Three: An Average Man
I was 182 cm tall last time I checked. That’s just under six feet. Above average height for a man, overall. But not by much. Based on the chart, I am taller than a little over half of men and about 99 percent of women born in 20 of the world’s wealthiest countries between 1980 and 1994. Why just the wealthiest ones? Heights increase as standards of living increase (on average)—they are correlated or related to one another; as one changes, the other changes too.
At the same time, women tend to always be shorter than men; the reasons for that are fairly complex. Men are taller than women, but obviously all men aren’t taller than all women; men are taller on average. When people are studied scientifically, it creates a bunch of group-level averages with overlap like this. Comparing group averages and differences across place and time shows how people are different. With more credible and carefully gathered information—evidence—it becomes possible to figure out how and why these differences exist, and why they change (or don’t). As a sociologist, my goal is to describe the social world as accurately as possible. And that has meant (among other things) learning that most differences between groups (including between women and men) are average differences with overlap.
People notice differences. They may judge difference positively or negatively depending on context, but the differences themselves are a fact of life. That’s all the word diversity means—that living things, including human beings, are different. No two humans are exactly alike. In fact, no one just like you has ever lived or will ever live. You are unique. Just like everyone else, I guess.
I am slightly above average height for a man born in a particular time and place; what people decide that means, whether it’s positive or negative, doesn’t change the fact of the matter. But I have never been ridiculed or rejected for being a man of slightly above average height, but some people do get ridiculed or who are made to feel uncomfortable because they’re noticeably above, or below, average height for their sex.
When you’re a little tall, people ask you to reach things for them from high shelves. Building a shelf at one height and expecting everyone to reach it is equality. Recognizing that this shelf isn’t reachable for everyone, and building more shelves or different shelves, raises questions of equity. Equity goes beyond treating everyone the same way, or equality. Diversity may be a fact of life, but equity isn’t. It’s a political decision; human beings living together may disagree about what is or isn’t a “reasonable accommodation” for people who are different, and who may be different for reasons outside their control.
Of course, everyone has some characteristics that are roughly average and others that are not. I have long hair. Almost down to my waist. In the United States, that’s unusual for a man overall. I would conjecture, or guess based on what I know or have experienced already, two bell curves with hair length in the U.S., on which women’s hair is longer than men’s but with some overlap. I am conjecturing my hair would be longer than almost all men’s hair and longer than most women’s hair too. Hair length is like height; cultures have different norms, or expected and accepted practices, in terms of hair; and people are judged by other people based on those norms or standards.
What hair length is normalized for the sexes is a social construction; it’s largely or entirely a matter of social agreement. We know it could be different because there are examples in other places and times of how it can be different. And within a society or culture there are different subcultures or groups that wear their hair differently. I listen to metal music; a man having long hair isn’t all that unusual in that subculture. I also live in northern Minnesota, where I would conjecture (guess based on what I see) that there are more long-haired men per capita than, say, North Texas where I grew up.
Of course, my conjecture could be subjected to scientific study. I could find out how long people’s hair is by studying it. Conjectures can always be proven wrong, or they are not conjectures. If I say my hair is longer than almost all men’s and most women’s, that can be put to the test. If I say my hair is longer than a unicorn’s, that’s not science; because I can’t show you any unicorns, you can’t in principle show I’m wrong. Science is a social activity too; it means other people, in principle, would be able to prove you wrong. Ideas about how science is done like the “falsification criterion,” which comes from the work of philosopher of science Karl R. Popper, are part of scientific practice. From this perspective, the goal of science and any other scholarly activity is to work together through conjecture and falsification to get things less wrong over time.
But hair length isn’t like height—a few minutes with scissors could change my haircut, but no amount of wishing will make me any taller. Social psychologists call those ascribed (given) and achieved (chosen) status. Height is more ascribed by things outside us, such as genetic heritage and access to calories; but hair length is more achieved, being something I can decide on. In practice it’s not so simple. A significant minority of men and some women may lose some or all of their hair at some point, temporarily or permanently, by inheriting a gene that causes hair to fall out (or not to grow to begin with); or undergoing chemotherapy as part of cancer treatment. It’s also more recently possible to undergo limb lengthening surgery, an expensive major surgery with a long recovery time, to increase one’s height.
So, let’s say a guy with long hair makes you uncomfortable, for whatever reason. Maybe you stare at me for a little too long. You might ask me why my hair is like this, but it’s not really a question. It’s a form of social policing, a way to informally enforce social rules. One way to do this is by demanding an account for why I do not conform to what you expect a masculine presentation of self to be. It isn’t really “why do you have long hair?” it’s “your hair should be more like that of an average man, and it’s not, and I don’t approve.” The goal of this emotional reaction is to reinforce conformity to social norms among group members.
Not all social policing is necessarily about things like hair; and not all deviance is as relatively benign. An intervention for a person who has a substance abuse problem is a kind of social policing too; a way for friends and loved ones to let a person know a person is behaving recklessly and hurting the people around them. Social policing can also be more, or less, aggressive, depending on how important to others your deviance, or being outside social norms, is to them. Being deviant can be uncomfortable, especially when subjected to social policing. And not all forms or acts of deviance are achieved, like hair; some are ascribed, like height. Additionally, social policing is sometimes violent, even lethal.
A more inclusive society is just a society with fewer or less rigid norms. But all social groups have social norms, and inclusion is political like equity; it has to do with how a society or culture draws its boundaries in terms of deviance and crime. It is easy to think of deviant behaviors that most people may not want to include, welcome, or accept. Habitually telling lies is deviant; most groups exclude habitual liars from their ranks. Some decisions to be inclusive of some will seem to exclude others. In a society that normalized men having long hair, I might not feel deviant, but men with short hair might face social policing. Different groups of reasonable people may have different priorities or concerns when it comes to making decisions about inclusion and exclusion.
So, for me, sociology is the science of human diversity. We study how people are different, with the recognition that those differences, like height or hair length or a thousand other things, are average differences with some (and often quite a bit of) overlap. We look for correlations, or meaningful relationships between factors; and then try to explain why two or more things are linked to each other based on what else we know and what makes the most sense. For me, this is describing the social world, and that is a full-time job. This can be more of a “pure” science or scholarly work; it can also be “applied” in countless ways to potentially advocate for a social world different from the one that exists here and now.
Physics can teach you how to split an atom; deciding whether you want to build, or advocate for or against, nuclear power or nuclear weapons or both or neither involves application of that knowledge. Knowledge has value in and of itself because it gives you agency, the ability to more effectively influence what happens in your own life. Some of the things supported by sociological research are grim; and might make you feel out of control. But the purpose of knowing is to figure out how to take that knowledge with you and use that knowledge in your own life. What you ultimately do with that knowledge isn’t up to me; it’s up to you.
Of course, this is me describing sociology from the perspective of a long-haired man of slightly above average height who grew up in North Texas and lives in Northern Minnesota. I don’t know if I am an “average sociologist” in terms of how I teach or do research and I don’t have the last word. My understanding is always incomplete, and I am always correcting errors and refining judgement and trying to get closer to the truth. Because I am endlessly fascinated by the human condition, how we’re different, what motivates us, how to deal with those moments in which I’m more or less (un)comfortable, and how to make sense of it all more broadly.
Important Words
Account
Achieved (status)
Agency
Ascribed (status)
Conjecture
Correlated
Deviance
Diversity
Equality
Equity
Evidence
Inclusive
Norms
Social Construction
Social Policing
Subcultures
Sit With It: Big Questions
Think of one average difference between humans that you have observed. How might you go about testing your conjecture sociologically?
Think of one thing that used to be an ascribed status (given, cannot be changed), or may be an ascribed status in another culture, but is now achieved (can be changed). What is different, or what changed socially, technologically, or otherwise, to make this possible?
Think of one thing that used to be deviant, but is no longer, or one thing that is deviant now, that used to be a norm. Defend your answer.
Image Credit: Height Curve by Sex, Our World in Data, Creative Commons License, ourworldindata.org, data source: Jelenkovic et al. 2016. “Genetic and Environmental Influences on Adult Human Heights across Birth Cohorts from 1889 to 1994.”
