Social Structure and Social Interaction

Social Structure and Social Interaction

SOC 100: Intro to Sociology

Status Set

1.) Father- Mastered

2.) Husband- Achieved

3.) Brother- Ascribed

4.) Son- Ascribed

5.) Veteran- Achieved

Roles

The status that is most important to me is Father. It’s special to me because I believe its roles are more important than any other statuses roles. The role of a Father is to teach his kids everything in life. Some of the things that kids learn from their Father is what’s right and what’s wrong and how they should act in society. My kids not only learn from me by what I teach them but how I act. They see how a Father should act so that way when they get older if they decide to have kids they can base their actions off of my own. Just like how I learned my role from watching my own father raise myself and my brothers and sisters. Of course, my role is always evolving as I learn the best ways to teach my kids and they react to different teaching methods. I believe my role as a Father will pass down from generations unlike any of the others.

Role Conflict

One of the biggest conflicts between my statuses was when I was deployed to Kuwait for six months. My status as a Father was practically put on hold because of my status as a military member at the time. My daughter was three months old when I left. For her I’m sure it was no big deal as she wasn’t that attached to me at the time. But for me it was tough. She was my first kid and I was missing out on time with her I’ll never get back. To help with this conflict I tried to talk to her and my wife on video chat as much as I could, so she could still see and hear me. Another thing that helped was a little thing the U.S.O had set up in Kuwait where you could video tape yourself reading a kid’s book. They would record it to a CD and send it and the book for free. This helped me feel like I was still upholding my role as a Father as well as a service member.