Chapter One: What is Sociology?

Chapter One: What is Sociology?

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What Is Sociology? • Sociology is one of the social sciences— disciplines that examine the human, or social, world.

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Sociology and the Social Sciences

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What Is Sociology? (cont’d.) • Sociology can help you develop a sociological perspective—a way of taking a sociological approach or thinking sociologically about the world.

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What Is Sociology? (cont’d.) • Sociology—the study of society • According to Howard Becker, sociology is the study of people “doing things together” because neither the individual nor society exist independently of one another. 5

What Is Sociology? (cont’d.) • Sociology looks at a broad range of institutions (structures in our society, like education, economics, and politics) to better understand social relationships.

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What Is Sociology? (cont’d.) • Sociologists are interested in all aspects of society. • Society—a group of people who shape their lives in patterned ways that distinguish their group from other groups 7

Culture Shock • Culture shock is the sense of disorientation you experience upon entering a new environment. • Behaviors that are typical in one society or culture may seem very strange in another context. 8

Sociological Imagination

• Sociological imagination is a term coined by C. Wright Mills. • Mills says, “To understand social life, we must understand the intersection between biography and history.”

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Sociological Imagination (cont’d.)

• Sociological imagination: a quality of the mind that allows us to understand the relationship between our particular situation in life and what is happening at a social level

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The Beginner’s Mind • Just as it sounds, the “beginner’s mind” is the opposite of an expert’s mind. Bernard McGrane says that to explore the social world, it is important that we clear our minds of stereotypes, expectations, and opinions so that we are more receptive to our experiences. 11

Levels of Analysis

• Sociologists can use different levels of analysis to explore social relationships: • Microsociology: examines small-group interactions to see how they impact larger institutions in society • Macrosociology: examines large-scale social structures to determine how they impact groups and individuals 12

The Micro-Macro Continuum

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Microsociology

Macrosociology

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Sociological Theories • Theories in sociology are propositions that explain the social world and help to make predictions about future events. • Theories are also sometimes referred to as approaches, schools of thought, paradigms, or perspectives.

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Sociology’s Roots • Auguste Comte: • Stated that sociology needed to be treated like any other scientific discipline • Laid the groundwork for future sociologists and helped build the discipline 17

Auguste Comte

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Harriet Martineau: • A social activist who traveled the United States and wrote about social changes that were radical for this time period • Martineau translated Comte’s work into English, making his ideas accessible to England and America. 19

Harriet Martineau

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Herbert Spencer was the first great English-speaking sociologist. • Spencer believed in evolution and coined the phrase “survival of the fittest.” • He believed that societies evolve through time by adapting to their changing environment. His philosophy is often referred to as social Darwinism. 21

Herbert Spencer

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Émile Durkheim worked to establish sociology as an important academic discipline.

• Interested in the social factors that bond and hold people together • Studied the correlation between social isolation and suicide 23

Émile Durkheim

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Karl Marx was a German philosopher and political activist. • Marx contributed significantly to sociology’s conflict theory.

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Karl Marx

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Marx believed that capitalism was creating social inequality between the bourgeoisie, who owned the means of production (money, factories, natural resources, and land), and the proletariat, who were the workers. • According to Marx, this inequality leads to class conflict. 27

Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Max Weber was also interested in how society was becoming industrialized. • He was concerned with the process of rationalization, applying economic logic to all human activity. • He believed that contemporary life was filled with disenchantment, the result of the dehumanizing features of modern societies. 28

Max Weber

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • George Herbert Mead was interested in the connection between thought and action—or between the individual and society. • Mead suggested that the meanings that we give to objects in our society are social processes—people interact, and meanings come from these interactions.

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George Herbert Mead

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Sociology’s Roots (cont’d.) • Erving Goffman was interested in how the “self” is developed through interactions with others in society. • Goffman used the term dramaturgy to describe the way people strategically present themselves to others. 32

Erving Goffman

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Schools of Thought

• Your book refers to paradigms, or schools of thought. Paradigms are ways of thinking, or “theoretical umbrellas,” meant to provide a broad explanation for the way things work.

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Modern Schools of Thought • Structural functionalism: • Society is viewed as an ordered system of interrelated parts, or structures, which are the social institutions that make up society (family, education, politics, the economy). • Each of these different structures meets the needs of society by performing specific functions for the whole system (society).

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Modern Schools of Thought (cont’d.) • Conflict theory: • Sees social conflict as the basis of society and social change

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Modern Schools of Thought (cont’d.) • Symbolic interactionism: • Sees interaction and meaning as central to society and assumes that meanings are not inherent but rather are created through interaction

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New Theoretical Approaches • Feminist theory: • Looks at both gender inequalities in society and the way that gender structures the social world and considers remedies to these inequalities

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New Theoretical Approaches (cont’d.) • Queer theory: • Proposes that categories of sexual identity are social constructs and that no sexual category is fundamentally either deviant or normal

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New Theoretical Approaches (cont’d.) • Postmodernist theory: • Suggests that social reality is diverse, pluralistic, and constantly changing

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