SOC 1301
What is Sociology?
Chapter 1, p 3-37

You should be able to:
Define:
• Sociology- the study of human behavior in society and how people react, they look to save the people, they get the base of where it is coming from and examine it

• Sociological imagination- By C. Wright Mills (1959) basically saying that there is a reason for people acting the way that they do, because of the experiences they have had and history it sees our lives as contextual lives—our individual identities are sensible only in social contexts—such as family, or our jobs, or our set of friends—in which we find ourselves

sociologists don’t think in “either/or”; but they usually think in“both/and”

sociologist look for facts that relate to the topic
Sociology is a kind of posture, a perspextive, a way of seeing the world.

• Canon- officially recognized set of foundational sociologists

• Latent functions- underlying but important part of doing something, comes along with the activity or choice ex. college • Manifest functions- the obvious and final goal of the choice ex. college • Macrolevel analysis- analysis of the large scale patterns or social structures of society, such as economies or political systems

• Microlevel analysis- analysis of small-scale social patterns, such as individual interactions or small group dynamics • Conflict Theory- a sociological paradigm that views society as organized by conflict rather than consensus and sees that norms and values are not equally distributed or accepted among members of a society. This theory tends to focus on inequality. Basically their are problems and it helps run our society and make it work as it does. • Structural functionalism- a sociological paradigm that contends that all social life consists of several distinct, integrated levels that enable the world—and individuals who are within in—to find stability, order, and meaning. • Symbolic Interactionism: sociological perspective that examines how individuals and groups interact, focusing on the creation of personal identity through interaction with others. Of particular interest is the relationship between individual action and group pressures. • Modernism- the challenging of tradition, religion, and aristocracies as remnants of the past and saw industry, democracy, and science as the wave of the future • Postmodernism- a late-twentieth-century worldview that emphasizes the existence of different world views and concepts of reality, rather than one “correct” or “true” one. Postmodernism emphasizes that a particular reality is a social construction by a particular group, community, or class. • McDonaldization- the homogenizing spread of consumerism around the globe • Globalization- interconnections among different groups of people all over the world that connect and divide different groups of people • Multiculturalism: different ways different groups of people approach issues

In one word or sentence describe the contributions of the intellectual founders of sociology, including those whose work is not part of the classical canon: • Auguste Comte: introduced the word “sociology in 1838 • Karl Marx: class • Emile Durkeim: suicide • Max