SOC100B(Notes from Course Readings)The PromiseWhat ordinary people are directly aware of and what they try to do are bounded by the private orbits in which they liveOrdinary people do not usually know what this connection means for the kinds of people they are becoming and for the kinds of history-making in which they might take partPeople often sense that older ways of feeling and thinking have collapsed and that newer beginners are ambiguous to the point of moral stasisSociological Imagination:Quality of mind that will help them to use information and to develop reason in order to achieve lucid summations of what is going on in the world and of what may be happening within themselves→ sociological imaginationThe capacity to shift from one perspective to another- from the political to the psychologicalTroubles (characters of individual) vs. issues (matters dealing with organization or society as a whole)To be aware of the idea of social structure and to use it with sensibility is to be capable of tracing such linkages among a great variety of milieux. To be able to do that is to possess the sociological imaginationDNA Is Only One Way to Spell IdentityBelief that race is almost entirely a social demarcation, not a biological one“Our family emphasizes the values both sides have in common”- Author’s family overlooks the issues that society sometimes create in differentiating between racesForging of a new interracial futureDr. King Weeps from His GraveKing’s dream of a more democratic America, has become, in his words, “a nightmare”, owing to the persistence of “racism, poverty, militarism, and materialism”The four catastrophes:1. Militarism- the imperial catastrophe that warped country’s priority and stature2. Materialism- the spiritual catastrophe promoted by corporate media complex and creating hard-core consumers3. Racism- the moral catastrophe invoking violence and hatred towards people4. Poverty- the economic catastrophe creating the gap between the powerful greedy and the miserable poorThe absence of a King-worthy narrative to reinvigorate poor and working people has enabled right-wing populists to seize the moment with credible claims about governmentcorruption and ridiculous claims about tax cuts’ stimulating growth.King’s response to this crisis would be for there to be a revolution in priorities, a re-evaluation of our values, a reinvigoration of our public life and a fundamental transformation of our way of thinking and living that promotes a transfer of power from oligarchs and plutocrats to everyday people and ordinary