anthropology-social status

1. SOCIAL
STRATIFICATION
Prepared by: SSTSOCIALSTUd.

2. Social Stratification
•refers to a system by which a society ranks categories of people
in a hierarchy.
•Refers to structural inequality, a recurrent pattern of differential
access to good and services and things that count in society
• Describes the way in which different groups of people are
placed within the society.
Statusof people is often determined by how society is
stratified -the basis which include
Wealth and income
Social class
Ethnicity
Political Status
Religion

3. Factors of Stratification
Basis are:
Family
background
power
wealth
A network of
social
connection

4. • ECONOMIC PURPOSES
• Social Stratification is created and maintained by
one group in order to protect and enhance its
economic interest.
• Functional PURPOSES
• Stratification is necessary and inevitable piece of
machinery that keeps society functioning efficiently
Why there is
stratification?
Think of it as a product of ability, priority
and privilege.

5. Types of Stratification:
Open Stratification
or Achieved
Achieved status through
merit and effort
Sometimes know as
meritocracy
Closed Stratification
or Ascribed
Ascribed statuses largely
determined a person’s
throughout life
social status a person is
assigned at birth or assumed
involuntarily later in life. It is a
position that is neither earned
nor chosen but assigned.
A system of social
stratification based on ability
and achievement rather than
social background

6. System of Stratification
Slavery
Castes
Estates
Social class

7. Slavery
 a system of stratification in which one person
owns another, as he or she would own property, and
exploits the slave’s labor for economic gain. Slaves
are one of the lowest categories in any stratification
system, as they possess virtually no power or wealth
of their own
In extreme cases he is wholly without rights. He is
in lower condition as compared with freemen.
The slaves have no political rights he does not
choose his government, he does not attend the
public councils. Socially he is despised.
It is an extreme form of inequality in which some
individuals are owned by others as their property

8. examples of slavery
• Greek and Roman
• southern states of USA in the 18th and
19th centuries.
According to H.J Nieboer the basis of slavery is
always economic because with it emerged a kind
of aristocracy which lived upon slave labour.

9. Castes System
A caste system has
legally or formally
defined groupings
that are assigned by
birth and not
subject to change.
Best-Known
Example are in
India and
South Africa

11. Caste System in Africa
• Apartheid or
separation of
races
European
(white)
African
(black)
Mixed European and
African ancestry
(Coloured or any
colored descent)
Asian

12. Estates or Feudal Systems
Three characteristics of
feudal system

13. Feudal system in France

14. Social Class • Classes are:
 Upper and lower
classes
Middle Class-Average
o Upper-middle class
oSkilled technicians
oProfessionals(doctors,
lawyer , professors)
oPoliticians
oLifestyles includes luxury
items, elegant homes.
o Lower-middle class
oWhite-collar workers
Working Class
Underclass
 A class system is a social
ranking based primarily
on economic position in
which achieved
characteristics can
influence social mobility.
 Class refers to
institutionalized system
by which some group
have more economic
resources and power than
do others.

16. It is possible that
social class can
be moved
upward and
downward?
What do You Think?