1 INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY

Sociology exposes students to a broad diversity of scholarship & perspectives. This diversity goes
beyond recognizing gender, racial-ethnic and social class differences to acknowledging a plurality of
voices and views within the discipline (Ferguson, Susan 2002)

Forces shaping and constraining our lives

Operate in a social environment influencing us

What is Sociology?

Systematic and scientific study of human social life

Study of human groups, communities & societies

Study of institutions & organizations

Subject matter – “us as social beings”

Wide scope of sociology- ranging from analysis of passing encounters between individuals in
the street to the investigation of global social processes

Socio + logy= study of society

Relevance of Sociology

Think about the society & how it affects your life

Studies all the cultural symbols humans create

Explores all the social structures that order social life

Examines all processes

Attempts to understand the transformations and change in society

Sociological Imagination- C.W, Mills

Sociological imagination requires us to think ourselves away from the familiar routines of
our daily life

Understand the relationship between personal experience and the wider society-Public
issues

Sociological imagination allows us to see that many events –seem individual- reflect larger
issues e.g. Divorce, unemployment

Critical ways of seeing the ‘social’

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Emergence of Sociology

Confluence of events in Europe in the late eighteenth century set the stage for the
emergence of Sociology

Old feudal estates began giving way to labour moving into industry

New forms of governments- monarchies giving way to democratic forms

Foundations of society –altered

◦ Employment, income, living arrangements, family, community and religion

People worried –new emerging order-think systematically what the changes meant for the
future

Resulting intellectual movement termed as Enlightenment

Hold of religion, dogma and tradition was broken

Science emerged as a way of thinking

Along with science the thinking about social world emerged

In England this kind of thinking was termed was ‘The Age of Reason’

Enlightenment philosophers- John Locke, Charles Montesquieu, Rousseau- developed

theories of government

French Revolution
◦ Accelerated systematic thinking about the social world
◦ Violence of the revolution shocked all of Europe
◦ Overthrew old regime
◦ Ideas- liberty, freedom & equality

Industrial Revolution
o Greatly transformed the old agrarian societies
o Process of change from an agrarian handicraft economy to one dominated by
industry & the machine manufacturing
o Discoveries and inventions
o Large scale migration- rural to urban
o Expansion of knowledge- science, technology, education, medicine, art, literature
etc.

It was around the turn of the eighteen and into the nineteenth centuries, that sociology as a
discipline emerged.

Founding Fathers of Sociology: Auguste Comte, Karl Marx, Max Weber, Emile Durkheim

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References

* Giddens, Anthony (2001) Sociology. Polity Press (8th Edition)

* Turner, Jonathan ( 1993) Sociology -Concepts & Uses. McGraw Hill

*Schaefer, Richard (2006) Sociology- A brief introduction. Tata McGraw Hill

*Ferguson, Susan (2002) Mapping the social landscape -Readings in sociology, McGraw Hill

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