1. Modernity Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft
Peter Burger identified characteristics of modernization – process of social change begun by industrialization
Decline of small, traditional towns
High-tech communications puts small towns in touch with world
Expansion of personal choice
Unending series of options referred to as “individualization”
Increasing diversity in beliefs
Promotes more rational, scientific world-view
Future orientation and growing awareness of time
Living in industrialized nations tends to focus more on future than on past
Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft
sociologist
Ferdinand Tönnies
community-town
civil society or
'association‘-City

2. Ferdinand Tonnies & Loss of Community
With modernization comes loss of gemeinschaft, or human community
Loss of community caring
Beginning of individualization
Business-like emphasis
Modernity brings about condition gesellschaft, or impersonal
People live among strangers
Ignore most they pass on streets

3. Emile Durkheim & Division of Labor
Modernization is marked by increases in a complex division of labor
People performing highly distinctive roles rather than everyone performing same daily routines
Society transformed from mechanical to organic solidarity
Mechanical solidarity refers to a time when society was held together by social bonds anchored in common moral sentiments
Organic solidarity refers to modernity during which time social bonding is accomplished by way of mutual dependence

4. Max Weber and Rational Society
Modernization means replacing a traditional worldview with a rational way of thinking
Modern people value efficiency, have little reverence for the past and adopt whatever social patterns allow them to achieve their goals
Karl Marx & Capitalism
Industrial revolution was a capitalist revolution
Social conflict in capitalism sows seeds of egalitarian socialist revolution

5. Theoretical Analysis of Modernity
Structural-functional theory
Mass society is a society in which prosperity and bureaucracy have eroded traditional social ties
Draws upon the ideas of Tonnies, Durkheim and Weber
Social-conflict theory
Class society is a capitalist society with pronounced social stratification
Draws upon the ideas of Marx

6. David Riesman: Modernity & the Individual
Personal identity can be a problem since society changes so rapidly; Inherent instability
Social character refers to personality patterns common to members of a particular society
Tradition-directedness refers to rigid conformity to time-honored ways of living
Other-directedness refers to a receptiveness to the latest trends and fashions, often expressed in the practice of imitating others

7. Postmodernity Social Patterns Characteristic of Postindustrial Societies
In some ways, modernity has failed
Much poverty and stress
The bright light of progress is fading
Less confidence about future
Science no longer holds the answers
Science has created its share of problems
Cultural debates are intensifying
The promises of social movements have not been fulfilled
Social institutions are changing
All institutions are going through change, including the most basic, the family