3/26/23, 9:03 PM 11.

4 Examining Deviance

11.4
Examining Deviance

Introduction
Your textbook outlines the social foundations of deviance. These three key
ingredients are worth emphasizing. First deviance varies according to cultural
norms. These norms can differ by group and time period. Second, something or
someone becomes deviant when others define and respond to it as such. Third,
the perception of cultural norms reflects social inequality. Those with power and
influence are better able to shape these cultural norms, including what is or is not
deviant at a particular time and place (Macionis and Gerber 2018: 226).  

We consider having a young child drop out of school to work full-time or marry, for
example, as deviant. Similarly, smoking around children is classified as deviant. In
Ontario, for example, parents who smoke in a car with a child under the age of
sixteen can be fined up to $250 per offense. This was not always the case. As
researchers from Stanford University note, children were used quite successfully
by large tobacco companies to promote smoking as “part of normal family life”:


Children have played a huge role in tobacco advertising over the
decades, and images of children fulfill multiple purposes for tobacco
advertisers. Particularly in the Baby Boomer era, depictions of children
with their mothers or fathers in cigarette ads reinforced the
respectability of smoking as part of normal family life…

—  Stanford University, (n.d.)


https://contensis.uwaterloo.ca/sites/courses/SOC-101/lecture-content/module-11/m11-4.aspx 1/4
3/26/23, 9:03 PM 11.4 Examining Deviance

Smoking and Children

You can see by the images, smoking and family fun were intimately connected.
Doctors, who are respected authority figures, also promoted smoking for its
health benefits. They were featured in many tobacco ads.

https://contensis.uwaterloo.ca/sites/courses/SOC-101/lecture-content/module-11/m11-4.aspx 2/4
3/26/23, 9:03 PM 11.4 Examining Deviance

L&M Holiday Advertisement showing father smoking while building a snowman

with his family.
Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company, (1960)

L&M Advertisement showing child surrounded by men, accompanied by his father

who is smoking.
Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company, (1962)

https://contensis.uwaterloo.ca/sites/courses/SOC-101/lecture-content/module-11/m11-4.aspx 3/4
3/26/23, 9:03 PM 11.4 Examining Deviance

How things have changed! Today, even letting children play alone in the backyard
is defined as ‘deviant.’ One Winnipeg family learned this the hard way. As outlined
by CTV news in their coverage entitled Mother says she was investigated over
children playing in the backyard (https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/mother-says-
she-was-investigated-over-children-playing-in-backyard-1.2870845) , the
Kendrick family was investigated by Child and Family Services when it received a
complaint about their two children – aged ten and five – playing alone in the
backyard. These cases of alleged child neglect highlight how deviance has
evolved within the family sphere.

While drawing on these ideas, this week I will highlight three approaches to the
study of deviance that both extend your textbook material and connect
to the material we have already covered in the course: moral panics, moral
entrepreneurs, and the culture of fear.  

References
Becker, Howard. 2018 (1963, 1997). Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance. New York: The Free Press.

Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company. (1960). When a cigarette means a lot... (holiday snowman) [Advertisement].
Retrieved from http://tobacco.stanford.edu/tobacco_main/images.php?
token2=fm_st143.php&token1=fm_img4333.php&theme_file=fm_mt016.php&theme_name=Infants%20&%20Children&subth

Liggett & Myers Tobacco Company. (1962). When a cigarette means a lot... (summer sports) [Advertisement].
Retrieved from http://tobacco.stanford.edu/tobacco_main/images.php?
token2=fm_st143.php&token1=fm_img4333.php&theme_file=fm_mt016.php&theme_name=Infants%20&%20Children&subth

Staff, CTV News. (2016, April 23). Mother says she was investigated over children playing in backyard. Retrieved
from https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/mother-says-she-was-investigated-over-children-playing-in-backyard-
1.2870845

Stanford University. Children. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://tobacco.stanford.edu/tobacco_main/images.php?

token2=fm_st143.php&token1=fm_img4333.php&theme_file=fm_mt016.php&theme_name=Infants &
Children&subtheme_name=Children

https://contensis.uwaterloo.ca/sites/courses/SOC-101/lecture-content/module-11/m11-4.aspx 4/4