chapter 6 in the CRIM textbook)

Social structure theories suggest that people’s place in the socioeconomic structure influences their chances of becoming criminals. Poor people are more likely to commit crimes because they are unable to achieve monetary or social success in any other way. Social structure theory includes three schools of thought: social disorganization, strain, and cultural deviance theories. Social disorganization theory suggests that the urban poor violate the law because they live in areas in which social control has broken down. Strain theories view crime as resulting from the anger people experience over their inability to achieve legitimate social and economic success. Cultural deviance theories hold that a unique value system develops in lower-class areas. Lower-class values approve of behaviors such as being tough, never showing fear, and defying authority. People perceiving strain will bond together in their own groups or subcultures for support and recognition.

Social Process Theories (Chapter 7 in the CRIM textbook)

Social learning theory stresses that people learn how to commit crimes. Social control theory analyzes the failure of society to control criminal tendencies. Labeling theory maintains that negative labels produce criminal careers. Social learning theory suggests that people learn criminal behaviors much as they learn conventional behavior. Control theory maintains that all people have the potential to become criminals, but their bonds to conventional society prevent them from violating the law. This view suggests that a person’s self-concept aids his or her commitment to conventional action. Social reaction or labeling theory holds that criminality is promoted by becoming negatively labeled by significant others. Such labels as “criminal,” “ex-con,” and “junkie” isolate people from society and lock them into lives of crime.

Today's question has to do with Social Process theory:

1. Describe the four main elements of the social bond that a person maintains with society: attachment, commitment, involvement and belief.

C Block Social Studies 10 - Today you'll have part of the class to continue work on your 'Ole Bill Coot assignment but first...we'll examine the Confederation debate in British Columbia. We'll look at those supporting Confederation - joining Canada (like Anthony Musgrave, John Robson and Amor deCosmos), those supporting Annexation - joining the U.S.A. (like John Sebastien Helmcken) and those supporting Imperialism - staying a colony of Great Britain. I'd like you to explain the positions of each and identify the impacts on BC for each. So...

Confederation - benefits of this idea and impacts on BC
Annexation - benefits of this idea and impacts on BC
Imperialism - benefits of this idea and impacts on BC

After this you may continue working on 'Ole Bill Coot which is due this Friday...yep a deadline that is two days away. No worries right?