Sociology Lesson 2: Sociological Perspective

Sociological Imagination

• The sociological imagination provides a new perspective on unfamiliar environments and allows us to understand how individuals are impacted by groups and society.
• It examines the effects of social surroundings on people's lives and how people's beliefs and actions are influenced by their social position, jobs, income, education, gender, race, and ethnicity.
• According to C.Wright Mills, the sociological imagination enables us to grasp the connection between history and biography, and understand how external influences shape our worldview.

The Global Context and the Local

• The world has become a small, interconnected community, with global events and local experiences shaping our lives.
• Sociology allows us to examine both the global network and our singular experiences in our intimate spheres of existence.

Social Problems

• Social problems are issues that affect many people, go beyond the individual, and are in conflict with prevailing principles.
• Sociologists study social problems to understand their causes and effects, and to identify solutions.

Sociological Imagination (C.Wright Mills)

• The sociological imagination helps us to perceive how society and ourselves relate to each other.
• It involves understanding the relationship between biography (a person's life experiences) and history (events that have shaped an entire society's values and beliefs).
• This distinction is essential to sociology, as it allows us to recognize the general in the specific and set individual behavior in a broader societal framework.

Thinking like a Sociologist: Key Questions

• What are the institutions and social structures that influence how people behave?
• How do social norms, values, and beliefs affect how people act and interact with one another?
• How do inequality and power function in society?
• What are the root causes and effects of societal issues?
• How do people and communities establish and uphold social order?
• What effects do social movements and societal transformation have on people and society as a whole?
• How can sociological understanding be applied to advance social justice and transform society?

Sociology and Common Sense

• Sociology is a relatively new field of study, having evolved into a renowned social science with evident societal value.
• Common sense helps us to find solutions to everyday problems, but it can be inaccurate when it comes to understanding social phenomena.
• Expertise in sociology regularly challenges common sense, and one of the most important tasks for sociologists is debunking myths and spotting society trends.

Perspectivising Human Behavior

• Realizing that a variety of factors, such as social, cultural, and psychological influences, have an impact on how people behave.
• Appreciating the diversity and complexity of human experience and behavior.
• Examining the interaction between individual and societal factors in shaping behavior.
• Recognizing the influence of power and inequality on individual and group behavior.

Understanding Causality

• To prove causality, three conditions must be met: temporal order, empirical association, and the exclusion of reasonable alternatives.
• Temporal order states that a cause must occur before an effect.
• Empirical association states that two phenomena must occur together or seem to act in concert.
• Excluding alternatives involves demonstrating that the effect is caused by the causative variable and not by another factor.

Sociological Themes and Topics

• Race, ethnicity, and discrimination.
• Gender and sexuality; families and kinship.
• Education and socialization; religion and spirituality.
• Globalization and transnationalism; health, disease, and medicine.

Levels of Analysis

• Micro level: focuses on social interaction, individual behavior, and small groups (e.g., studying homeless individuals' behavior on the streets and in shelters)
• Meso level: focuses on intermediate-level social structures, such as organizations and communities (e.g., analyzing how changes in specific societal segments contribute to homelessness)
• Macro level: focuses on large-scale social structures, such as society as a whole (e.g., examining societal trends and how they affect homelessness)

Structural Functionalism

• Views society as a cohesive whole, made up of interconnected parts that work together to maintain social order
• Emphasizes the importance of understanding both the structure and function of each part of society
• Functionalists argue that each part of society has a specific function and that social order is maintained through cooperation and harmony
• Robert Merton's concept of "functions" refers to the positive outcomes of people's actions that help maintain social equilibrium
• Merton also identified "dysfunctions" as negative outcomes of people's behavior that can threaten social stability

Conflict Theory

• Views society as composed of groups that are in conflict with each other over limited resources
• Emphasizes the importance of understanding the struggle for power and resources between different groups
• Karl Marx, the founder of conflict theory, argued that class conflict is the key to understanding human history
• Marx believed that the proletariat (workers) and the bourgeoisie (capitalists) are in conflict, and that the bourgeoisie use their power to exploit the proletariat
• Conflict theory has been expanded to include the study of conflict between different groups, including men and women, and different social classes

Symbolic Interactionism

• Views society as composed of individuals who interact with each other through symbols and objects that have meaning
• Emphasizes the importance of understanding how symbols and meaning are created and used in social interactions
• Charles Horton Cooley and George Herbert Mead are two prominent sociologists who developed this perspective
• Symbolic interactionism argues that relationships and society as a whole rely on symbols, and that without symbols, human relationships would not be what they are

Contemporary Theoretical Approaches

• Feminism: emphasizes the importance of gender in determining social relationships and systems
• Postcolonialism: emphasizes the importance of colonialism and its lasting effects on social structures and relationships
• Postmodernism: emphasizes the importance of language and discourse in shaping social structures and relationships
• These theories can be used to examine different aspects of social life, such as gender inequality, colonialism, and cultural norms and values

What is Science?

• Verifiable evidence is the foundation of science, which involves factual observations that can be verified by other observers through measurement, counting, and accuracy checks.
• Scientific observation differs from regular observation in that it is accurate, precise, systematic, and objective.

Goals of Science

• The primary goals of science are to explain why something occurs, to generalize beyond specific instances, and to predict what will happen in the future.
• Scientists conduct methodical studies, detailing their methodology so others can review their work.

Sociology as a Science

• A science can be defined as a body of organized, verified knowledge secured through scientific investigation or a method of study whereby a body of organized, verified knowledge is discovered.
• Sociology is a science to the extent that it creates a corpus of categorized, validated knowledge based on scientific research, rejecting myth, folklore, and wishful thinking.
• Sociology employs scientific methods of inquiry, making it a science.

Theory Building Process: Inductive vs. Deductive

• Inductive process: reasoning from particular data to universal theories, moving from the specific to the general.
• Deductive process: reasoning from general theories to specific hypotheses, moving from the general to the specific.

Concepts and Variables

• Concepts are the building blocks of theory, representing ideas that can be expressed verbally or symbolically.
• Concepts have two parts: a definition and a sign (a word, phrase, or written character).
• Concepts can be vague and challenging to define, requiring examples and analogous concepts to explain.

Theory Building Process: Causation vs Correlation

• Sociologists must be careful not to confuse correlation (where two variables are connected) with causation (where a change in one variable causes a change in the other).
• To prove causality, three conditions must be met: (1) the two variables must be related, (2) the cause must occur before the effect, and (3) the relationship must hold even after controlling for other pertinent variables.

Is Sociology a Science?

• Sociology investigates social phenomena using scientific approaches, making it a science.
• Some argue that sociology cannot be a science due to the complexity and subjectivity of social processes, while others believe it can be a science if it follows sound scientific ideas and practices.