Das Boot

In 1971, during a time where colleges and universities did not have review boards to make sure ethics were followed, Zimbardo had a hypothesis. The professor in Psychology thought that personality traits of prisoner and guards are the reason of abusive behavior in prison. Like all good scientists, Zimbardo put his question into motion, turning the basement of the university into a prison. In present day, this experiment would have been much harder to get passed by Institutional Review Boards, or…

1.A. Adam Smith describes how productivity growth in economics can lead to economic growth. Smith being an optimist himself saw that the driving force of capitalism would be self-betterment, a yearn for profit, and the desire to make money. One method to increase productivity was to enhance the division of labor. Organization is one way to enhance the division of labor and thus their productivity of labor. Firms also seek to use capital, mainly in the forms of machinery, to aid in the…

Different “Ways of Seeing” In the essay, “Ways of Seeing,” John Berger applies Marxism to art history. Marxism is the social, economic and political theory formed by Karl Marx. It deals with class struggle and the oppression of the lower classes by the upper classes. In the essay, Berger focuses on using Marxist methodology, when he analyzes and explains an artist named Frans Hal. Berger uses Hals paintings to demonstrate the structure of social classes, and their struggles to give an idea of…

The Stanford prison experiment was an experiment held between August 14th and went all the way up until August 20th. In this experiment, a psychology professor named Philip Zimbardo attempts to form a model prison where he would select participants to either be guards or prisoners. The participants were interviewed, and the ones chosen were randomly assigned their roles of being either prisoners, or guards. The model prison was created in the basement of Stanford University, and it was meant to…

The experience of the soldiers of the Vietnam War presents itself within the poems, “Camouflaging the Chimera” by Yusef Koumunyakaa and “A Piece of Sky without Bombs” by Lam Thi My Da. In Koumunyakaa’s poem, the author describes the experience of the American Soldiers as they travelled through the secluded jungles of Vietnam, waiting for the Vietcong to attack. The purpose of this poem is to highlight the experiences of a soldier in Vietnam, rather than just looking in from an outside…

IV: Rebuttals to my Characterisation of Reclamation In the above, I have created a model to represent to sociological phenomena of the reclamation of slurs. I have given an example how we can see this mechanism at work with respect to the word queer. Though this provides evidence in support of my thesis the question arises as to what measure should be used to more so test the effectiveness of the model. What should be considered and how can my thesis best be supported? The model which I have…

In “Clients” by Kathy Page, we see how capitalism can take control of people’s lives and forget some of the simplest things, such as social interaction and the sentimental value of one another. In this story we are shown a couple that seems to be always out of time and unable to interact or lost the ability to communicate. They resort to hiring Martin, a conversationalist and therapist to generate the thought process and help teach them how to communicate with each other once again. In the end,…

The Stanford Prison Experiment (August 1971) was conducted by Philip Zimbardo and his peers at Stanford University to investigate the effects of 24 physically and mentally healthy male college students becoming guards or prisoners. One of the key elements present throughout the experiment was deindividuation, the loss of one’s sense of individuality. In deindividuation, the social identity consumes an individual completely in order for group norms to be maximally accessible. The central…

When it comes to the Abu Ghraib prison and the Stanford Prison Experiment the competing valued were at stake. For the Stanford prison experiment it was based on a study that was conducted to determine psychology of imprisonment. This experience was a simulation experiment that was carried out at the Stanford University. During the experiment it was ended after 6 days instead of the 14 days because the students weren't able to bear the simulated prison life. During the experience the…

How does having power corrupt people? Having power can corrupt people in manys, such as what happen in The Well by Ira Sher and what happen in The Stanford Prison Experiment by Saul McLeod. In the article The Stanford Prison Experiment, Philip Zimbardo had constructed an experiment to confirm what might cause a guard to have brutality against a prisoner and that’s just what Zimbardo had done. In the article it says, “Within hours of beginning the experiment some guards began to harass…