Class notes
Social Thinking Unit 1 to 5
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Social ThinkingUnit 1-5
Unit 1. Introduction
● Origin and meaning of sociology as a discipline
○ Sociology – the systemic study of human society
■ Benefits:
● Enables us to challenge familiar understandings of ourselves
and others so we can critically assess the truth
● Enables us to assess both the opportunities and constraints
that characterize our lives
● Helps us recognize human differences and suffering and
confront the challenges of living in a diverse world
■ Problems
● Sociology is part of a changing world
● Sociologists are part of what they study (risk of ethnocentrism)
● Sociologists create ideas that shape how societies work
○ Auguste Comte (19th century) – “father of sociology”
■ Founded sociology during the time of the French Revolution (liberal
movement) and European industrialization (urban movement)
■ Two parts of his discipline:
● Social statics – the study of how society is held together
● Social dynamics – the study of how society changes
■ Also influenced by secularization – the loss of the relevance of religion
in people’s everyday lives
■ Individuals felt anxiety in the face of social change. The way society
worked was no longer self-evident.
● They were motivated to understand and control society.
○ Emile Durkheim’s study on suicide – the differences in suicide rates between
groups correspond to people’s degree of social integration
■ People with stronger social ties tend to have lower suicide rates.
○ Psychology studies humans in terms of individual attributes, whereas
sociology studies how humans are oriented towards action.
○ Sociology is…
■ “seeing the general in the particular”
■ “seeing the strange in the familiar.”
● Main sociological perspectives
○ Sociological theory – a way of thinking about society
■ Theory – a statement of how and why specific facts are related
○ Theoretical perspective – a basic image that guides thinking and research
■ Classical perspectives have shaped sociology in the past
■ Emerging perspectives are shaping sociology now
, Classical Traditional Perspectives in Sociology
Functionalism
The Functionalist Perspective
Functionalist Perspective – a framework for building a theory that envisages
society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and
stability
● Recognizes that our lives are guided by social structure – relatively stable
patterns of social behavior
Influential Thinkers:
1. August Comte
a. Promoted social integration during a time of tumultuous change
2. Herbert Spencer
a. Related society to the human body
b. Social Darwinism – “Survival of the fittest”
i. Advocated a free-market economy with no government
interference
ii. Believed that the “best” are rewarded
1. Counterargument → Ability only partly accounts for
personal success. Favoring the rich and powerful
does not necessarily benefit society as a whole.
3. Emile Durkheim
a. Social solidarity – Focuses on how societies “hang together”
4. Talcott Parsons
a. Related society to a system
5. Robert K. Merton
a. Studied social functions – consequences for the operation of
society; likely to differ for various members of society; can be
positive or negative
i. Manifest functions – the recognized and intended
consequences of any social pattern
ii. Latent functions – the largely unrecognized and unintended
consequences of any social pattern
Social dysfunctions – any social pattern’s undesirable consequences for the
operation of society
Critical Comment
1. How can we assume that society has a “natural” order when social patterns
vary from place to place and change over time?
a. Functionalism is too deterministic.
2. By emphasizing social integration, functionalism tends to gloss over
inequality based on social class, race, ethnicity, and gender – divisions that
may generate considerable tension and conflict.
a. Functionalism promotes stability at the expense of conflict and
change.
Conflict Paradigm
The Conflict Perspective
Conflict Perspective – a framework for building a theory that envisages society as
an arena of inequality that generates conflict and change
, ● Highlights division based on inequality instead of solidarity
○ Divisions between social class, race, ethnicity, age, and sex lead to
an unequal distribution of money, power, education, and social
prestige
● Helps us see how inequality and the conflict it generates are rooted in the
organization of society itself
Karl Marx – the most influential thinker for the conflict perspective
● His ideas underlie the conflict perspective.
● His goal was to reduce social inequality.
Critical Comment
1. Because this perspective highlights inequality and division, it glosses over
how shared values or interdependence generate unity among members of
a society.
2. To the extent that the conflict approach explicitly pursues political goals, it
can relinquish any claim to scientific objectivity.
Social action paradigm
The Social Action Perspective
Social Action Perspective – a micro-theory that focuses on how actors assemble
social meanings
● Both the functional and conflict perspectives share a macro-level
orientation – a focus on broad social structures that characterize society as
a whole
● Action theory, by contrast, starts with how people (actors) orientate
themselves to each other and how they do so based on meanings.
○ Micro-level orientation – a focus on social interaction in specific
situations
Max Weber – the most influential thinker for the action perspective
● Emphasized how human meanings and actions shape society
Ideal type – an abstract statement of the essential, though often exaggerated,
characteristics of any social phenomenon (e.g. religions)
Symbolic interactionism – a theoretical framework that envisages society as the
product of people’s everyday interactions
● Society arises as a shared reality that its members construct
● Sociologists guided by this approach view society as a mosaic of subjective
meanings and variable responses
○ Dramaturgical analysis – emphasizes how we resemble actors on a
stage as we play out our various roles before others
○ Social exchange analysis – social interaction amounts to a
negotiation in which individuals are guided by what they stand to
gain and lose from others
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