The Sociological Concept of Crash Sociology is the systemic study of human society and social interaction. Sociologists study human societies and their social interactions in order to develop theories of how human behavior is shaped by group life and how, in turn, group life is affected by individuals (Kendall, 4). The movie Crash (Haggis, 2005), is full of many sociological issues, such as race, social class, and gender. Crash makes you see how group life is affected by individuals and how human behavior is shaped by group life. The main issue throughout the movie is racism and the perspectives on different cultures. The movie is set in Los Angeles, a city with a cultural mix of every nationality. The movie starts out at
She immediately wanted the locks changed on the house. The Mexican locksmith showed up and she instantly showed racism towards him. There are many more scenes throughout the movie that continues to show racism. At some point in the movie you see everyone being judged by their race, gender, or social class. Crash shows all of these inequalities as unequal and unfair. The same people that makes judgment on others is some how affected by someone else. They end up “crashing” into whom they where judging and realizing that everyone is the same. One of the major theoretical perspectives in the movie Crash is the conflict perspective. Conflict perspectives are based on the assumption that social life is a continuous struggle (Kendall, 67). According to the sociologist K. Sue Jewell (1993), popular cultural images are often linked to negative stereotypes of people of color (Kendall, 68). This movie shows how people have a negative stereotype of people of different color. There is continuous conflict during the movie Crash. Du Bois pointed out that although people in this country promote such values as democracy, freedom, and equality, they also accept racism and group discrimination. Towards the end, the characters are trying to show equality to the ones they discriminated against earlier. Social structure creates boundaries that define which persons or groups will be the “insiders and which will be the “outsiders.” Conflict theorists maintain that