SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION

* ADDITIONS IN BOLD *

- Johnson believes that socially constructed reality so powerful is that people rarely if ever experience it as that (from Johnson’s “Privilege, Oppression, and Difference”, pg. 20).
- Social construction makes people think that our culture defines a concept like race as if it were really how things are; in an objective sense (from Johnson’s “Privilege, Oppression, and Difference”, pg. 20).
- A part of social construction is when human beings give something a name, or importance, which then gives that concept a significance it wouldn’t have had previously.
- Let’s people believe that things like race or gender have clear-cut definitions, and cannot be changed.
- Social norms are a part of social construction. People are more likely to go with the norm (path of least resistance) because it’s the choice everyone else goes with. Going against the norm can produce encouraging or discouraging results, but people are afraid of the result. Social construction gives these norms an importance that they didn’t have previously, so that is why people choose the choices over others (from Johnson’s “Capitalism, Class, and the Matrix of Domination”).