Rules, Class, Culture

This week has been very interesting as I've thought about the rules that are in my family and also about my social class. The videos we watched for class were very interesting, they were about different social classes in America. My favorite one talked about yard ornaments because I know a place where they are very common and people even dress them up for holidays and seasons. in class we talked about different working classes such as lower class, lower middle class, middle middle class, upper middle class, working class, upper class, and elite. I would have considered my family middle middle class, but after the discussion I realized we're probably working class. The realization was interesting more that earth shattering. I will probably be middle class somewhere after I get married, simply because of education.

We also talked about feedback. I didn't quite understand that. There was a lot of talk about positive and negative, what I think I understand about it is that negative feedback are small changes that bring us back to homeostasis. Positive feedback are a lot bigger adjustments that need to be made to bring the system back to original homeostasis, or to create a new homeostasis. I really have no idea, though if that is right. We also talked about class and culture. I tried to think about what my culture would be, I think it is stage mom culture, even though I wouldn't consider my mom a stage mom. My family does a lot of active stuff that involves performing in different mediums; singing, acting, jump rope, drums; and so we are always busy because of that. If we were in a lower class we might not be able to do a lot of that stuff and if we were in a higher class we might to do different things.

Theories

Well, I am still working on what exactly I need to say in this blog, but I found this week fascinating. I really enjoy learning about theories and ways to apply them especially thinking about how they apply to my family. Reading the articles and thinking about about family got me thinking about what rules for interaction do I have in my family. It was actually much harder than I thought it would be to find them. The big reason for that is I haven't lived at home for about 6 years and during that time things have changed: my siblings have grown up, most of us have served mission, my family is even living in a different house. The system has changed, and figuring out what the change is would be very interesting, but it would explain why when I go home I feel like I shake things up. The other hard thing this week was thinking about boundaries, and it was for the same reason, I haven't been home and I don't know what some of the boundaries between some of my family members are. I also discovered that I want to make some of my boundaries more open.

Research and Recent Trends

I'm not sure how I'm supposed to share what I've learned through the blog, but one way I thought of for this week is to share some of my thoughts on an article I found completely by chance called "'Mormons in America' Pew survey explores beliefs, attitudes of LDS Church members". I found the article at this website: http://desne.ws/AfmdnI. It is about a study that was done by Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life .

I thought this article was interesting to read after learning about research studies. It talks about creating a survey using terminology that would be mutually understood by all those that took it. I thought it was interesting because in class and in the articles about research it mention terminology being one of the trials in research. One thing I thought made this study very strong is that it wasn't done by the church, but they did get the advice of members as they were putting the study together. Something I also thought it was really interesting that they showed the results about what they learned about American "Mormons" and compared it to what they learned about what other people believe about Mormons. Some of those things were in line, but when it came to whether or not we were christian there was a huge difference of opinion. There were several results from the survey that fit the stereotypes often associated with Mormons, like where most of them live. They surveyed more than a thousand members that were found when they had done previous studies. They had questions that made sure the participants were members of the church and not groups that are not call themselves Mormons but are not affiliated with the church. I liked that they admitted that the study could have done a better job at representing the marginal members, it admitted that there is a lot they could still learn in further studies. Another thing I liked about the study, and this is more of a personal note, I liked that it reflected many positive things about the church.