ABSTRACT
You can think about social change in three ways. First, change can reflect significant social events, such as World War II, the assassination of President Kennedy, the breakup of the Soviet Empire, the suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Afghan War, or the 2009 presidential election. Each of these events has affected change in contemporary America. Second, change can be macroscopic, reflecting broad-scale social trends and cultural themes. These pervasive
change processes enable you to see patterns and make more general sense out of particular historical events by revealing “underlying” patterns and directions. Third, change can occur in the spheres of social life that are closely connected to the lives of individuals, such as age groups, families, work settings, education, religion, and so forth. This third perspective focuses on change in the population and social institutions.
