The document explores Marxism and symbolic interactionism, highlighting Marxism's critique of capitalism and its class struggle theory, emphasizing the roles of the bourgeoisie and proletariat. It also discusses symbolic interactionism, which focuses on the socially constructed nature of reality and emphasizes face-to-face interactions in understanding societal symbols and meanings. Additionally, the document touches on operant conditioning as a learning principle in psychology, illustrating its application in everyday behaviors.

1. Marxism and Symbolic
Interactionism and its
Importance in Examining Socio -
Cultural, Economic, and
Political Condition

2. Marxism Theories
Marxism is a social, political, and economic philosophy named after
Karl Marx, which examines the effect of capitalism on labor,
productivity, and economic development and argues for a worker
revolution to overturn capitalism in favor of communism.
Marxism posits that the struggle between social classes, specifically
between the bourgeoisie, or capitalists, and the proletariat, or workers,
defines economic relations in a capitalist economy and will inevitably
lead to revolutionary communism.

3. Karl Marx is, along with Freud, one of a handful of thinkers from
the last two centuries who has had a truly transformative effect on
society, on culture, and on our very understanding of ourselves.
Louis Althusser represents an important break in Marxist thought,
particularly when it comes to the notion of ideology.
Fredric Jameson is surely the most influential contemporary
Marxist thinker in the United States.
Marxism Theories

4. Class
It is a group of people who share similar characteristics specifically with
regard to their socioeconomic status.
Socioeconomic status
It refers to a person’s standing with regard to his/her access to resources,
monetary capability, income status, occupation, and living situation.
Class conflict (class warfare or class struggle)
It refers to the conflict between different classes in a community that is
composed of different social or economic positions and opposing interests.
Marxism Theories

5. The Six Elements in Marx’s View of Class
Conflict according to Quexbook, 2018
Classes are authority relationships based on property ownership.
A class defines groupings of individuals with shared life
situations and interests.
Classes are naturally antagonistic by virtue of their interests.

6. The Six Elements in Marx’s View of Class Conflict
according to Quexbook, 2018
Imminent within modern society is the growth of two antagonistic
classes and their struggle, which eventually absorbs all social relations.
Political organization and Power are an instrumentality of class
struggle and reigning ideas are its reflection.
Structural change is a consequence of the class struggle

7. Variables that Determine Class from a Marxian
Perspective according to Quexbook, 2018
Conflicts over the distribution of economic rewards between the classes
Easy communication between the individuals in the same class positions
so that ideas and action programs are readily disseminated.
Growth of class consciousness in the sense that members of the class
have a feeling of solidarity and understanding of their historic role.

8. Variables that Determine Class from a Marxian
Perspective according to Quexbook, 2018
Profound dissatisfaction of the lower class over its inability to control
the economic structure of which it feels itself to be exploited victim
Establishment of a political organization resulting from the economic
structure, the historical situation, and maturation of class
consciousness.

9. Two Types of People According to Karl Marx according to
Quexbook, 2018
1. Proletariat is consisting of the working or labor
class.
2. Bourgeoisie is consisting of the management
class; those who own the means of production.

10. The Three Sources of Income
 Owners of simple labor power or laborers whose main source of
income is labor.
 Owners of capital or capitalists whose main source of income is profit
or surplus value.
 Landowners whose main source of income is ground rent.

11. The Three Levels of Culture Model according to
Quexbook, 2018
1. Infrastructure - population, basic biological need, and
resources (labor, equipment, technology, etc.).
2. Structure - pattern of organization (government,
education, production regulation, etc.).
3. Superstructure - social institutions (law, religion, politics,
art, science, superstition, values, emotions, traditions, etc.).

12. Two-stage argument for the labor theory of value
First Stage :
to argue that if two objects can be compared in the sense of being put on
either side of an equals sign, then there must be a ‘third thing of identical
magnitude in both of them’ to which they are both reducible.
Second Stage :
a search for the appropriate ‘third thing’, which is labor in Marx’s view, as
the only plausible common element. Both steps of the argument are, of
course, highly contestable.

13. Capitalism is distinctive, Marx argues, in that it involves not merely the
exchange of commodities, but the advancement of capital, in the form of
money, with the purpose of generating profit through the purchase of
commodities and their transformation into other commodities which can
command a higher price, and thus yield a profit.
The cost of this commodity is determined in the same way as the cost of
every other, i.e. in terms of the amount of socially necessary labor power
required to produce it. In this case the value of a day’s labor power is the
value of the commodities necessary to keep the worker alive for a day.
Marxism Theories

14. In Marx’s analysis labor power is the only commodity which can produce
more value than it is worth, and for this reason it is known as variable capital.
Other commodities simply pass their value on to the finished commodities,
but do not create any extra value. They are known as constant capital.
Profit
is the result of the labor performed by the worker beyond that necessary to
create the value of his or her wages. This is the surplus value theory of
profit.
Marxism Theories

15. The Cambridge economist Joan Robinson, in An Essay on Marxian
Economics, picked out two aspects of particular note.
First:
Marx’s refusal to accept that capitalism involves a harmony of interests
between workers and capitalists, replacing this with a class based analysis of
the worker’s struggle for better wages and conditions of work, versus the
capitalist’s drive for ever greater profits.
Second:
Marx’s denial that there is any long-run tendency to equilibrium in the
market, and his descriptions of mechanisms which underlie the trade-cycle of
boom and bust. Both provide a salutary corrective to aspects of orthodox
economic theory.

16. Symbolic Interactionism
Symbolic Interactionism is a social psychological theory
developed from the work of Charles Horton Cooley and George Herbert
Mead in the early part of the twentieth century (the actual name of the
theory comes from Herbert Blumer, one of Mead’s students). According
to this theory, people inhabit a world that is in large part socially
constructed.

17. Examples of Symbolic Interactionism in Everyday Life
The way you perceive the world is unique. Based on your
interactions with words, ideas, and events, different objects, or words,
can have different meanings to you. Explore different examples of
symbolic interactionism at play in society.
Examples:
1. An image of a stick figure with a dress means woman.
2. An image of a stick figure without a dress means man.
3. A drawing of a heart means love.

18. Examples in Society
Societies are full of symbolic interactionism. And your interactions are
different based on the society in which you live. Additionally, many symbolic
interactionism examples seen throughout society can be subjective, based on your
experiences with that particular symbol. Check out a few different society
examples of symbolic interactionism.
Examples:
 Philippine Flag
 Gender (Male and Female)
 Colorism
 Rainbow

19. Symbolic Interactionism
Meaning behind Symbolic Interaction
The way you see the world colors your understanding of it.
Look no further than symbolic interactionism to see how this is
true. Interested to explore more about behaviors, check out operant
conditioning examples.

20. What is Operant and Classical Conditioning ?
Operant conditioning is a learning process whereby deliberate behaviors are reinforced
through consequences. It differs from classical conditioning, also called respondent or
Pavlovian conditioning, in which involuntary behaviors are triggered by external stimuli.
Examples:
A dog that has learned the sound of a bell precedes the arrival of food may begin to
salivate at the sound of a bell, even if no food arrives. By contrast, a dog might learn
that, by sitting and staying, it will earn a treat. If the dog then gets better at sitting and
staying in order to receive the treat, then this is an example of operant conditioning.

21. What is Operant Conditioning and Timing?
The core concept of operant conditioning is simple: when a certain
deliberate behavior is reinforced, that behavior will become more common.
Timing and frequency are very important in reinforcement.
 Continuous reinforcement schedule (commonly abbreviated CRF)
provides reinforcement for all noted behaviors.
 Intermittent reinforcement schedule (commonly abbreviated INT)
reinforces some target behaviors but never all of them.

22. Psychology divides reinforcement into four main categories:
Positive reinforcement - describes the best-known examples of operant
conditioning: receiving a reward for acting in a certain way.
Example:
When a worker is rewarded with a performance bonus for exceptional
sales figures, she is inclined to continue performing at a high level in
hopes of receiving another bonus in the future.

23. Psychology divides reinforcement into four main
categories:
Negative reinforcement - rewards a behavior by removing an unpleasant
stimulus, rather than adding a pleasant one.
Example:
In a sense, young children condition their parents through negative
reinforcement. Screaming, tantrums and other "acting out" behaviors are
generally intended to draw a parent's attention. When the parent behaves
as the child wants, the unpleasant condition - the screaming and crying -
stops. That's negative reinforcement.

24. Psychology divides reinforcement into four main
categories:
Punishment - something done after a given deliberate action that lowers the
chance of that action taking place in the future. Whereas reinforcement is meant to
encourage a certain behavior, punishment is meant to discourage a certain behavior.
Example:
An employee who misses work may suffer a cut in wages. The loss of income
(an undesired consequence) constitutes the punishment for missing work (an
undesired behavior).

25. Psychology divides reinforcement into four main
categories:
Extinction - as the loss of conditioning over time when the conditioning stimuli are
no longer present. Over time, an animal (or person) will become less conditioned
unless the stimuli that conditioned them in the first place is reapplied.
Example:
In school, if a student receives a gold star for an excellent test score but does not
receive more gold stars in subsequent tests, he may become increasingly
unmotivated to perform well in future tests. The operant conditioning of the
positive behavior (doing well on a test) is becoming extinct.

26. B.F. Skinner and Conditioning
Burrhus Frederic Skinner was a psychologist and researcher credited with
establishing the principles of operant conditioning. B.F. Skinner began with
Thorndike's law of effect, which states that behaviors that cause satisfactory
results will be repeated. Skinner considered satisfaction to be insufficiently
specific to measure and set out to design a means of measuring learned behaviors.
The operant conditioning chamber, popularly known as a Skinner box, was his
solution. He kept his test subjects, primarily pigeons and rats, in circumstances
that allowed him to closely observe their behavior.

27. Operant Conditioning and You
It can be uncomfortable to talk about human behavior in the
clinical language of psychology. That said, operant conditioning
describes a simple phenomenon that happens in every part of life. It's
just one of the mechanisms by which people learn. It's vital to
understand how that mechanism works to make sure it works best for
you.

28. Theoretical Model of Symbolic Interactionism
Symbolic interactionism, as it pertains to government, focuses its attention on figures,
emblems, or individuals that represent power and authority. Many diverse entities in
larger society can be considered symbolic: trees, doves, wedding rings.
Symbolic interactionists are not interested in large structures such as the government.
As micro-sociologists, they are more interested in the face-to-face aspects of politics. In
reality, much of politics consists of face-to-face backroom meetings and lobbyist efforts.
Symbolic interactionists are most interested in the interaction between these small
groups who make decisions, or in the case of some recent congressional committees,
demonstrate the inability to make any decisions at all.