Social Change

1
Social Change

• The urban transformation
• Population change
• Environmental issues

2
The Urban Transformation

• Transformation from a nomadic life to living in
  settled, densely populated areas

3
An Historical Overview
4
Modern Cities

• Public health advances
• Led to rapid urbanization

5
Worlds Largest Megacities(2000)

• Tokyo 33 Million
• New York 20
• Seoul 20
• Mexico City 19
• Sao Paulo 18
• Bombay 18
• Osaka 16

6
Largest U.S. Cities (2004 est.)

• New York 8.1 Million
• Los Angeles 3.8
• Chicago 2.9
• Houston 2.0
• Philadelphia 1.5
• Phoenix 1.4
• San Diego 1.3
• San Antonio 1.2

7
Your Town Size (percent of class)
8
Urbanization

• Requires change in economic and social
  organization

9
Urbanism

• The way of life of city dwellers
• Human psychological adaptation
• Can have high urbanization and low urbanism in a
  society

10
Urbanism in U.S.

• Urbanism as a Way of Life (L. Wirth 1938)
• Anomie rootlessness, purposelessness
• Gives people more freedom.. to deviate and prey
  on others

11
City Life

• in this perspective city life leads to

12
Other Views

• Aronson, City, Illusion, Nostalgia, and Reality
• City nurtures art, literature, innovation
• Necessary for
• civilization

13

• P. Hausers research in Rangoon, Bangkok,
  Djakarta, Calcutta
• No increased indifference, no pronounced
  loneliness
• No breakdown
• in caste barriers

14
M. Sussmans Research

• 45 of middle class
• Commonly help each other with child care, sick
  care, financial aid

15

• Worldwide
• There is a relationship between relative
  deprivation and crime/deviance

16
City Life is Suburban Life

• Suburbs
• Incorporated or unincorporated spatial
  communities that lie outside the central city but
  within the metropolitan area
• 1960 60 million people
• 1970 74 million
• 2000 143 million

17
Reasons for Suburbanization

• Anti-urban bias
• Government support for suburban housing VA and
  FHA loans
• Industry movement to suburbs

18
Consequences

• Homogeneity of residential areas
• Especially regarding income and family stage
• Isolation of homeowners
• Sprawl

19
Exurbanization

• Exurbs are middle and upper-middle class
  communities that can be found in outlying
  semi-rural suburbia
• Sometimes form around old villages or small towns