SOCIOLOGY

OVERVIEW OF SOCIOLOGY

Definition

Sociology is the systematic study of social behavior and human groups. It focuses primarily on the influence of social relationships on peoples attitudes and behavior and on how societies are established and change.

It tries to explain why people think and act in the way that they do. Interest of sociologists primarily in the ongoing pattern of behavior that people follow.THE SOCIOLOGICAL OUTLOOK/PERSPECTIVE

1. Looks for answers by examining the social groups within which people do their thinking and acting

2. Examines social groups and the pattern of coordination within them so that we can gain a fuller understanding of why people behave the way they do.

SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION

1. The ability to connect seemingly impersonal remote historical forces to the most basic incident of an individuals life.

2. The sociological imagination enables people to distinguish between personal troubles and public issues

TROUBLES AND ISSUES

Troubles - Personal needs, problems, and difficulties can be explained in terms of individual shortcomings related to motivation, attitude, ability, character, or judgment.

Issues A matter that can be explained only by factors outside an individuals control and immediate environment. IssuesTroubles

Focus

Outside the individualFocus

Personal needs, problems, and difficulties

Cause

Flaws or breakdown in institutional arrangementsCause

Individual shortcomings

Examples of Causes

Unemployment resulting from profit making strategies that reduce labor costs through downsizing, automation, outsourcing, and lay-offs.Examples of causes

Lack of motivation

Bad attitude

Flawed character

Weak skills

Resolution

Change institutional structureResolution

Change individual shortcomings

Change strategies

Institute tax incentives discouraging specific behaviors

Change or write new laws

Institute embargoes

Change loan criteriaChange strategies

Seek therapy

Find new friends

Take mood altering medication

Look for a job/change job

Try harder

SOCIETY IS A HUMAN CREATION

Society is a relatively large, self-sufficient collection of people that

1. Share and transmit a common heritage from one generation to another

2. Contains patterns of behavior that govern interaction

3. Occupies a given territory

Patterns of behavior are

1. Highly coordinated forms of interactions.

2. They are not random

The coordination of behavior patterns makes a society a useful means of survival.

Institution A relatively stable and predictable arrangement among people that has emerged over time with the purpose of coordinating human interaction and behavior in ways that meet some social need. How humans create society

Coordination of behavioral patterns as a means of survival Coordinated patterns of behavior permits a variety of needs to be taken care of simultaneously.

Coordination as a mode of adaptation Division of labor develops when different activities form in a society and different people come to specialize in those activities.

Once a division of labor occurs, the number of divisions that can arise becomes unlimited.

Division of labor give way to the invention of tools.

However, tools would be useless if there is no coordination of activities

Coordination and communication

Communication means that an idea or thought or experience of mine can become known to you through your experience of my behavior.

Symbols anything that you and I both agree will stand for (or communicate) something else.

1. Symbols are limitless and flexible

2. Symbols are tied to things they communicate only in the specific way and for the length of time people in groups choose to have them serve the purpose.

Language

1. The ultimate human symbol is in the symbol system of language

2. A language is essentially a code in which meaning is encoded into (or changed into) particular symbols according to the rules of the code, which are referred to as grammar. ACCEPTED PROPER HUMAN BEHAVIOR

As human behavior becomes coordinated in social groups, it is organized into ongoing patterns that are accepted as proper within the group.

Habits, habitual patterns of behavior and values

1. Habitual patterns of behavior are hard to break.

2. When habits are not just individual but are followed by everyone in the group, the force of others expectation is added to the force of habit in general.

3. Patterns of behavior may begin because they are useful in dealing with problems the social group has.

4. Over time, they become important in their own right simply because they are there.

5. They may continue even when they are no longer useful, or perhaps are even destructive to the social group.

Coordination and human values

Habits - habits or patterns of behavior can become values in a social group.

Values a value is an ideal agreed on by a social group as to what is good or desirable.

DEVELOPMENT OF CULTURE: REASON AND RULES FOR COORDINATION

1. People believe strongly in their habits

2. This results from the conscious manner in which humans coordinate themselves in social groups.

3. Whatever patterns develop, those who follow them will notice think all manner of thoughts about them.

CULTURE

1. Culture is a general concept used by sociologists.

2. Culture refers to all objects, skills, ideas, beliefs, and patterns of behavior that are developed and shared by members of a social group.

3. Culture is anything that is created and shared by given groups of humans.

Elements of culture are interconnected.

All elements of culture, from tools to religious beliefs, develop simultaneously and in an interconnected manner

A change in one element causes changes in other elements.

NORMS

1. The shared rules that govern the wide variety of patterned behavior within the culture

2. Cannot be seen or touched

3. Can be unmistakably felt through the negative responses of others when we violate the agreed upon behavior.

4. Provide the what, where, how, and when of patterned behavior.

5. The why is provided by the values.

Values may hold individuals to the norm when the force of habit fails and the utility of following the norm is called into question.

Values may also keep individuals following the norm when no one is watching to see that the norm is adhered to.

Systems of justification Humans develop elaborate systems of justification in their culture so that individuals following current norms will not consciously search for alternative.

Roles

1. Patterned behavior that are organized as culture undergo development.2. The expected behavior patterns that develop for specific activities or positions in a society. 3. Roles are also called norm-governed behavior because roles respond to the expectation of others. NOTE: Being born into a human society and its culture is like entering into an ongoing game.

HUMANS ARE CREATIONS OF SOCIETY

Humans are dependent for many years.

Human bodies have slow maturation built into their design.

Difference between the coordination of animals and coordination of humans. Humans do not inherit their forms of coordination. They must learn them from other humans.

Therefore, a growing physical maturity then comes to be accompanied by a growing social maturity.

Physical maturity and social maturity are both necessary to function as a human in a society

There are few limits to the things humans can learn from their culture.

How society create humans

Socialization: the internalization of culture

Socialization is the ongoing process by which humans come to learn about and believe in their cultures.

Socialization leads to a curious development in the thinking of the individuals it affects.

Socialization never stops.

What happens during socialization:

Noting watching the behavior of others and taking note when that behavior is out of line according to the shared norms of the group.

Forms of noting

1. Comments

2. Snickers

3. Ridicule

4. Withdrawing of affection

5. Exile

6. Violence

What the forms of noting or responses communicate

1. The fact that a norm has been broken

2. A definition of the norm, so that it can be followed in the future

3. The importance of the norm

Social control the enforcement of group norms.

Social control comes with the responses to a breach of the norm.

Why socialization is not always effective

1. People are in daily contact with a variety of groups and social institutions that are incompatible with one another in terms of norms and values.

2. The more influence one group has, the less open individuals of that group will be to the socialization and social control of other group.

Internalization is the process by which we come to know the norms of a culture and , more importantly, come to hold the value of a culture as our own. Internalization of others views All members of a society see positive views of themselves from others whose views are important to them. At the same time more general values tend to sneak in the backdoor. Once these positive views become values and established in the individual, they may become immovable, even if the individual becomes aware of them, dont like them, and desire to change them. Internalization of the knowledge of our culture enable us to Acquire and develop skills Acquire the knowledge of doing things Internalization and world view

Colors or limits what we see about others.

This applies even among people of different nationalities.

WHAT SOCIALIZATION DOES TO HUMANS

As projected by sociologists, socialization postulates that every part of the individuals personality is in some way affected by membership in a social group.

Socialization gives a false belief that we are aware of all of it.

Our desire to be members of an accepted by at least one social group overrides our ability to stand back and understand what the social group does to us in return.

Our unconscious manipulation by social groups brings up the question of freedom and conformity which are not necessarily comforting.

Freedom versus conformity in society

Sociology projects social groups as coercive

Members of social groups demand conformity from each other and employ, nevertheless, tactics of social control when they dont get it.

Group members facing social control seem desperate to learn the groups norms so that they might conform voluntarily.

Sociologists, however, do not relegate humans to behavioral robots.

The variety of social groups that most people associate with lessens the influence of each - ridicule from one group will not be quite as devastating if we get respect from some other group.

BASIC OBSERVATIONS

People are more than happy to turn-over their freedom of choice to the social group.

If we fit ourselves into the on-going patterns that our social group provides, we give up our freedom to decide what to do.

But we are also saved from the responsibility of having to decide. So if we are in an organization where conformity is strictly enforced, we blame the role we play for any behavior that, in the course of our conformity, becomes destructive of others.

On the other hand, people are far from being role robots. Thus, social experiences often place us in too many conflicting situations for roles to be followed with unquestioned obedience.

Sociology has no answer for the basic question of freedom versus conformity. It only provides a better way to ask it.

TOO MUCH PERSONAL FREEDOM

Too much personal freedom is highly disruptive and can be dangerous to personal welfare.

TOO MUCH CONFORMITY

On the other hand, some of the great horrors of history happened in the name of conformity.

People didnt have he power or were not psychologically able to say no.

They fit into the patterns provided for them and passed the responsibility for their own action to others.

SOCIETY CREATE HUMANS

The social groups we create turn around and seduce us into being loyal members.

SOCIOLOGY AND PREVENTING MANIPULATION BY SOCIAL GROUPS

Sociology brings that seduction more into the light.

Individuals can thus use the sociological outlook to watch the process of manipulation in action.

That does not mean that we will be immune from those processes, as everyone needs some kind of social group to survive, but at least we will have some protection provided by understanding.

Sociology brings society into question.

Therefore, it places all the rules and values we live with into a sharper perspective.

We become aware of where they come from, how we came to accept them, and how they make us feel.

This understanding give them (the rules and values) a little less control over our freedom.

CHRONOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIOLOGY IN THE PHILIPPINES

1938 Serafin D. Macaraeg

1950 A. W. Salt and Murray Bartlett; Clyde Hewtrlin

1952 Philippine Sociological Society

1957 Community Development Research Council

1960 Fr. Frank Lynch and the Institute of the Phil Culture

1972 Xavier University, Ph D Program in Sociology

U. P. , B. S. Degree in Sociology

THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES IN SOCIOLOGY

Structural functionalism the order theorists

A perspective that views the various parts (or structures) of society in terms of the functions they fulfill for the overall society.

To the structural-functionalists, society is a finely tuned machine (or a complex organism like the human body) in which all the parts are interdependent and operate for the good of the whole.

Talcot Parsons (1902-1979) and Robert Merton (1910 - ) developed and refined functionalism without altering its basic nature. Merton observed that functions could be divided into manifest functions and latent functions.

Manifest functions are the obvious functions provided by social structures. For example, educational systems serve to pass on cultural knowledge to each generation.

Latent functions are the unintentional or hidden functions provided by social structures, which may not be known or understood until the structure is altered.

For example, educational systems tend to keep wealth in the hands of the wealthy across generations because the children of the wealthy have access to better schools and do better in school, and people with more education get better jobs and earn more money.

Dysfunction. American sociologist William Graham Sumner (1906) believed that some of the most basic elements of culture occasionally outlive their usefulness and end up either serving no function or creating problems by their continued existence. Robert Merton coined the term dysfunction to refer to social structures that seem to produce negative consequences for society.

Criticisms Against Structural-Functionalists

The structural-functionalists are sometimes called order theorists by critics who suggest that the theory focuses attention on maintaining social order and the status quo at the expense of understanding social change.

These critics say that structural-functionalists look at social change as if it were a sickness in society rather than a common process.

The defenders of the theory, on the other hand, point out that the functional perspective offers a unique and clear picture of social cohesion in society by unearthing the forces that build consensus among its members.

Conflict theory conflict perspectives

Conflict theory is generally traced to the pioneering work of Karl Marx (1818-1883), in particular his study of the social inequality characteristic of capitalist economies in industrial societies.

Marx and adherents of this perspective observed that human inequality is not just a result of some individuals being stronger or smarter than others; rather, a structural inequality is built into the very fabric of society.

Conflict theorists assume that built-in differences in power and wealth will produce conflict in society between those who have them and those who dont.

The favored few will fear those less favored while the have-nots will feel envy. The favored will work to maintain the status quo (as it clearly benefits them), while the remainder of society will be encouraged to compete for greater power and wealth.

In short, conflict theory focuses on the structured inequality of society, which produces conflict as individuals and groups with different interests compete with one another.

Question confronting conflict theory: If all these assumptions are correct, why are most social relations apparently so peaceful?

The conflict theorists answer by pointing to efforts by the powerful to maintain the status quo.

a. Power and wealth give the haves greater access to weapons, for instance, with which to dominate others.

b. Power provides access to less obvious means of control.

c. Power and wealth mean that you can publish the books (and determine their content), structure the school curriculum, purchase the politicians (or buy an office yourself), make the movies, influence the major religions, and, in general have a major impact on the kinds of ideas and beliefs that most members of your society are likely to have.

Many of these ideas are part of a set of coordinated ideas, termed an ideology; conflict theorists say that the set of ideas promulgated by the ruling members of society always support their own interests.

Conflict theorists, instead of looking at value consensus,

roam the corridors of power relations, asking questions about how power develops,

how it is used, and

what its results are.

Unlike structural-functionalism, conflict theory provides a definite insight into social change, showing how internal contradictions in societies can lead to change over time.

Interactionist perspective Symbolic interaction perspective

Interactionists perspective (sometimes called symbolic interactionist perspective) maintains that human behavior is a meaningful response to an agreed upon social reality shared by members of society; in order to understand a response, we need to understand that social reality.

What is reality?

To the interactionists, the reality of society exists only in the imaginations of society members.

As your neighbors and other observers react similarly to your action and you interpret their behavior, you come to understand their shared sense of social reality.

A certain action is what it is in a society because the people believe that to be the case and maintain the shared nature of that belief by reminding one another as they interact.

The belief lives in their shared imaginations and nowhere else.

In this sense, to the interactionists the social world is a collective imagination and survives only so long as we agree to continue imagining it

If new imaginations arise and come to be shared, society changes.

German sociologist, Max Weber (1864-1920), is often credited with nudging the interactionist perspective into existence through his emphasis on the importance of meaning in social action.

According to him, we can only understand, explain, and predict an individuals action if we first know what that action means to the individual.

Individuals, argued Weber, act only after interpreting the actions of others in some way that is meaningful to them.

Sociologist must gain understanding of this meaning which Weber termed Verstehen.George Herbert Mead (1863-1931) and Charles Cooley (1864-1929) continued this tradition in sociology and are generally credited with laying the foundation of the interactionist perspective.

Mead, in particular, outlined an approach to human behavior, saying, that the human mind is the product of social interaction. As we think about ourselves, we do so in terms of how others react to us. Over time, the mind comes to reflect the general attitudes and perspectives of an individuals social community. Cooley used the term looking glass self for this process.