Chapter 1

Sociological Perspective – Understanding human behavior by placing it within its broader social context

Society – people who share a culture and a territory

Social Location – the group memberships that people have because of their location in history and society

Because we now have global communications our world has become a global village.

(page 5)

Science - The application of systematic methods to obtain knowledge and the knowledge obtained by those methods

Natural Sciences – the intellectual and academic disciplines designed t explain and predict events in our natural environments

Social Sciences – the intellectual and academic disciplines designed to understand the social world objectively by means of controlled and repeated observations

Anthropology…the study of humanity Economics…studies the production and

distribution of the material goods and services of a society

Political Science…examine how governments are formed, how they operate, and how they are related to other institutions of society

Psychology…the study of human behavior

Sociology…the study of societies and the behavior of societies (cultures, group structures, belief systems)

1. To make Generalizations – statements that go beyond the indivual case and are applied to a broader group r situation

2. To look for Patterns – recurring characteristics or events

3. To predict or specify what will happen in the future

Common sense – those things “everyone knows” are true (look at pages 8-Down-to-Earth box)

Scientific method – using objective, systematic observations to test theories

Positivism - the application of the scientific approach to the social world

Sociology – the study of society and human behavior

Auguste Comte (1798-1857) is the founder of Sociology. He believed that the scientificmethod should be applied to Sociology but did not apply it himself.

1820-1903 Disagreed with Comte

that Sociology should guide social reform because he believed over time weak societies would die out. He called this principle “the survival of the fittest”…he coined this term, not Darwin!

However, his views became known as Social Darwinism

1818-1883 Like Comte, thought people

should try to change society Class Conflict – Marx’s term for

the struggle between capitalists and workers

Bourgeoisie – Marx’s term for the capitalists, those who own the means of production

Proletariat – Marx’s term for the exploited class, the mass of workers who do not own the means of production.

1858-1917 Identified Social Integration

– the degree to which members of a group or a society feel united by shared values and other social bonds; a.k.a. social cohesion

Got Sociology recognized as a separate discipline

Studied how social forces affect behavior, see Figure 1.1 on page 13

1864-1920 Believed religion is the central

force in social change Origin of capitalism came from

the Protestants of the Calvinist tradition wanting signs they were on the path to Heaven

Called the readiness to invest into capital the “Protestant Ethic”

He called the readiness to invest in capital to make money the “spirit of capitalism”

Value Free – the view that a sociologist’s personal values or biases should not influence social research

Values – the standards by which people define what is desirable or undesirable, good or bad, beautiful or ugly

Objectivity – total neutralityReplication – repeating a study in

order to test its findings

Weber Verstehen - a

German word used by Weber that is perhaps best understood as “to have insight into someone’s situation”

Subjective Meanings – The meanings that people give their own behavior

Durkheim Stressed Social

Facts – Durkheim’s term for a group’s patterns of behavior

If we add Verstehen to social facts, we gain insight that goes beyond statistics, but learn the reasons why…

Examples… June weddings Babies being born on TuesdaysSuicide among the elderly

1800sAttitudes of the time were that

women were wives and mothersWomen were expected to devoted

themselves to the 4 Ks: Kirche, Kuchen, Kinder, and Kleider (church, cooking, children, and clothes)

Few people at all were educated beyond the basics

1802-1876Published Society in America Before Durkheim and Weber Were Born

Her Work was Ignored

University of Kansas develops first Sociology dept. in North America in 1890 followed by University of Chicago in 1892, Atlanta University in 1897, McGill University in Canada in 1922, Harvard in 1930 and Berkeley in the 1950s!

1860-1935 Co-won Nobel

Peace Prize Worked on behalf

of poor immigrants Co-founded

Chicago’s Hull-House (still there today!)

Leader in women’s rights and Women’s suffrage

1868-1963 Spent his lifetime

studying relations between African Americans and Whites

Until recently Du Bois’ contributions went unrecognized

He had over 2,000 writings including The Philadelphia Negro (page 20 has an excerpt from one of his writings)

Basic or Pure Sociology – Sociological research whose purpose is to make discoveries about life in human groups, not to make changes in those groups

Applied Sociology – the use of Sociology to solve problems from the micro level of family relationships to the macro level of crime and pollution

Theory – a general statement about how some parts of the world fit together and how they work; an explanation of how two or more facts are related to one another

Symbolic Interactionism – A theoretical perspective in which society is viewed as composed of symbols that people use to establish meaning, develop their views of the world, and communicate with one another

Emotional SatisfactionThe Love SymbolThe Meaning of ChildrenThe Meaning of ParenthoodMarital RolesPerception of AlternativesThe Meaning of Divorce

Functional Analysis – a theoretical framework in which society is viewed as composed of various parts, each with a function that, when fulfilled, contributes to a society’s equilibrium; a.k.a. functionalism and structural functionalism(Society is a Whole Unit Made Up of Interrelated Parts that Work Together)

Comte and Spencer viewed society as a living organism

Conflict Theory - a theoretical framework in which society is viewed as composed as groups that are competing for scarce resources

Founded by Karl Marx who thought the key to human history was class conflict

Macro-level Analysis – an examination of large-scale patterns of society

Micro-level Analysis – an examination of small scale patterns of society

Social Interaction – what people do when they are in one another’s presence

Nonverbal Interaction – communication without words through gestures, use of space, silence, and so on

Sociology has gone through 3 phases…1.Emphasis on reforming society2.Emphasis on basic Sociology

And now …1.Globalization – the growing interconnections

among nations due to the expansion of capitalismGlobalization of Capitalism – capitalism becoming the globe’s dominant economic system

The influence of applied Sociology is also likely to increase