The social stratification groups are the creation of horizontal, vertically differentiated according to criteria established and recognized. Social stratification accounts or means to represent the social inequality of a society in the distribution of socially valued goods and attributes. The concept of social stratification implies that there is a hierarchy social as well as a structured social inequality. This inequality is institutionalized and has a consistency and coherence over time. Forms of social stratification, usually cited are the castes , estates and social classes .

A social stratum consists of a group of people, social aggregates, which share a similar site or place within the social hierarchy or scale, where they share similar beliefs, values, attitudes, life styles and events. They are characterized by their relative amount of power, prestige and privileges they have. While the focus of stratification refers to the distribution of goods and social stratification attributes, but can also be considered on the basis of ethnicity , gender and age .

Features and statist social parental traits with different social status, yet simple societies to explain complex and carried out in a context by which we take to express in monetary conditions which turn on the reasons for the millions of problems that exist among different socio-economic status. Which include socio-economic, occupational, professional, etc?

Pseudo Caste: Caste in India as the stratum endogamous, fixed at birth, associated with occupation, religion, ethnicity and social traits.

Estates or social status, socio-economic unit wide and diffuse social class does not help, but can be identified with one or a grouping of various kinds but without clear social conscience.

Social Class: Classes defined according to their property relations resources and sources of income. In each socio-economic system, there are at least two antagonistic classes often develop a social conscience.

Ethnicity, people and nations, the ethnic community is diversified into four basic types, ethnic tribal peoples, nations and nationalities and ethnic groups.

Bibliography forms of social stratification “social anthropology” Introduction Chapter 14 page 242.

Social stratification is a term that is sometimes used synonymously with social class by some economists, sociologists and political scientists because it does not have the connotation Marxist who does have the word class.

According to Max Weber Social Stratification is set in relation to axes or dimensions:

• Income: See Income distribution and consumption.
• Prestige: View social status and social structure.
• Power: see Political Power , Bureaucracy and Class Struggle.

The layering concept we can understand in two ways, either as a “process by which a given society is divided into various aggregates called-each of which involves a different degree of prestige, property and power,” or well as “the result of that process” (Giner 1990:118). So this double acceptance can draw the conclusion that estratificion is the process and result of the division of society into strata or layers.

Types of Social Stratification

Slavery

The conditions of the slaves were variable in some places like Classical Athens, slaves often held positions of great responsibility though remained the property of their owners. On contrary, those built the pyramids or working in mines or plantations, had much less freedom and were treated superhuman.

Systems of Caste

Portuguese means race or race pure, “is a form of social stratification based on ascriptive characteristics of the people”, there is no global system of castes, there are many, but all share common elements, there is a group (the untouchables) who are the outcasts, and the Brahmins who are above all caste systems, find among traders, farmers, … In India there is a collective mobility (the mobility is impossible slavery, who was born a slave, slave dies) a whole group change establishment. E.g. the group of liquor dealers is much richer and begins to change behavior patterns.

Estates

Highest honor and prestige, whose specific qualities are expressed in common life styles, use of symbols or badges of the family titles of Duke, and so on. Repugnant status who for-profit activities of the armed improper distance and exclude the other estates .* Clergy – 2nd estate, the clergy possess the truth revealed, as the craftsmen who performed manual labor and the farmers who cultivated the land and raised animals on the farms. * Farmers – 3rd estate.

System Classes

Differences from other systems: It belongs to a social group with nothing to intercede, no religion, no law, the fact that the position is acquired, so there is mobility, that our differences are very marked by the economic situation ( income, assets) and the class position is not based on personal relationships (master-slave) this is not as important as a function of working conditions.