Sociological Analysis of the Elderly through an Interview

Jane is a woman in her mid-sixties. A co-founder of a community outreach programme impacting the lives of minority groups positively in terms of offering assistance on matters; substance abuse, access to the justice system and providing free food to disadvantaged members of the community. Jane is an extraordinary woman who exhibits an unusually high amount of charisma and an eagerness to share stories about her life. She sparks curiosity in the manner she is candid and introspective about her life. This study will explore the development of Jane’s identity in the context of her life events and societal setting. The semi-structured interview was used during this interview. Semi-structured Interviews offers a balance between the flexibility of an open-ended interview and the focus of a structured ethnographic survey. This technique guides the researcher through the interview process.

Whereas it maintains the same level of structure, it accords the researcher the opportunity to probe the respondent for additional details. This interview method offers flexibility to the researcher that it offers a great deal of flexibility for you as a researcher. The community outreach programme has received accolades due to its positive contribution to the community over the past two decades. I first met Jane in her offices following a call I had made to her office scheduling for an interview. Jane is a 65-year-old mother of 4 married to Mark Conrad a retired human right lawyer. From an African ethnicity, Jane is married to Mark who is white and together they live in at a middle-class townhouse in New York. To date, they both volunteer full time at the outreach center.

The school was never a walk in the park for me, said Jane. I had to juggle between school and fending for the family hence I consistently had below-average grades. I couldn’t get to college as I did not have a college fund, neither could she get a scholarship because my grades were not above average”. It was a frustrating journey for her being in school. Jane did not think much about the importance for education, she just dreamt about owning a coffee shop outside the bronks, because, living in a black ghetto that is as far as her vision took her. Though not a ghetto setting, 9th street was largely a mix of black and Hispanic community and gangs ran the streets. Jarome always stopped by the coffee shop for his daily dose of coffee and that is when he met Mark.

Jarome, though a leader of the gang was passionate about obtaining justice for the minority groups who were denied Justice. A modern day, Robin Hood- such Irony! From then Mark embraced that noble calling as a legal representative to the community’s underprivileged upon which I joined him in providing bread and coffee for whoever came seeking for assistance in a small office Jerome had hire for Mark. Jane had been an Atheist until she met Mark through whom she got to that eureka moment and she joined him at the local Catholic Church. Her economic class is one of low-income class, Jane is an atheist before meeting Mark, she does not believe in the existence of God. The Justice system does not serve blacks in the community to an extent that she has to hire vigilantes to protect the family business.

Coming from the black ethnicity, racisms was pronounced and blacks were discriminated against. The level of education was the bare minimum whereby she had no interest in pursuing higher education because a platform had not been accorded to her impressing the importance of education. According to (Blau, 1977), social structures are the systematized set of social relationships, patterns, and institutions making up a society. Theoretical Analysis According to Burrell (2017), sociologists analyze social phenomena at different levels and from different perspectives. As stated by Dahrendorf (1959), in sociology, the social conflict theory is a macro-oriented paradigm which perceives the society as an arena marred with conflicts due to societal inequalities This theory explains that the structure of the society is such that very few individuals benefit at the expense of the wider society due to factors such as sex, race, class, and age which bring about the disparity hence inequality.

To a social conflict theorist, this paradigm is about dominant group versus minority group relations. When the conflict theory is applied to Jane’s case, her neighborhood is marginalized and there is a scarcity of basic resources necessary for a decent level of human dignity. The scarcity within the community breeds vices which led to the creation of community cartels which helped retain a share of community resources. M.  Inequality and heterogeneity: A primitive theory of social structure (Vol. New York: Free Press. V Brinkmann, S. Interview. James, E. L. Kippen, S. Liamputtong, P. Researching sensitive topics: Qualitative research as emotion work.