Chapter 1

The Sociological Perspective

and

Research Methods

Putting Social Life Into

Perspective Sociology is the systematic study of human society and

social interaction.

Sociologists study societies and social interactions to develop theories of :

How human behavior is shaped by group life.

How group life is affected by individuals.

Why Study Sociology? Helps us gain a better understanding of ourselves and our

social world.

Helps us see how behavior is shaped by the groups to

which we belong and our society.

Promotes understanding and tolerance by helping us look

beyond personal experiences and gain insight into the

larger world order.

Society A society is a large social grouping that shares

the same geographical territory and is subject to

the same political authority and dominant cultural

expectations, such as the United States, Mexico,

or Nigeria.

Fields That Use Social

Science Research

The Sociological Imagination

The ability to see the relationship between

individual experiences and the larger society.

Distinguishes between personal troubles and

social issues.

Personal Troubles Personal troubles are private problems that affect

individuals and the networks of people with which

they associate regularly.

Example: One person being unemployed or

running up a high credit card debt could be

identified as a personal trouble.

Public Issues Public issues are problems that affect large

numbers of people and require solutions at the

societal level.

Widespread unemployment and massive,

nationwide consumer debt are examples of

public issues.

Discussion Fresh Prince Extended

Introduction

What problems led Will’s

mother to ship him off to

Bel-Air?

Were these personal

troubles or public

issues?

It is sometimes difficult

for Americans to

recognize public issues.

Why do you think this is?

Overspending as a Personal

Trouble People use credit cards and spend more than they can

afford, affecting all aspects of their lives, including health, family relationships, and employment stability.

Sociologist George Ritzer suggests that people may overspend through a gradual process.

Credit cards lure people into consumption by easy credit and entice them into further consumption by offers of ‘payment holidays,’ new cards, and increased credit limits.

Overspending as a Public

Issue Between 1990 and 2000, credit card debt tripled in

the United States.

As corporations “write off ” bad debt from those

who declare bankruptcy or do not pay their bills, all

consumers pay either directly or indirectly for that

debt.

Overspending as a Public

Issue Poverty is forgotten as a social issue when more affluent

people are having a spending holiday and consuming all they can afford to purchase.

Sociologist Robert D. Manning found that students are aggressively targeted by credit card companies even though it is accepted that some of the students will ruin their credit while still in college.

Importance of a Global

Sociological Imagination Although existing sociological theory and research provide

a foundation for sociological thinking, we must develop a

more global approach for the future.

In the 21st century, we face important challenges in a

rapidly changing nation and world.

High Income Countries Nations with highly industrialized economies;

technologically advanced industrial, administrative, and service occupations.

Examples: United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Western Europe.

Have a high standard of living and a lower death rate due to advances in nutrition and medical technology.

Personal debt may threaten economic even among middle- and upper income people.

Middle Income Countries Nations with industrializing economies, particularly

in urban areas, and moderate levels of national

and personal income

Example: The nations of Eastern Europe and

many Latin American countries.

Low Income Countries Primarily agrarian nations with little industrialization and low

levels of national and personal income.

Examples: Many of the nations of Africa and Asia,

particularly the People’s Republic of China and India,

where people typically work the land and are among the

poorest in the world.

Definitions Race is used to specify groups of people distinguished by

physical characteristics such as skin color.

There are no “pure” racial types, and race is considered by most sociologists to be a social construction people use to justify social inequalities.

Ethnicity refers to the cultural heritage or identity of a group and is based on factors such as language or country of

origin.

Class is the relative location of a person or group within the larger society, based on wealth, power, prestige, or other valued resources.

Sex refers to the biological and anatomical differences between females and males.

Gender refers to the meanings, beliefs, and practices associated with sex differences, referred to as femininity and masculinity.

Sociology and the Age of

Enlightenment The origins of sociological thinking can be traced

to the scientific revolution in the late 17th and mid-

18th centuries and the Age of Enlightenment.

A basic assumption of the Enlightenment was that

scientific laws had been designed with a view to

human happiness.

Sociology and the Age of

Enlightenment In France, the Enlightenment was dominated by the

philosophes, including Montesquieu, Rousseau, and

Turgot.

They believed human society could be improved through

scientific discoveries.

If people were free from the ignorance of the past, they

could create new forms of political and economic

organization, which would produce wealth and destroy the

aristocracy.

Sociology and the Age of Revolution,

Industrialization, and Urbanization The Enlightenment produced an intellectual revolution in

how people thought about social change, progress, and critical thinking.

Views of the philosophers regarding equal opportunity stirred political and economic revolutions in America and France.

The Industrial Revolution occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries, when economic, technological, and social changes occurred as technology shifted from agriculture to manufacturing.

Sociology and the Age of Revolution,

Industrialization, and Urbanization Industrialization is the process by which societies are

transformed from dependence on agriculture and handmade products to an emphasis on manufacturing and related industries.

Urbanization is the process by which an increasing proportion of a population lives in cities rather than in rural areas.

In Case You Missed It…

Incredibly Brief Little Summaries of a Small

Number of Important Sociologists from

Across the Modern Era that Made a Huge

Impact on the Field and led to Major

Categorizations and Innovations While Also

Contributing to the Greater Realm of

Science Wait Are You Still Reading This

August Comte Considered the “founder of sociology.”

Comte’s philosophy became known as positivism—

a belief that the world can best be understood

through scientific inquiry.

Comte believed objective, bias-free knowledge was

attainable only through the use of science rather

than religion.

Two Dimensions Of Comte’s

Positivism Methodological - the application of scientific

knowledge to physical and social phenomena.

Social and political - the use of such knowledge to

predict the likely results of different policies so that

the best one could be chosen.

Harriet Martineau Believed society would improve when:

Women and men were treated equally.

Enlightened reform occurred.

Cooperation existed among all social classes.

Liked by: Comte

(Winter 1995, Michigan) During the ski season at Sugarloaf

Resort, a new lift operator was assigned to work the bottom

of Lift 2. He was greatly impressed by the bull wheel that

turned slowly above his head. The giant spokes on the

wheel were impossible to resist. He grabbed a spoke and

did a few pull-ups while the wheel turned. After entertaining

himself in this manner for awhile, he decided to try this trick

on the outer rim of the wheel. His timing was off. He did not

drop down in time. Caught between the wheel and the lift

cable, he was sliced in twain during his fateful final trip

around the bull wheel.

(13 January 2005, Croatia) One fateful afternoon, 55-

year-old Marko retreated to his semi-detached

workshop to make himself a tool for chimney cleaning.

The chimney was too high for a simple broom to work,

but if he could attach a brush to a chain and then

weigh it down with something, that would do the trick.

But what could he use as a weight? He happened to

have the perfect object. It was heavy, yet compact. And

best of all, it was made of metal, so he could weld it to

the chain. He must have somehow overlooked the fact

that it was also a hand grenade and was filled with

explosive material.

Marko turned on his welding apparatus and began to

create an arc between the chain and the grenade. As

the metal heated up, the grenade exploded. The force

of the explosion killed poor Marko instantly, blasting

shrapnel through the walls of the shed

(23 September 2002, Brazil) A farm keeper from

São Paulo decided to remove a beehive from

his orange tree. He didn't know exactly how to

proceed, but he knew the hive should be

burned, and he knew bees sting. So he

protected his head with a plastic bag sealed

tightly around his neck, grabbed a torch, and

went off to fight the bees.

His worried wife went to look for him a few

hours later, and found him dead. However, it

wasn't the bees that killed him. The plastic bag

had protected him from smoke, stingers, and...

oxygen! He had forgotten to put breathing

holes in the bag.

WHAT’S THE POINT???

Darwinism can be applied to

humans!

Herbert Spencer Spencer’s major contribution to sociology was an

evolutionary perspective on social order and

social change.

Social Darwinism - the belief that those human

beings, best adapted to their environment survive

and prosper, whereas those poorly adapted die

out. Overshadowed by:

Darwin

Emile Durkheim Believed the limits of human potential are socially, not

biologically based.

One of his most important contributions to sociology was

the idea that societies are built on social facts.

Social facts are patterned ways of acting, thinking, and

feeling that exist outside any one individual but that

exert social control over each person.

Disagrees with:

Spencer

Karl Marx Viewed history as a clash between conflicting

ideas and forces.

Believed class conflict produced social change

and a better society.

Combined ideas from philosophy, history, and

social science into a new theory.

Max Weber Believed sociological research should exclude

personal values and economic interests.

Provided insights on rationalization (world as

efficient machine), bureaucracy and religion.

Georg Simmel Theorized about society as a web of patterned

interactions among people.

Analyzed how social interactions vary depending

on the size of the social group.

Developed formal sociology, an approach that

focuses attention on the universal recurring social

forms that underlie the varying content of social

interaction.

The Chicago School

First dept. of sociology in U.S. @ U. of

Chicago

Faulty instrumental in starting American

Sociological Association

Jane Adams Founded Hull House, one of the most famous

settlement houses, in Chicago.

One of the authors of a methodology text used by sociologists for the next forty years.

Awarded Nobel Prize for assistance to the underprivileged.

W. E. B. Du Bois One of the first to note the identity conflict of being

both a black and an American.

Pointed out that people in the U.S. espouse values

of democracy, freedom, and equality while they

accept racism and group discrimination.

Theoretical Perspectives

Theory View of Society

Functionalist

Composed of interrelated

parts that work together to

maintain stability.

Conflict

Society is characterized by

social inequality; social life is

a struggle for scarce

resources.

Theoretical Perspectives

Theory View of Society

Symbolic

Interactionist

Behavior is learned in interaction

with other people.

Postmodernist

Postindustrialization,

consumerism, and global

communications bring into

question assumptions about

social life and the nature of reality.

Functionalist Perspective

MACROLEVEL

Church, school, gov’t all must function in

tandem

Merton: Manifest Functions vs. Latent

Functions

Intended functions of social unit vs.

unintended/hidden functions

Apply It!

What are the manifest and latent functions

of a…

School?

Shopping mall?

Little League?

Conflict Perspective MACROLEVEL

“Power Elite”

Proletariat and bourgeoisie

Power and Prestige

Feminism

Symbolic Interactionist

MICROLEVEL

Society = Sum of all indy/group

interaction

PACKETOLOGY!

COMPLETE PAGES 14-15 IN YOUR

PACKET TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN

THE PERSPECTIVES!

Postmodern

MACROLEVEL/MICROLEVEL

Consumption of information, services has

changed things

Question the system

OUTDATED

HOOKING UP

How Sociology Works With Other

Social Sciences

Sociological Research Theory - a set of logically interrelated statements that

attempt to describe, explain, and predict social events.

Research is the process of collecting information for the

purpose of testing an existing theory or generating a new

one.

The relationship between theory and research has been

referred to as a continuous cycle.

Sociology and Anthropology Anthropology seeks to understand human

existence over geographic space and evolutionary

time.

Sociology seeks to understand contemporary

social organization, relations, and change.

Sociology and Psychology Psychology is the study of behavior and mental

processes - what occurs in the mind.

Sociological research examines the effects of

groups, organizations, and institutions on social

life.

Sociology and Economics Economists attempt to explain how the limited

resources of a society are allocated among

competing demands.

Economists focus on economic systems such as

monetary policy, inflation, and the national debt.

Sociologists focus on a number of social

institutions, one of which is the economy.

Sociology and Political

Science Political scientists concentrate on political

institutions.

Sociologists study political institutions within

the context of other social institutions, such

as families.