Social institutions

Essay by EssaySwap ContributorCollege, Undergraduate February 2008

download word file, 11 pages 5.0

Social institutions can be found all though out the world. Social institution is a system of statuses, roles, values, and norms that is organized to satisfy one or more of the basic societal needs. It may differ from place to place. One good example of a social institution would be found in the film, The Dead Poets Society. It tells about and shows how each of the students at Welton Academy have different ways at handling their set of social institutions. Each student learns with the help of their new teacher, Mr. Keating, that they should be free thinkers and seize the day and not to waste life because it is very precious. Some important institutions that will be viewed are family and education institutions.

Family is a very important institution that comes to mind when discussing different types of social institutions. Family is a group of people who are related by marriage, blood, or adoption and who live together and share economic resources.

American families are organized by different types of form groups. A nuclear family consists of one or both parents and their children. The nuclear family is the family form that is most recognizable to Americans. Then there is the extended family. The extended family consists of three or more generations of a family sharing the same residence. Nuclear families and extended families often are part of a much larger kinship system. Kinship refers to a network of people who are related by marriage, birth, or adoption. American marriage patterns are usually a monogamy, which means that a marriage of one man to one woman is present. Another American pattern is neolocality which means that a newly married couple is free to set up access of individuals and groups to power and social rewards. From these...