Road Within Sociology

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Film Analysis Introduction The film that was chosen was The Road Within, the main social problems presented was mental illness and how the individuals suffering with those individual illnesses. Thing such as Tourette Syndrome, Obsessive Compulsive disorder, and Anorexia are mental illnesses that has been portrayed as weird, humorous, or stupid to some. This is a problem because instead of doing something to fix or to try to make the issue relatable, society has put so much stigma around it that nobody seems to know how to react to it anymore. Not only that but it has also come to a point where people with mental illness are viewed as not people. Instead they dwindled to just being a label and only seen as a disease or a nuisance. Synopsis …show more content…

Nobody wants to be told that their opinions, values, and ways of understanding things are wrong. Being one of the reasons as to why mental illness is a seen as an annoyance to society, because most of the time unless they did take the time to educate themselves they are wrong. Through the Functionalistic theory that “A social system composed of parts that work together to benefit the whole.” (Henslin, pg.27) can be used against those who have mental illnesses. In the movie, there is a scene where Vincent is talking to his father about how he had been taking care of his mother, while his father left to get remarried, thus sparking His father’s rebuttal of since Vincent wasn’t even able to go to the seven eleven down the street, let alone take care of himself there would have been no way that he could care for his mother. Therefore, showing that through the functionalistic view, that Vincent was not benefiting society and failing at fulfilling his part in society, basically saying that he was a dysfunction. Per Durkheim “when society’s parts fail to perform their functions, society is in an abnormal or pathological state.” (Henslin, pg.29), this is seen whenever Vincent goes through his fit at the funeral. The distain and disapproving face of those in attendance exemplifying exactly what Durkheim was saying, when thrown in peculiar situations society does not know how to react. However, Robert Merton presented the idea of manifest function, which “is an action that is intended to help some part of the system.” (Henslin, pg.29), because these types of illnesses exist it has created specific roles in society such as therapist and doctors who specialize in the study of mental illnesses. Still, the creation of these jobs has

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