Collective Conscience, Collective Representation, and...

Collective Conscience, Collective Representations, and Social Currents: The events that the young Amish will be apart of during Rumspringa appear to be similar to what an English person, like you or I, is showed to during high school and college. The problem with Rumspringa is that the Amish are very unexposed to our sort of lifestyle their entire lives, that when they finally get to experience it for themselves, they tend to have over exposure. There are two categories of solidarity that we have discussed throughout class, one being mechanical, and the other organic. Mechanical Solidarity: A mechanical solidarity is created on similarity among individuals. The importance is placed on values and beliefs, similar backgrounds and†¦show more content†¦Durkheim also conceived that religion was necessary to any society. Religion was seen as real and observable according to Durkheim. Therefore, Amish society can be empirically studied as a group due to their practices being in relation to sacred objects and they are united as one church through ritual even within their everyday lives. The religious collective is an identifying distinctive of the traditional Amish society that acts as a dividing element from modern societies. Movie Examples: What Faron experienced during Rumspringa, is the product of seeing only one side of English life. The lifestyle that he was living was not that of a normal, conservative English lifestyle. He did not agree to enroll in an English high school or work a standard 9-5 English job. Morality: The way the Amish are raised, with such a huge influence that is put on family does not allow them to go into Rumspringa, stress free without influence from everyone. The influences could be good, because parents only want what is best for them, but the parents themselves fail to accept that the Amish church may not be ideal for their children. The freedom Amish teenagers experience during Rumspringa only increases their misperception since not all of what they participate in is accurate for success within English society. Movie Examples: For individuals like Gerald, it appears as if they can see the bigger picture of what a usual, English life looks