Lecture notes for the course Sociology for Psychology Students. Elaborations on the slides, which can come in handy, considering most of the slides have only pictures/ very little text.
LECTURE 1
1. Why sociology?
people do not operate in a vacuum
sociology is about context: everything people do is driven by
their surroundings
sociology pays attention to the societal level of functioning
individual motivations that are the result of people’s
interactions with others
importance of social embeddedness
- more integration leads to less deviant behavior
- people conform to what is considered normal in their
community
sociology can influence relationships between individual
characteristics and adverse outcomes
difference between psychology and sociology: suicide studies
- strongly influenced by integration and regulation
- perceived as an individualistic act but it is driven by social
factors
- more individualism, less integration higher rates of
suicide
everyone wants to belong to a social group
sociology systematically explores how human society works
pros of sociology:
- debunking
- understanding
- empowering/ mobilizing for minorities
- recognition
cons of sociology:
- everything always changes
- sociologists are people too
* want to be close to people but they should keep their
distance
- sociology becomes part of the public debate
Durkheim: people consist of an individual and a social being
2. What is sociology?
looks at interactions between people
looks for general elements in social behavior
, social policy: the idea of understanding society and human
culture
- improvement of society and social interaction
definition: “science of society”
- social problems vs personal troubles
- Mills: “the Sociological Imagination”
- sociological vs social problems
sociology vs common sense (Bauman)
sociology is/in human language
sociology has 3 levels:
- micro level (proximal environment)
- meso level
* gym, sports, office, university
- macro level
3 key questions of sociology:
1) social inequality
2) social cohesion
3) rationalization (or culture)
- how has society become modern?
- how are we capable of organizing the world in a rational
way?
3. Genesis of sociology
social philosophers used to not test their idealistic views
changes in structures of societies:
- transition from agriculture to industrialization (invention of
the steam machine)
- classification based on technology
* technology produces new problems as well
societal changes
- growth of politics
- economic changes (capitalism/ industrial revolution)
- freedom, equality, solidarity
- church/ religion have become less powerful
- growth of cities
discovery of society
- start of modern science
- society is discovered and it can be studied
- science has to do with looking for practical solutions
Auguste Comte:
, - coined the term sociology
- three stages of the development of the world/ thinking
about society
Herbert Spencer:
- he came up with the term “survival of the fittest”
* seen as what is best for society
- rise of social-darwinistic thinking
- organisms are simply adapting to what is happening around
them (random according to Darwin, whereas Spencer says
that if we know what is good for society, we have a goal we
need to attain)
19th century landmarks:
- civilization labor
- discipline
- education of the masses
- trust in science
- the “social question”
* situation of the laborers which was the result of capitalism/
the question whether people should get voting rights
research themes in the 19th century:
- poverty
- division of labor
- class relations
* upper and lower class
* people should do good for the poor because it is good for
the latter but it also serves the richer (well-understood self-
interest)
ex. lack of sanitation in poor neighborhoods/ if not taken care
of, the diseases could get to the richer neighborhoods
4. Paradigm
the Kuhn cycle
- in social sciences, there is no all-encompassing paradigm
4 main paradigms in sociology:
- structural-functionalistic paradigm
- conflict paradigm
- symbolic interactionist paradigm
- rational choice paradigm
theories are part of paradigms
sociological approaches:
, - positivistic
* seeing is believing
* deductive science
- humanistic
* what motivates people
* putting yourself in the shoes of others
- critical
* activist/ political stance
* focus on changing the world
* facts are not neutral (they are made and discussed by
scientists)
LECTURE 2
1. 3 key questions
Marx: how is social inequality possible?
- perspective and paradigm: conflict
- Marx never talked about the conflict paradigm himself (it
was developed based on his work)
3 founding fathers of sociology
- transition from agriculture to industrialized/ capitalist
society
- interested in change
- quarrel about scarce resources which leads to social change
state socialists = communists (according to Marx)
- socialism is the step between capitalism and communism
- socialism deprives people of private property
2. Marx & Engels
part of Marx’s writings were published by Engels
best-known work: “Das Kapital”
lived in the 19th century: low form of capitalism
- no social security system
- no protection from the state
- capitalism causes poverty
Engels: “the condition of the working class in England”
- groups have different life expectancies depending on their
living conditions
ideas of Marx & Engels
- conflict between classes
* in means of production (working class and upper class)
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