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The Origins of Sociology
August Comte
(1798-1857)
Considered the Founder of Modern Sociology
Coined the phrase: Sociology (1838)
Described Sociology as having three stages:
Theological
Metaphysical
Scientific
The Origins of Sociology
August Comte
(1798-1857)
 Favored positivism — a way of
understanding based on science
 Strongly influenced the academic
discipline of Sociology in the United States
The Origins of Sociology
August Comte
(1798-1857)
The term sociology comes from:
Latin – socius (friend or associate)
Greek – logos (word)
--------------------------“words about human associations”
The Origins of Sociology
Karl Marx
(1818-1883)
Saw striking inequalities in the new
industrial society.
Known for Marxist Sociology and the Social-
Conflict Approach
The Origins of Sociology
GENDER & RACE: Marginal Voices
Harriet Martineau
Jane Addams
(1802-1876)
(1860-1935)
W.E.B. Du Bois
(1868-1963)
3 Perspectives of Sociology
The Structural–Functional
Paradigm
The
structural-functional paradigm sees
society as a complex system whose parts work
together.
It asserts that our lives are guided by social
structures.
Herbert Spencer
Emile Durkheim
Robert Merton
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
–Focuses on the social order
-Sees social change as harmful.
-Inspired by sociologists Herbert
Spencer and Emile Durkheim.
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
-Each part of society performs certain functions
for the society as a whole, and the parts are
interdependent
-GREEF Model
Government
Religion
Education
Economy
Family/Friends
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
-What holds society together is social
consensus – most members of society agree
on what would be good for everybody and
then cooperate to achieve it.
-Social consensus can be either in the form of
mechanical or organic solidarity.
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
-Mechanical Solidarity: a type of social
cohesion that develops when people do
similar work and have similar beliefs
and values.
-This exists in relatively small-scale,
traditional societies.
(Ex: small farming community)
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
-Organic Solidarity: a type of social cohesion
that arises when the people in a society
perform a wide variety of specialized jobs and
therefore have to depend on one another.
-This is characteristic in complex, industrialized
societies.
(Ex: U.S. society)
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
- European sociologists used
functionalism to explain society as a
whole – to clarify how order and
stability were maintained.
- American sociologists have been more
interested in discovering the functions
of specific types of human behavior.
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
-Sociologist Robert Merton classified
functions of society into two types:
Manifest and Latent
-Manifest Functions – are intended and obvious.
Example: go to college to get an education.
-Latent Functions – are unintended and often
unrecognized. Example: go to college and find
a wife.
Functionalist:
Focus on Social Order
Criticisms:
-The functionalist perspective by itself can’t lead to a
complete picture of social events.
-It has also been criticized for focusing on the
positive functions of social events, and ignoring the
negative.
-The application of functionalism to analyze society
has been criticized for being inherently conservative.
The Social–Conflict
Paradigm
The
social-conflict paradigm sees society
as an arena of inequality that generates
conflict and change.
Critical
evaluation: This paradigm has
developed rapidly in recent years.
Karl Marx
W.E.B. Du Bois
Conflict:
Focus on Social Conflict
-Sees social change as beneficial.
-Assumes that the social order is imposed by the powerful on
the weak.
Conflict:
Focus on Social Conflict
- This perspective is critical of the status quo.
- It emphasizes that groups or societies have conflicting
interests and values and compete with each other for
scarce resources. The more powerful groups gain more
than the less powerful, but the former continue to seek
more wealth and power while the latter continue to struggle
for scarce resources.
-Because of this perpetual competition, society or the world
is always changing.
Conflict:
Focus on Social Conflict
-This perspective originated with Karl Marx,
and gained popularity in the U.S. during the
Civil Rights Movement.
(Marx saw conflict between economic groups,
but today, conflict theorists define social
conflict to mean conflict between any unequal
groups in society.)
Conflict:
Focus on Social Conflict
Criticisms:
The conflict perspective has been criticized
for overly stressing social conflict and other
negative aspects of society while ignoring the
order, stability and other positive aspects of
society.
The Symbolic–Interaction
Paradigm
The
symbolic-interaction paradigm sees
society as the product of the everyday
interactions of individuals.
Max Weber
George Herbert Mead
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
-Looks at specific situations in everyday
life and the kinds of social interactions
that are taking place.
-Meaning is assigned to human
interaction
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
-People respond to their own
interpretations of physical things
-Because people constantly impose
interpretations and then act accordingly,
human behavior is fluid, always
changing.
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
-George Herbert Mead introduced symbolic
interactionism to sociology in the 1920s
-Max Weber is considered to have shaped
Symbolic Interactionist persepective.
-Weber argued people act according to their
interpretation of the meaning of their social
world.
-Verstehen Method (pronounced fairSHTAY-in)
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
According to symbolic interactionism, people assign
meanings to each other’s words and actions. Our response
to a person’s action is therefore determined not by that
person’s action in and of itself but by our subjective
interpretation of that person’s action.
Example: When we speak to a friend, an observer can
easily give an objective report of the words we have said.
But our friend’s response will depend not on the list of words
we spoke but on our friend’s interpretation of the entire
interaction, and our friends response is at the same time
influencing what we are saying.
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
How we act is constantly being altered by how we
interpret other people’s actions and their reactions
to our own behavior.
Human behavior is thus not real in and of itself but
becomes real only after it has been subjected to
“reality construction,” the process by which we
interpret what a given action means and respond to
it in accordance with the interpretation.
Symbolic Interactionist:
Focus on Social Interactions
The symbolic interactionist perspective is very useful for
understanding why and how we interact with others,
something that we do during most of our waking hours.
Criticisms:
But the perspective has been criticized for ignoring the larger
issues of national and international order and change.
It has also been faulted for ignoring the influence of larger
social forces such as social institutions, groups, cultures, and
societies on individual interactions.
Multiple View
-The idea that each perspective is useful
because we can’t take everything into
account in such a complex world.
-People gain an integrated view of society
by using all three perspectives together.