Sociological Viewpoint

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Sociological Viewpoint

• The Beginnings of Sociology
• Sociological Perspectives
• The Origins of Sociology
• Sociological Theory
• Current Perspectives

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Sociologys Purpose

• This course will lend you the ability to
  understand and apply knowledge about our social
  world as well as visualize how a scientific
  approach can be used to study social issues.

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Seeing the Strange in the Familiar

• Emile Durkheims study of suicide in the late
  1890s found the following more likely to commit
  suicide
• Why?
• Men
• Protestants
• The wealthy
• The unmarried

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Sociologys Purpose

• What social institutions are Americans between
  the ages of 14-18 a part of?

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Sociological Perspective

• Sociology views society from the viewpoint of an
  observer, Focusing on social interaction and
  social phenomena.

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Sociological Perspective

• This perspective gives a person the ability to
  see the invisible workings of society.
• Instead of wondering why somebody did something
  YOU can understand the what invisible forces
  pushed them.
• It also exposes the judgments we all succumb to.
  As Americans Is the way we live
• Better?
• The right way?
• More civilized?

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Sociological Perspective

• Why are white people more likely to graduate from
  college?

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Sociological Imagination

• When you develop this perspective you at the
  same time develop a Sociological Imagination.
• The ability to see the connection between the
  larger world and your own life.

Nowadays men often feel that their private lives
are a series of traps. They sense that within
their everyday worlds, they cannot overcome their
troubles, and in this feeling, they are often
quite correct What ordinary men are directly
aware of and what they try to do are bounded by
the private orbits in which they live their
visions and their powers are limited to the
close-up scenes of job, family, neighborhood in
other milieux, they move vicariously and remain
spectators. And the more aware they become,
however vaguely, of ambitions and of threats
which transcend their immediate locales, the more
trapped they seem to feel.
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• Underlying this sense of being trapped are
  seemingly impersonal changes in the very
  structure of continent-wide societies. The facts
  of contemporary history are also facts about the
  success and the failure of individual men and
  women. When a society is industrialized, a
  peasant becomes a worker a feudal lord is
  liquidated or becomes a businessman. When classes
  rise or fall, a man is employed or unemployed
  when the rate of investment goes up or down, a
  man takes new heart or goes broke. When wars
  happen, an insurance salesman becomes a rocket
  launcher a store clerk, a radar man a wife
  lives alone a child grows up without a father.
  Neither the life of an individual nor the history
  of a society can be understood without
  understanding both.
• Yet men do not usually define the troubles they
  endure in terms of historical change and
  institutional contradiction. The well-being they
  enjoy, they do not usually impute to the big ups
  and downs of the societies in which they live.
  Seldom aware of the intricate connection between
  the patterns of their own lives and the course of
  world history, ordinary men do not usually know
  what this connection means for the kinds of men
  they are becoming and for the kinds of
  history-making in which they might take part.
  They do not possess the quality of mind essential
  to grasp the interplay of man and society, of
  biography and history, of self and world. They
  cannot cope with their personal troubles in such
  ways as to control the structural transformations
  that usually lie behind them.

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• The sociological imagination enables its
  possessor to understand the larger historical
  scene in terms of its meaning for the inner life
  and the external career of a variety of
  individuals.  It enables him to take into account
  how individuals, in the welter of their daily
  experience, often become falsely conscious of
  their social positions. Within that welter, the
  framework of modern society is sought, and within
  that framework the psychologies of a variety of
  men and women are formulated.  By such means the
  personal uneasiness of individuals is focused
  upon explicit troubles and the indifference of
  publics is transformed into involvement with
  public issues.
• Excepts from C.Wright Mills The Sociological
  Imagination published 1959

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Sociological Imagination

• Take the issue of race relations
• How does is race viewed at the societal level in
  the U.S., and how do you view race from your
  situation?

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• Consider marriage. Inside a marriage a man and a
  woman may experience personal troubles, but when
  the divorce rate during the first four years of
  marriage is 250 out of every 1,000 attempts, this
  is an indication of a structural issue having to
  do with the institutions of marriage and the
  family and other institutions that bear upon
  them...

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As A Science

• Science a body of systematically arranged
  knowledge that shows the operation of general
  laws.
• carried out by the .
• Scientific Method a process by which a body of
  scientific knowledge is built through
  observation, experimentation, generalization, and
  verification.

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Science As A Method

• Empiricism the view that generalizations are
  valid only if they rely on evidence that can be
  observed directly or verified through our senses.
• Sociology would more likely study divorce rates
  instead of personal reasons for divorce

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Social Sciences

• Sociology is one of a hand full of social
  sciences academic disciplines that apply
  scientific methods to studying human behavior.
• However, instead of focusing on physical
  properties it attempts to understand people
  through theory. This makes soc. And the social
  sciences soft sciences.

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Social Sciences

• Other social sciences include
• Anthropology Which focuses on past cultures or
  the origin of culture.
• Economics Focuses on economic factors such as
  the production and consumption by people.
• 3. Political Science Studies the organization of
  governments and the basis of politics.

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Social Sciences

• Other social sciences include
• 4. History Sets it sights on the study of past
  events.
• 5. Education studies pedagogy the science of
  understanding how people learn.
• closely related but significantly different are
• Behavioral Sciences
• Psychology looks to study and understand the
  behaviors, thought processes, and cognitive
  abilities of individuals.

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Development

• The Beginnings of Sociology
• Sociology as a field developed in the late 18th
  century/early 19th century.
• Rapid change because of the Industrial Revolution
  led to the study of social conditions
• Growth of cities
• Declining power of the church
• Growth of manufacturing
• Growth of urban and transient populations.
• Development of never before seen urban issues and
  problems.

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Development

• also people are starting to question their
  rulers and forms of government.
• American Revolution
• 2. French Revolution

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Early Sociologists

• Early sociology grew in France, Germany, and
  England and produced numerous sociologists.
• Auguste Comte
• Considered Founder of Sociology
• Focused on social order and social change
• Cited social statics processes that keep
  society together ex marriage
• social dynamics- social processes
• that cause change-ex education

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Early Sociologists

• Herbert Spencer
• Influenced by Charles Darwin
• Society is a set of parts that work together to
  form something bigger
• That it is natural for societies to change even
  violently
• View was coined Survival of the Fittest
• and became known as Social Darwinism

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Early Sociologists

• Karl Marx
• Believed society is influenced by its economy.
• Society is divided into (2) classes- the
  proletariat (workers)-the bourgeoisie
  (capitalists)
• The imbalance between the two always lead to
  conflict.
• Society would eventually lead into a classless
  society.
• Conflict is the primary cause of social change.

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Early Sociologists

• 1. Emile Durkheim
• First sociologist to apply scientific methods to
  the study of society.
• Saw society as a set of parts that make up a
  larger system.
• Everything in society has a function.
• Renowned for his study of suicide.

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Early Sociologists

• Max Weber
• Interested in separate groups within society.
• Focused on how society effects the individual.
• Applied the process of Verstehen (the meanings
  people give to their actions)
• Employed the concept of ideal type ( the
  examination of a particular element of society
  ex schools)

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• A theory possible explanations of why certain
  factors in society influence each other.

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Theoretical Perspectives

• the perspectives of sociology are based on many
  theories.
• A theory possible explanations of why certain
  factors in society influence each other.
• Theories are outlined by paradigms or frameworks
  for questions to be answered
• The theoretical perspectives take these theories
  and their frameworks and attempt to apply them to
  social life.

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Structural-Functional Approach

• Looks at society as a set of interrelated parts
  that work together to produce a stable social
  system focus on functions and dysfunctions
• This understanding presumes that most people
  agree on what is best for society and work
  towards achieving it. Ex work (almost all people
  work in diff. jobs which ensures that society
  functions smoothly.)
• think of human society as a great machine with
  each person and component of society as a gear
  moving with each other

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TIMEOUT...think of Pink Floyd's timeless musical
hits
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Functionalism

• As with anything some things do not function
  properly Dysfunctions elements of society that
  have a negative effect.
• Some functions are Manifest or intended
• Some functions are Latent or unintended

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Social-Conflict Perspective

• Focuses on the elements of society that promote
  competition and change
• Interest lies in the conflicts that arise for the
  struggle for power Which can include
• violent riots
• Wars
• the war of the sexes or the struggle between
  worker and owner.
• Conflict between minority and majority

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Conflict Perspectives

• The basis lies in the theory that resources such
  as power and money are limited so there is always
  a struggle for it
• Those who agree with this perspective agree that
  conflict and change are inevitable amongst
  societies.

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Conflict Perspectives

• Educational Examples
• Vocational Schools Courses v. College
  Preparatory Schools Courses
• 2. Inner City Schools v. Suburban Schools

v.
v.
v.
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Abbott v. Burke

• (1990)The NJ Supreme Court rules in Abbott v.
  Burke (Abbott II) that inadequate and unequal
  funding denies students in urban districts a
  thorough and efficient education and requires the
  State to equalize funding between suburban and
  urban districts for regular education and to
  provide extra or "supplemental" programs to "wipe
  out disadvantages as much as a school district
  can."

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Symbolic-Interaction Perspective

• This perspective narrows its sight on how people
  interact with one another, and how and why people
  commit certain actions in other words how do
  people make sense of and navigate their social
  world?
• The cornerstone of this outlook is understanding
  that the components, systems, and facets of
  society are developed, maintained and changed by
  the interaction of people.
• This approach takes a narrowed micro-level
  viewpoint towards society.

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Symbolic-Interaction Perspective

• That is, human beings live in a world of symbols,
  attaching meaning to virtually everything, from
  the words on this page to the wink of an eye.
  Reality, therefore, is simply how we define our
  surroundings, our obligations toward others, and
  even our own identities.
• P. 17 Sociology

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Interactionist Perspective

• All of the things we surround our lives with are
  symbols
• Ex Cars, clothes, jewelry, tattoos, flags,
  business suits, combed hair are all symbols that
  say something about us to others.
• to study all of these components the
  interactionist perspective many different
  approaches

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Interactionist Perspective

• Ethnomethodology the study of how people create
  and share their understandings of social life.
• 2. Dramaturgical the study of social life as if
  it was a theater.

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Symbolic Interactionism

• all of these sub-categories of the
  interactionist approach focus on.
• Definition Concerned with the meanings that
  people place on their own and one anothers
  behavior.
• a PVHS senior giving directions to a freshman
• a teacher giving a student the bathroom pass
• the principal signing a form giving consent for a
  teacher to take a day off
• a policeman waiving a motorist past an accident
• the possibilities and implications are endless

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• .Next Up..
• What methods does sociology employ to study and
  research people and society?