Sociology (
Latin:
socius, "companion";
-ology, "the study of",
Greek λόγος,
lógos, "word",
"knowledge") is the study of
human societies. It is a
social
science (with which it is informally
synonymous) that uses various methods of
empirical investigation and
critical analysis to develop and refine a
body of knowledge on human social activity, often with the goal of
applying such knowledge to the pursuit of social welfare. Subject
matter ranges from the
micro level of
agency and
interaction to the
macro level of systems and
social structures.
Sociology is a broad discipline in terms of both methodology and
subject matter. Its traditional focuses have included
social stratification (i.e.
class relations),
religion,
secularization,
modernity,
culture and
deviance, and its approaches have
included both
qualitative and
quantitative research
techniques. As much of what humans do fits under the category of
social structure and agency,
sociology has gradually expanded its focus to further subjects,
such as
medical,
military and
penal organizations,
the internet, and even the role of
social activity in the development of
scientific knowledge. The
range of social scientific methods has also been broadly expanded.
The
linguistic and
cultural turns of the mid-20th century led to
increasingly
interpretative,
hermeneutic, and "
postmodern" approaches to the study of society.
Conversely, recent decades have seen the rise of new mathematically
rigorous approaches, such as
social
network analysis.
History
Origins
Sociological reasoning predates the origin of the term.
Social analysis has origins in the common
stock of
Western knowledge and
philosophy, and has been carried out from
at least as early as the time of
Plato. There
is evidence of early
sociology in medieval Islam. It
may be said that the first sociologist was
Ibn Khaldun, a 14th century Arab scholar from
North Africa, whose
Muqaddimah
was the first work to advance social-scientific theories of
social cohesion and
social conflict.
The word
"sociologie" was first coined in 1780 by the French
essayist Emmanuel Joseph Sieyès
(1748–1836) in an unpublished manuscript. It was later
established by
Auguste Comte
(1798–1857) in 1838. Comte had earlier used the term "social
physics", but that had subsequently been appropriated by others,
most notably the Belgian statistician
Adolphe Quetelet. Comte endeavoured to
unify history, psychology and economics through the scientific
understanding of the social realm. Writing shortly after the
malaise of the
French Revolution,
he proposed that social ills could be remedied through sociological
positivism, an epistemological approach
outlined in
The Course in Positive Philosophy [1830–1842]
and
A General View of
Positivism (1844). Comte believed a
positivist stage would mark the final
era, after conjectural
theological and
metaphysical phases, in the progression
of human understanding.
Founding figures of the academic discipline
Though Comte is generally regarded as the "Father of Sociology",
the discipline was formally established by another French thinker,
Émile Durkheim (1858–1917), who
developed positivism in greater detail. Durkheim set up the first
European department of sociology at the
University of Bordeaux in 1895,
publishing his
Rules of the Sociological
Method. In 1896, he established the journal
L'Année Sociologique.
Durkheim's seminal monograph,
Suicide (1897), a case study of suicide
rates amongst
Catholic and
Protestant populations, distinguished
sociological analysis from
psychology or
philosophy. It also marked a major
contribution to the concept of
structural functionalism.
Sociology evolved as an academic response to the challenges of
modernity, such as
industrialization,
urbanization,
secularization, and a perceived process of
enveloping
rationalization.
The field predominated
in continental Europe, with
British
anthropology and statistics generally following on a separate
trajectory. By the turn of the 20th century, however, many
theorists were active in the
Anglo-American world. Few early sociologists
were confined strictly to the subject, interacting also with
economics,
jurisprudence,
psychology and
philosophy, with theories being appropriated in a
variety of different fields. Since its inception, sociological
epistemologies, methods, and frames of enquiry, have significantly
expanded and diverged.
A course
entitled "sociology" was taught in the United States at Yale
in 1875 by
William Graham Sumner, drawing
upon the thought of Comte and Herbert
Spencer rather than Durkheimian theory. In 1890, the oldest
continuing American course in the modern tradition began at the
University of
Kansas
, lectured by Frank
Blackmar. The Department of History and Sociology at the
University of Kansas was established in 1891.
The Department of
Sociology at the University of Chicago
was established in 1892 by Albion W. Small.
George Herbert
Mead and Charles Cooley, who had
met at the University of
Michigan
in 1891 (along with John
Dewey), would move to Chicago in 1894. Their influence
gave rise to
social psychology and
the
symbolic interactionism
of the modern
Chicago
School. The
American Journal of
Sociology was founded in 1895.
The first
sociology department to be established in the United Kingdom
was at the London School of Economics and Political
Science
(home of the British Journal of Sociology)
in 1904. In 1905, the
American Sociological
Association, the world's largest
association of professional
sociologists, was founded, and in 1909 the
Deutsche
Gesellschaft für Soziologie (
German Society for Sociology)
was founded by
Ferdinand
Tönnies and
Max Weber, among others.
In 1919,
Weber established the first department in Germany at the Ludwig
Maximilians University of Munich
, having presented an influential new antipositivist sociology. In 1920,
Florian Znaniecki set up the first
department
in Poland.
International co-operation in sociology began in 1893, when
René Worms founded the
Institut International de
Sociologie, an institution later eclipsed by the much
larger
International
Sociological Association (ISA), founded in 1949.
Durkheim,
Marx and
Weber are typically cited as the three
principal architects of social science. Their thought is central to
the modern sociological paradigms of
functionalism,
conflict theory and
anti-positivism respectively.
Vilfredo Pareto,
Ludwig Gumplowicz,
Ferdinand Tönnies, and
Georg Simmel are occasionally included on
academic curricula as further founding theorists. Each key figure
is associated with a particular theoretical perspective and
orientation.
Positivism and anti-positivism
The
methodological approach toward
sociology by early theorists was to treat the discipline in broadly
the same manner as
natural science.
An emphasis on
empiricism and the
scientific method was sought to
provide an incontestable foundation for any sociological claims or
findings, and to distinguish sociology from less empirical fields
such as
philosophy. This perspective,
called positivism, is based on the assumption that the only
authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge, and that such
knowledge can come only from positive affirmation of theories
through strict scientific and
quantitative methods.
Émile Durkheim was a major proponent of
theoretically grounded empirical research, seeking correlations
between
"social facts" to reveal
structural laws. His position was informed by an interest in
applying sociological findings in the pursuit of social reform and
the negation of social "
anomie". Today,
scholarly accounts of Durkheim's positivism may be vulnerable to
exaggeration and oversimplification: Comte was the only major
sociological thinker to postulate that the social realm may be
subject to scientific analysis in the same way as noble science,
whereas Durkheim acknowledged in greater detail the fundamental
epistemological limitations.
Reactions against positivism began when German philosopher
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
voiced opposition to both empiricism, which he rejected as
uncritical, and determinism, which he viewed as overly mechanistic.
Karl Marx's methodology borrowed from
Hegel
dialecticism but also a rejection
of positivism in favour of critical analysis, seeking to supplement
the empirical acquisition of "facts" with the elimination of
illusions. He maintained that appearances need to be critiqued
rather than simply documented. Marx rejected Comtean positivism but
nonetheless endeavoured to produce a
science of society
grounded in
historical
materialism.
Hermeneuticians and
neo-Kantian philosophers, such as
Wilhelm Dilthey and
Heinrich Rickert, argued that empirical
analysis of the
social world differs
to that of the
natural world due to
the irreducibly complex aspects of human
society and
culture.
At the turn of the 20th century the first generation of German
sociologists formally introduced methodological
antipositivism, proposing that research
should concentrate on human cultural
norm,
values,
symbols, and social processes viewed from a
subjective perspective.
Max Weber argued that sociology may be loosely
described as a 'science' as it is able to identify causal
relationships—especially among
ideal
types, or hypothetical simplifications of complex social
phenomena. As a nonpositivist, however, one seeks relationships
that are not as "ahistorical, invariant, or generalizable" as those
pursued by natural scientists.
Ferdinand Tönnies presented
Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft
(lit.
community and
society) as the two
normal types of human association. Tönnies drew
a sharp line between the realm of conceptuality and the reality of
social action: the first must be
treated axiomatically and in a deductive way ('pure' sociology),
whereas the second empirically and in an inductive way ('applied'
sociology).
Both Weber and
Georg Simmel pioneered
the
Verstehen (or 'interpretative')
approach toward social science; a systematic process in which an
outside observer attempts to relate to a particular cultural group,
or indigenous people, on their own terms and from their own
point-of-view. Through the work of Simmel, in particular, sociology
acquired a possible character beyond positivist data-collection or
grand, deterministic systems of structural law. Relatively isolated
from the sociological academy throughout his lifetime, Simmel
presented idiosyncratic analyses of modernity more reminiscent of
the
phenomenological and
existential writers than of Comte or
Durkheim, paying particular concern to the forms of, and
possibilities for, social individuality. His sociology engaged in a
neo-Kantian critique of the limits of
perception, asking 'What is society?' in a direct allusion to
Kant's question 'What is nature?'
Functionalism and conflict theory
Structural functionalism is a broad paradigm, both in sociology and
anthropology, which addresses the
social structure in terms of the
necessary function of its constituent elements. A common analogy
(popularized by
Herbert Spencer) is
to regard norms, values and institutions as 'organs' that work
toward the proper-functioning of the entire 'body' of society. The
perspective is implicit in the original sociological positivism of
Comte, but was theorized in full by Durkheim, again with respect to
observable, structural laws. Although functionalism shares an
history and theoretical affinity with the empirical method, later
functionalists, such as
Bronisław Malinowski and
Talcott Parsons, are to some extent
antipositivist. Similarly, whilst
functionalism shares an affinity with 'grand theory' (e.g.
systems theory in the work of
Niklas Luhmann), one may distinguish between
structural and non-structural conceptions. It is also simplistic to
equate the perspective directly with
conservative ideology. In the most basic terms
functionalism concerns "the effort to impute, as rigorously as
possible, to each feature, custom, or practice, its effect on the
functioning of a supposedly stable, cohesive system."
Conflict theories, by contrast, are perspectives which critique the
overarching socio-political system, which emphasize the inequality
of a particular social group, or which otherwise detract from
structural functionalism (though they may also be '
structural'). Conflict theories draw
attention to power differentials, such as
class conflict, and generally contrast
traditional or historically-dominant
ideologies. The term is most commonly associated
with
Marxism, but as a reaction to
functionalism and the scientific method may be associated with
critical theory,
feminist theory,
queer theory,
postmodern theory,
post-structural theory,
postcolonial theory, and a variety of
other perspectives.
Twentieth-century developments
In the
early 20th century, sociology expanded in the U.S.
, including
developments in both macrosociology,
concerned with the evolution of
societies, and microsociology,
concerned with everyday human social interactions. Based on
the
pragmatic social psychology of
George Herbert Mead,
Herbert Blumer and, later, the
Chicago school, sociologists
developed
symbolic
interactionism. In the 1920s,
Georg Lukács'
History and Class
Consciousness (1923) was released, whilst a number of
works by Durkheim and Weber were published posthumously. In the
1930s,
Talcott Parsons developed
action theory, integrating
the study of
social order with the
structural and voluntaristic aspects of macro and micro factors,
while placing the discussion within a higher explanatory context of
system theory and
cybernetics. In Austria and later the U.S.,
Alfred Schütz developed social
phenomenology, which
would later inform
social
constructionism. During the same period members of
the Frankfurt school developed
critical theory,
integrating the historical materialistic elements of
Marxism with the insights of
Weber,
Freud and
Gramsci —in theory, if not always in name—
often characterizing capitalist modernity as a move away from the
central tenets of
enlightenment.
During the
Interwar period,
sociology was undermined by totalitarian governments for reasons of
ostensible political control.
After the Russian Revolution, sociology was
gradually "politicized, Bolshevisized and eventually, Stalinized"
until it virtually ceased
to exist in the Soviet
Union
.Elizabeth Ann Weinberg, The Development of
Sociology in the Soviet Union, Taylor & Francis, 1974,
ISBN 0710078765, Google Print, p.8-9 In China, the
discipline
was banned along with
semiotics and
comparative linguistics as "
Bourgeois pseudoscience" in 1952,
not to return until 1979. During the same period, however,
sociology was also undermined by conservative universities in the
West. This was due, in part, to perceptions of the subject as
possessing an inherent tendency, through its own aims and remit,
toward
liberal or
left wing thought. Given that the subject was
founded by
structural
functionalists; concerned with organic
cohesion and
social solidarity, this view was somewhat
groundless (though it was Parsons who had introduced Durkheim to
American audiences, and his interpretation has been criticized for
a latent conservatism).
In the mid-20th century there was a general trend for American
sociology to be more scientific in nature, due to the prominence at
that time of action theory and other system-theoretical approaches.
In 1949,
Robert K. Merton released
Social Theory and Social
Structure, a major work in his functionalist project. By
the mid-1950s, new types of
quantitative and
qualitative research had been
developed, and sociological research was increasingly employed as a
tool by governments and businesses worldwide.
In 1959,
Erving Goffman published
The
Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, whilst
C. Wright
Mills presented
The
Sociological Imagination, encouraging humanistic discourse
and a rejection of abstracted grand theory. Parallel with the rise
of various
social movements in the
1960s, particularly in Britain, the
cultural turn saw a rise in
conflict theories emphasizing social
struggle, such as
neo-Marxism and
second-wave feminism.
Ralf Dahrendorf and
Ralph Miliband presented politically
influential theory on
class conflict
and industrialized
nation states. The
sociology of religion saw a
renaissance in the decade with new debates on
secularisation thesis and the very definition
of religious practise. Theorists such as
Gerhard Lenski and
John Milton Yinger formulated functional
definitions of what constitutes a religion, thus analysing new
social movements for their religious role. Theorists in the
tradition of
Western Marxism
continued to scrutize
consumerism and
ideology in analogous terms.
In the 1970s so-called
post-structuralist and
postmodernist theory, drawing upon
structuralism and
phenomenology as much as classical social
science, made a considerable impact on frames of sociological
enquiry. Often understood simply as a cultural style
'after-
Modernism' marked by
intertextuality,
pastiche and
irony,
sociological analyses of postmodernity have presented a distinct
era relating to (1) the dissolution of
metanarratives (particularly in the work of
Lyotard), and (2)
commodity fetishism and the 'mirroring'
of identity with consumption in late capitalist society (
Debord;
Baudrillard;
Jameson). Postmodernism has also
been associated with the rejection of enlightenment conceptions of
the human subject by thinkers such as
Claude Lévi-Strauss,
Michel Foucault, and, to a lesser extent, in
Louis Althusser's
anti-humanist defence of Marxism.
Most theorists associated with the movement actively refused the label, preferring to accept postmodernity as a historical phenomenon rather than a method of analysis, if at all. Nevertheless, self-consciously postmodern pieces continue to emerge within the social and political sciences in general.
In the 1980s, theorists outside of France tended to focus on
globalization,
communication, and
reflexivity in terms of a
'second' phase of modernity, rather than a distinct new era
per
se.
Jürgen Habermas
established
communicative
action as a reaction to postmodern challenges to the discourse
of modernity, informed both by
critical
theory and
pragmatism. Fellow German
sociologist,
Ulrich Beck, presented
The Risk Society (1992) as an
account of the manner in which the modern nation state has become
organized. In Britain,
Anthony
Giddens set out to reconcile recurrent theoretical dichotomies
through
structuration theory.
During the 1990s, Giddens developed work on the challenges of "high
modernity", as well as a new '
third way'
politics that would greatly influence
New
Labour in U.K. and the
Clinton administration in the U.S.
Leading Polish sociologist,
Zygmunt
Bauman, wrote extensively on the concepts of modernity and
postmodernity, particularly with reference to the
Holocaust and
consumerism. Whilst
Pierre Bourdieu gained significant critical
acclaim for his continued work on
cultural capital, certain French
sociologists, particularly
Jean
Baudrillard and
Michel
Maffesoli, were criticised for perceived
obfuscation and
relativism.
Functionalist-structuralist systems theorists such as
Niklas Luhmann remained dominant forces in
sociology up to the end of the century. In 1994,
Robert K. Merton won the
National Medal of Science for his
contributions to the
sociology of
science. The
positivist tradition is
popular to this day, particularly in the United States. The
discipline's two most
widely cited
American journals, the
American Journal of
Sociology and the
American Sociological
Review, primarily publish research in the positivist
tradition, with ASR exhibiting greater diversity (the
British
Journal of Sociology, on the other hand, publishes primarily
non-positivist articles). The 1990s gave rise to improvements in
quantitative methodologies.
Longitudinal studies were employed to
follow populations over the course of years and decades, enabling
researchers to study long-term phenomena and gain greater
reliability. Increases in the size of data sets
was facilitated by new statistical computer
software packages such as
SAS,
Stata, or
SPSS.
Social network
analysis is an example of a new paradigm in the positivist
tradition. The method, pioneered by theorists such as
Harrison White,
J. Clyde
Mitchell, and
Mark Granovetter,
is now common in various subfields, as well as other related
disciplines. There has also been a minor revival of a more
independent, empirical sociology in the spirit of
C. Wright
Mills and his studies of the
Power
Elite in the United States, according to
Stanley Aronowitz.
Research
Methodology

Social interactions and their
consequences are studied in sociology.
Sociological research methods may be divided into two broad
categories:
- Quantitative designs attempt
to quantify social phenomena and analyse numerical data, focusing
on the links among a smaller number of attributes across many cases.
- Qualitative designs emphasise
personal experiences and interpretation over quantification, are
concerned with understanding the meaning
of social phenomena, and focus on links among a larger number
of attributes across relatively few cases.
Sociologists are divided into camps of support for particular
research techniques. These disputes relate to the historical core
of social theory (
positivism and
antipositivism;
structure and agency). While very
different in many aspects, both qualitative and quantitative
approaches involve a systematic interaction between
theory and
data. The
choice of method often depends largely on what the researcher
intends to investigate. For example, a researcher concerned with
drawing a statistical generalization across an entire population
may administer a survey questionnaire to a representitive sample
population. By contrast, a researcher who seeks full contextual
understanding of an individuals'
social
actions may choose ethnographic
participant observation or
open-ended interviews. Studies will commonly combine, or
'triangulate', quantitative
and qualitative methods as part of a 'multi-strategy'
design. For instance, a quantitative study may be performed to gain
statistical patterns or a target sample, and then combined with a
qualitative interview to determine an agents' own
reflexivity.
Sampling
Typically a population is very large, making a
census or a complete
enumeration of all the values in that population
infeasible. A 'sample' thus forms a manageable
subset of a
population. In positivist research,
statistics derived from a sample are analysed in order to draw
inferences regarding the population as a
whole. The process of collecting information from a sample is
referred to as
'sampling'.
Sampling methods may be either 'random' (
random sampling,
systematic sampling,
stratified sampling,
cluster sampling) or non-random/
nonprobability (
convenience sampling,
purposive sampling,
snowball sampling).
Types of method
The following list of research methods is neither exclusive nor
exhaustive:

- Archival research or the Historical method: draws upon the secondary data located in historical archives
and records, such as biographies, memoirs, journals, and so
on.
- Content analysis: The content
of interviews and other texts are systematically analysed. Often
data is 'coded' as a part of the 'grounded theory' approach using qualitative
data analysis (QDA) software, such as NVivo..
- Experimental research: The
researcher isolates a single social process or social phenomena and
uses the data to either confirm or construct social theory.
Participants (also referred to as "subjects") are randomly assigned
to various conditions or "treatments", and then analyzes are made
between groups. Randomization allows the researcher to be sure that
the treatment is having the effect on group differences and not any
extraneous factors.
- Survey research: The researcher
produces data using interviews, questionnaires, or similar feedback
from a set of people chosen (including random selection) to
represent a particular population of interest. Survey items from an
interview or questionnaire may be open-ended or closed-ended.
Quantitative data may be tested using statistical software such as
PASW (SPSS).
- Life history: A study of the
personal life experiences and
trajectories of a participant. Through semi-structured interviews,
the researcher may probe into the decisive moments or various
influences in their life.
- Longitudinal study: An
extensive examination of a specific person or group over a long
period of time.
- Observation: Using data from the
senses, the researcher records information about social phenomenon
or behavior. Observation techniques can be either participant observation or
non-participant observation. In participant observation, the
researcher goes into the field (such as a community or a place of
work), and participates in the activities of the field for a
prolonged period of time in order acquire a deep understanding of
it. Data acquired through these techniques may be analyzed either
quantitatively or qualitatively.
Practical applications
Social research informs
economists,
politicians and
public
policy,
educators,
planners,
lawmakers,
administrators,
developers,
business magnates,
managers,
social
workers,
non-governmental organizations,
non-profit organizations,
and people interested in resolving
social
issues in general. There is often a great deal of crossover
between social research,
market
research, and other
statistical
fields.
Epistemology and ontology
The extent to which the discipline should be conducted
scientifically remains a salient issue with
respect to basic
ontological and
epistemological questions.
Controversies continue to rage on how to emphasize or integrate
subjectivity,
objectivity,
intersubjectivity and practicality in the
conduct of theory and research. Though essentially all major
theorists since the late 19th century have accepted that sociology
is not a science in the traditional sense of the word, the ability
to determine
causal relationships invokes
the same fundamental philosophical discussions held in science
meta-theory. Whereas positivism has
sometimes met with caricature as a breed of naive empiricism, the
word has a rich history of applications stretching from Comte to
the
logical positivism of the
Vienna Circle and beyond. By the same
token, successful positivism would be open to the same
critical rationalist non-
justificationism presented by
Karl Popper , which is itself disputed through
Thomas Kuhn's conception of epistemic
paradigm shift. The
linguistic and
cultural turns of the mid-20th century led to
a rise in abstracted philosophic and hermeneutic material in
sociology, as well as so-called "
postmodern" perspectives on the social
acquisition of knowledge. In recent years sociologists have
frequently engaged with figures such as
Ludwig Wittgenstein and
Jacques Derrida, just as
social philosophy has often met with
social theory. One notable critique of
social science is found in
Peter Winch's
Wittgensteinian text
The Idea of Social Science and its
Relation to Philosophy (1958).
Michel Foucault provides a potent critique
in his
archaeology of the human
sciences, though
Jürgen
Habermas and
Richard Rorty have
both argued that Foucault merely replaces one such system of
thought with another.
Structure and agency forms an
enduring debate in social theory: "Do social structures determine
an individual's behaviour or does human agency?" In this context
'
agency' refers to the capacity
of individuals to act independently and make free choices, whereas
'
structure' refers to factors which
limit or affect the choices and actions of individuals (such as
social class, religion, gender, ethnicity, and so on). Discussions
over the primacy of either structure and agency, and the
possibility of
agential
reflexivity, relate to the core of social ontology ("What is
the social world made of?", "What is a cause in the social world,
and what is an effect?"). One attempt to reconcile postmodern
critiques with the overarching project of social science has been
the development, particularly in Britain, of
critical realism. For critical realists
such as
Roy Bhaskar, traditional
positivism commits an 'epistemic fallacy' by failing to address the
ontological conditions which make science possible: that is,
structure and agency itself. A general outcome of incredulity
toward overly-structural or agential thought has been the
development of multidimensional theories, most notably the
Action Theory of
Talcott Parsons and
Anthony Giddens's
Theory of Structuration.
Despite meta-theoretical criticisms of sociological positivism,
statistical quantitative methods remain extremely common
in
practise.
Michael Burawoy has
contrasted
public sociology,
emphasising strict practical applications, with
academic
or
professional sociology, which largely concerns dialogue
amongst other social/political scientists and philosophers.
Scope and topics
Culture
Cultural sociology involves a
critical
analysis of the words, artifacts and symbols which interact
with forms of social life, whether within
subcultures or societies at large. For
Simmel, culture referred to "the cultivation of
individuals through the agency of external forms which have been
objectified in the course of history". Culture was a prevalent
object of
historical
materialist analysis for members of the
Frankfurt School, such as
Theodor Adorno and
Walter Benjamin. Loosely-distinct to culture
as a general object of sociological inquiry is the discipline of
Cultural Studies.
Birmingham School
cultural theorists such as
Richard
Hoggart,
Stuart
Hall and
Raymond Williams
emphasized the reciprocity in how mass-produced cultural texts are
used, questioning the valorized division between 'producers' and
'consumers' evident in earlier
neo-Marxist theory. Cultural Studies aims to
examine its subject matter in terms of cultural practices and their
relation to power. For example, a study of a subculture (such as
white working class youth in London) would consider the social
practices of the youth as they relate to the dominant
classes.
Criminality and deviance
Criminologists analyse the nature, causes, and control of criminal
activity, drawing upon methods across sociology,
psychology, and the
behavioral sciences. The sociology of
deviance focuses on actions or behaviors that violate
norm, including both formally-enacted rules
(e.g.,
crime) and informal violations of
cultural norms. It is the remit of sociologists to study why these
norms exist; how they change over time; and how they are enforced.
The concept of deviance is central in contemporary structural
functionalism and systems theory.
Robert K. Merton produced a
typology of
deviance, and also established the terms "
role model", "
unintended consequences", and
"
self-fulfilling
prophecy".
Economics
Economic sociology is the sociological analysis of economic
phenomena; the role economic structures and institutions play upon
society, and the influence a society holds over the nature of
economic structures and institutions. The relationship between
capitalism and
modernity is a salient issue.
Marx's
historical
materialism attempted to demonstrate how economic forces have a
fundamental influence on the structure of society.
Max Weber also, though less deterministically,
regarded economic processes as key to social understanding.
Georg Simmel, particularly in his
Philosophy of Money, was important in the early
development of economic sociology, as was
Emile Durkheim with works such as
The Division of Labour in
Society. Economic sociology is often synonymous with
socioeconomics. In many cases, however, socioeconomists focus on
the social impact of specific economic changes, such as the closing
of a factory, market manipulation, the signing of international
trade treaties, new natural gas regulation, and so on.
Environment
Environmental sociology is the study of societal-environmental
interactions, typically placing emphasis on the social factors that
cause environmental problems, the impacts of those issues, and the
efforts to resolve them. Attention is paid to the processes by
which environmental conditions become
defined and
known to a society. (See also:
sociology of disaster)
Education
The sociology of education is the study of how educational
institutions determine social structures, experiences, and other
outcomes. It is particularly concerned with the schooling systems
of modern industrial societies, including the expansion of
higher,
further,
adult, and
continuing education.
Family and childhood
The sociology of the family examines the family unit by means of
various theoretical perspectives, particularly with regard to the
modern historical emergence of the
nuclear family and its distinct
gender roles. The concept of
motherhood forms a central topic in the feminist
sociology of
Nancy Chodorow and
Jessie Bernard.
Gender and sexuality
Sociological analyses of gender and sexuality observe and critique
these categories, particularly with respect to power and
inequality, both at the level of small-scale interaction and in
terms of the broader social structure. At the historical core of
such work is
feminist theory and the
concern for
patriarchy: the systematic
oppression of women apparent in many societies. Feminist thought
may be divided into three 'waves' relating to (1) the initial
democratic
Suffrage movement of the
late-19th century, (2) the
second-wave feminism of the 1960s and
the development of increasingly complex academic theory, and (3)
the current, '
third wave', which
has tended to do-away with all generalizations regarding sex and
gender and is closely linked with
postmodernism,
antihumanism,
posthumanism and
queer
theory.
Marxist feminism and
black feminism are also important
perspectives. Studies of gender and sexuality developed
side-by-side with sociology rather than strictly within it. As the
great majority of universities do not possess a distinct school
dedicated to the area, however, it is most commonly taught from
within sociology departments.
Internet
The
Internet is of interest to sociologists
in various ways. The Internet can be used as a tool for
research (for example, conducting online
questionnaires), a discussion platform, and as a research topic.
Sociology of the Internet
in the broad sense includes analysis of
online communities (e.g.
newsgroups, social networking sites) and
virtual worlds. Organizational change is
catalyzed through
new media like the
Internet, thereby influencing social change at-large. This creates
the framework for a transformation from an
industrial to an
informational society (see
Manuel Castells and, in particular his turn
of the century account of "
The
Internet Galaxy"). Online communities can be studied
statistically through
network
analysis and at the same time interpreted qualitatively through
virtual ethnography. Social
change can be studied through statistical
demographics, or through the interpretation of
changing messages and symbols in online
media studies.
Knowledge
The sociology of knowledge is the study of the relationship between
human thought and the social context within which it arises, and of
the effects prevailing ideas have on societies. The term first came
into widespread use in the 1920s, when a number of German-speaking
theorists, most notably
Max Scheler, and
Karl Mannheim, wrote extensively on
it. With the dominance of
functionalism through the middle
years of the 20th century, the sociology of knowledge tended to
remain on the periphery of mainstream sociological thought. It was
largely reinvented and applied much more closely to everyday life
in the 1960s, particularly by
Peter
L. Berger and
Thomas Luckmann in
The Social Construction of
Reality (1966) and is still central for methods dealing
with qualitative understanding of human society (compare
socially constructed
reality). The "archaeological" and "genealogical" studies
of
Michel Foucault are of
considerable contemporary influence.
Law and punishment
The sociology of law refers to both a sub-discipline of sociology
and an approach within the field of
legal
studies. Sociology of law is a diverse field of study which
examines the interaction of law with other aspects of society, such
as the effect of legal institutions, doctrines, and practices on
other social phenomena and vice versa. Some of its areas of inquiry
include the social development of legal
institutions, the
social construction of legal issues, and
the relation of law to social change. Sociology of law also
intersects with the fields of
jurisprudence,
economic analysis of law and more
specialized subjects such as
criminology. A law is formal and therefore not
the same as a '
norm'. The sociology of
deviance, by contrast, examines both formal and informal deviations
from normality; both crime and purely cultural forms of deviance.
The sociology of punishment examines, without normative or moral
judgements, the nature of punitive actions.
Media
As with
cultural studies, media
studies is a distinct discipline which owes to the convergence of
sociology and other social sciences and humanities, in particular,
literary criticism and
critical theory. Though the production
process or the critique of aesthetic forms is not in the remit of
sociologists, analyses of
socializing
factors, such as
ideological effects and
audience reception, stem from
sociological theory and method. Thus the 'sociology of the media'
is not a subdiscipline
per se, but the media is a common
and often-indespensible topic.
Medical sociology
Medical sociology examines social interactions within medical
organizations and clinical institutions, while sociology of health
and illness focuses on the social effects of, and public attitudes
toward,
illnesses,
diseases,
disabilities
and the
ageing process. In Britain,
sociology was introduced into the medical curriculum following the
Goodenough Report (1944).
Military
Military sociology aims toward the systematic study of the military
as a social group rather than as an
organization. It is a highly
specialized subfield which examines issues related to service
personnel as a distinct
group with
coerced
collective action based on
shared
interests linked to survival
in
vocation and
combat, with purposes and
values that are more defined
and narrow than within civil society. Military sociology also
concerns
civilian-military relations and
interactions between other groups or governmental agencies. See
also:
sociology of terrorism.
Topics include:
- the dominant assumptions held by those in the military,
- changes in military members' willingness to fight,
- military unionization,
- military professionalism,
- the increased utilization of women,
- the military industrial-academic complex,
- the military's dependence on research, and
- the institutional and organizational structure of
military.
Political sociology
Political sociology is the study of the relations between state and
society. The discipline uses comparative history to analyze systems
of government and economic organization to understand the political
climate of societies. By comparing and analyzing history and
sociological data, political trends and patterns emerge. Political
sociology also concerns the play of power and personality, for
instance, the impact of globalization upon identity: "The
fragmentation and pluralization of values and life-styles, with the
growth of mass media and consumerism and decline of stable
occupations and communities, all means that previously taken for
granted social identities have become
politicized."
There are four main areas of research focus in contemporary
political sociology:
- The socio-political formation of the modern state.
- "Who rules"? How social inequality between groups (class, race,
gender, etc.) influences politics.
- How public personalities, social movements and trends outside
of the formal institutions of political power affect politics,
and
- Power relationships within and between social groups (e.g.
families, workplaces, bureaucracy, media, etc).
Race and ethnic relations
Race and ethnic relations is the area of sociology that studies the
social, political, and economic relations between ethnicities at
all levels of society. It encompasses the study of race and racism,
and of complex political interactions between members of different
groups. At the level of immigration policy, the issue is usually
discussed in terms of either
assimilationism or
multiculturalism.
Anti-racism and
postcolonialism are also integral concepts.
Major theorists include
Paul Gilroy,
Stuart Hall,
John
Rex and
Tariq Modood.
Religion
The sociology of religion concerns the practices, social
structures, historical backgrounds, developments, universal themes
and roles of religion in society. There is particular emphasis on
the recurring role of religion in all societies and throughout
recorded history. Crucially the sociology of religion does
not involve an assessment of the truth-claims particular
to a religion, though the process of comparing multiple conflicting
dogmas may require what
Peter L.
Berger has described as inherent
'methodological atheism'. Sociologists of religion attempt to
explain the effects of society on religion and the effects of
religion on society; in other words, their
dialectical
relationship. It may be said that the discipline of sociology
began with the analysis of religion in Durkheim's 1897
study of suicide rates amongst
Catholic and
Protestant populations.
Scientific knowledge and institutions
The sociology of science involves the study of science as a social
activity, especially dealing "with the social conditions and
effects of science, and with the social structures and processes of
scientific activity." Theorists include
Gaston Bachelard,
Karl Popper,
Paul
Feyerabend,
Thomas Kuhn,
Martin Kusch,
Bruno
Latour,
Robert K. Merton,
Michel
Foucault,
Anselm Strauss,
Lucy Suchman,
Sal Restivo,
Karin
Knorr-Cetina,
Randall Collins,
Barry Barnes,
David Bloor,
Harry
Collins, and
Steve Fuller.
Social psychology
Sociological social psychology, also known as psychological
sociology, is a specialist discipline which focuses on micro-scale
social interactions. Theory in this area may be described as
adhering to "sociological miniaturism", examining the nature of
societies through the study of individual thought processes and
emotional behaviours. Social psychology is closely allied with
symbolic interactionism and
the work of
George Herbert Mead.
A separate strand of social psychology is taught with
psychological emphasis.
Stratification
Social stratification is the hierarchical arrangement of
individuals into social classes, castes, and divisions within a
society. In modern
Western societies
stratification traditionally relates to cultural and economic
classes comprising of three main layers:
upper class,
middle
class, and
lower class, but each
class may be further subdivided into smaller classes (e.g.
occupational). Social stratification
is interpreted in radically different ways within sociology.
Proponents of
structural
functionalism suggest that, since social stratification exists
in most state societies, hierarchy must be beneficial in helping to
stabilize their existence.
Conflict
theorists, by contrast, critique the inaccessibility of
resources and lack of
social
mobility in stratified societies.
Karl
Marx distinguished social classes by their connection to the
means of production in the
capitalist system: the
bourgeoisie own
the means, but this includes the
proletariat itself as the workers can only sell
their own
labour power (forming the
base of the material
superstructure).
Max Weber critiqued
Marxist
economic determinism,
noting that social stratification is not based purely on economic
inequalities, but on other status and power differentials (e.g.
patriarchy).
Pierre Bourdieu provides a modern example in
the concepts of
cultural and
symbolic capital. Theorists such as
Ralf Dahrendorf have noted the
tendency toward an enlarged middle-class in modern Western
societies, particularly in relation to the necessity of an educated
work force in technological or service-based economies.
Perspectives concerning globalization, such as
dependency theory, suggest this effect
owes to the shift of workers to the
third
world.
Urban and rural spaces
Urban sociology involves the analysis of social life and human
interaction in metropolitan areas. It is a normative discipline,
seeking to study the structures, processes, changes and problems of
an urban area and by doing so providing inputs for planning and
policy making. Like most areas of sociology, urban sociologists use
statisticial analysis, observation, social theory, interviews, and
other methods to study a range of topics, including migration and
demographic trends, economics, poverty, race relations, economic
trends, and etc. After the industrial revolution theorists such as
Georg Simmel in
The Metropolis and
Mental life (1903) focused on the process of urbanization and
the effects it had on social alienation and anonymity. In the 1920s
and 1930s The
Chicago School produced
a major body of works specializing in urban sociology, utilising
symbolic interactionism as a
method of field research. Rural sociology, by contrast, is a field
of sociology associated with the study of social life in
non-metropolitan areas.
Work and industry
The sociology of work, or industrial sociology, examines "the
direction and implications of trends in
technological change,
globalization, labour markets, work
organization,
managerial practices and
employment relations to the
extent to which these trends are intimately related to changing
patterns of inequality in modern societies and to the changing
experiences of individuals and families the ways in which workers
challenge, resist and make their own contributions to the
patterning of work and shaping of work institutions."
Sociology and other academic disciplines
Sociology overlaps with a variety of disciplines that study
society; in particular,
political
science,
economics,
social philosophy, and most significantly
social/
cultural anthropology. Many
comparatively new
social sciences,
such as
communication studies,
critical theory,
cultural studies,
demography,
film
studies,
media studies, and
literary theory, draw upon methods
that originated in classical sociology. The distinct field of
social psychology emerged from the
many intersections of sociological and psychological interests, and
is further distinguished in terms of
sociological or
psychological emphasis.
Social anthropology is the
branch of
anthropology that studies how
contemporary living human beings behave in
social groups. Practitioners of social
anthropology investigate, often through long-term, intensive
field studies (including
participant observation methods),
the
social organization of a
particular people:
customs,
economic and
political organization,
law and
conflict resolution, patterns of
consumption and exchange,
kinship and family structure,
gender relations, childrearing and
socialization,
religion, and so on. Traditionally, social
anthropologists analysed non-industrial societies (generally rural)
and foreign cultures whereas sociologists focused on industrialized
societies in the western world. Social anthropology has, however,
now expanded to study modern Western societies and sociology have
also expanded into studying variety of societies in other
countries, meaning that the two disciplines increasingly converge.
Although both belong to separate academic disciplines, these
subjects overlap more with each other than most social
sciences.
Sociobiology is the study of how
social behavior and organization
have been influenced by
evolution and
other
biological process. The
field blends sociology with a number of other sciences, such as
anthropology,
biology,
zoology, and others.
Sociobiology has generated controversy within the sociological
academy for giving too much attention to gene expression over
socialization and environmental factors in general (see '
nature or nurture').
In 2007,
The Times Higher
Education Guide published a list of 'The most cited authors of
books in the Humanities' (including philosophy and psychology).
Seven of the top ten are listed as sociologists:
Michel Foucault (1),
Pierre Bourdieu (2),
Anthony Giddens (5),
Erving Goffman (6),
Jurgen Habermas (7),
Max Weber (8), and
Bruno
Latour (10).
See also
Related theories, methods and fields of inquiry
Footnotes
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& Gordon Marshall (eds), Oxford University Press, 2005, ISBN
0198609868, ISBN 978-0198609865
- Giddens, Anthony, Duneier, Mitchell, Applebaum, Richard. 2007.
Introduction to Sociology. Sixth Edition. New York: W.W.
Norton and Company
- H. Mowlana (2001). "Information in the Arab World",
Cooperation South Journal 1.
- Dr. S. W. Akhtar (1997). "The Islamic Concept of Knowledge",
Al-Tawhid: A Quarterly Journal of Islamic Thought &
Culture 12 (3).
- Amber Haque (2004)m, "Psychology from Islamic Perspective:
Contributions of Early Muslim Scholars and Challenges to
Contemporary Muslim Psychologists", Journal of Religion and
Health 43 (4): 357–377 [375].
- Des Manuscrits de Sieyès. 1773–1799, Volumes I and II,
published by Christine Fauré, Jacques Guilhaumou, Jacques Vallier
et Françoise Weil, Paris, Champion>, 1999 and 2007. See also
Christine Fauré and Jacques Guilhaumou, Sieyès et le non-dit de
la sociologie: du mot à la chose, in Revue d’histoire des
sciences humaines, Numéro 15, novembre 2006: Naissances de la
science sociale. See also the article 'sociologie' in the
French-language Wikipedia.
- A Dictionary of Sociology, Article: Comte,
Auguste
- Dictionary of the Social Sciences, Article: Comte,
Auguste
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University Press.
- Gianfranco Poggi (2000). Durkheim. Oxford: Oxford
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- Habermas, Jurgen, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity:
Modernity's Consciousness of Time, Polity Press (1985),
paperback, ISBN 0-7456-0830-2, p2
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Introduction to Sociology. Sixth Edition. New York: W.W.
Norton and Company. Chapter 1.
- http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O119-Sociology.html
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the World. University of Texas Press. ISBN 0-292-72700-3.
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Sociological Theory and Research, being Selected papers of Charles
Horton Cooley, edited by Robert Cooley Angell, New York: Henry
Holt
- http://www.isa-sociology.org/ International Sociological
Association Website
- http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/weber/ Max Weber - Stanford
Encyclopaedia of Philosophy
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Religion, Emotion and Morality' Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing.
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Dilthey's Concept of Understanding, The London School of
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Society, Cambridge University Press (2001), hardcover, 266
pages, ISBN 0-521-56119-1; trade paperback, Cambridge University
Press (2001), 266 pages, ISBN 0-521-56782-3
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Chicago University Press, 1971. pxix.
- Levine, Donald (ed) 'Simmel: On individuality and social forms'
Chicago University Press, 1971. p6.
- Bourricaud, F. 'The Sociology of Talcott Parsons' Chicago
University Press. ISBN 0-226-067564. p. 94
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Religion, Emotion and Morality' Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing.
- Haralambos & Holborn. 'Sociology: Themes and perspectives'
(2004) 6th ed, Collins Educational. ISBN 978-0-00-715447-0.
- The Mead Project
- Talcott Parsons (1937) The Structure of Social Action.
New York: McGraw-Hill
- Wagner, H. R. (1983). Alfred Schutz: An Intellectual Biography.
Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press. p5-12
- Martin Jay. The Dialectical Imagination: A History of the
Frankfurt School and the Institute for Social Research 1923-1950,
Berkeley, University of California Press, 1996 ISBN
0-520-20423-9.
- Adorno, Theodor. (1973) Negative Dialectics.
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in 1966)
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Construction of a Harmonious Society, ASA Footnotes,
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Religion, Emotion and Morality' Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing.
- Bannister, Robert C. (1991) Sociology and Scientism: The
American Quest for Objectivity, 1880-1940. University of North
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- Robert K. Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure, Free
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- Macionis, J Plummer, K Sociology: A Global
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- Daniel Geary, (2009) Radical Ambition: C. Wright Mills, the
Left, and American Social Thought University of California
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- Campbell, Colin. (1971) Toward a Sociology of
Irreligion Pan Publishing. 1999.
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Irreligion Pan Publishing. 1999.
- La société du spectacle, 1967, numerous editions; in English:
The Society of the Spectacle, Zone Books 1995, ISBN 0-942299-79-5.
Society of the Spectacle, Rebel Press 2004, ISBN
0-946061-12-2.
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- 'Cultural Studies: Theory and Practise'. By: Barker, Chris.
Sage Publications, 2005. p446.
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York: Routledge. ISBN 0415088887. p.5
- Althusser, L. (1969), For Marx, translated by Ben Brewster,
33-34, Verso. ISBN 1-84467-052-X.
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- Jürgen Habermas (1984) Theory of Communicative Action,
trans. Thomas McCarthy, Boston: Beacon Press.
- Giddens, Anthony (1994) Beyond Left and Right — the Future of
Radical Politics. Cambridge : Polity (publisher).
- Giddens, Anthony (Ed.) (2001) The Global Third Way Debate.
Cambridge : Polity (publisher).
- Bauman, Zygmunt. Postmodernity and its discontents.
New York: New York University Press. 1997. ISBN 0-7456-1791-3
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and Bernard
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Découverte, 2007, p. 351-387.
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- Positivism in sociological research: USA and UK (1966–1990).
By: Gartrell, C. David, Gartrell, John W., British Journal of
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(2004) 6th ed, Collins Educational. ISBN 978-0-00-715447-0. Chapter
14: Methods
- Haralambos & Holborn. 'Sociology: Themes and perspectives'
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Present in Hoy, D (eds) 'Foucault: A critical reader' Basil
Blackwell. Oxford, 1986.
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1986.
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Chicago University Press, 1971. pxix.
- 'Cultural Studies: Theory and Practise'. By: Barker, Chris.
Sage Publications, 2005. p446.
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352-353. ISBN 978-0-07-352818-2.
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Bibliography
- Aby, Stephen H. Sociology: A Guide to Reference and
Information Sources, 3rd edn. Littleton, CO, Libraries
Unlimited Inc., 2005, ISBN 1-56308-947-5
- Calhoun, Craig (ed) Dictionary of the Social Sciences,
Oxford University Press, 2002, ISBN 978-0-19-512371-5
- Macionis, John J. 2004. Sociology (10th Edition).
Prentice Hall, ISBN 0-13-184918-2
- Nash, Kate. 2000. Contemporary Political Sociology:
Globalization, Politics, and Power. Blackwell Publishers. ISBN
0-631-20660-4
- Scott, John & Marshall, Gordon (eds) A Dictionary of
Sociology (3rd Ed). Oxford University Press, 2005, ISBN
0-19-860986-8,
Further reading
- Wikibooks: Introduction to sociology
- Ankerl, Guy.Experimental Sociology of Architecture.
A Guide to Theory, Research, and Literature, 1983 Mouton de Gruyter, ISBN
90-279-3440-1
- Babbie, Earl R.. 2003. The
Practice of Social Research, 10th edition. Wadsworth, Thomson Learning Inc., ISBN
0-534-62029-9
- Collins, Randall. 1994. Four
Sociological Traditions. Oxford, Oxford University Press ISBN
0-19-508208-7
- Coser, Lewis A., Masters of
Sociological Thought : Ideas in Historical and Social Context,
New York, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1971. ISBN 0-15-555128-0.
- Giddens, Anthony. 2006.
Sociology (5th edition), Polity, Cambridge. ISBN
0-7456-3378-1
- Merton, Robert K.. 1959.
Social Theory and Social Structure. Toward the
codification of theory and research, Glencoe: Ill. (Revised
and enlarged edition)
- Mills, C. Wright, The Sociological Imagination,1959
- C. Wright Mills, Intellectual Craftsmanship Advices
how to Work for young Sociologist
- Nisbet, Robert A. 1967. The
Sociological Tradition, London, Heinemann Educational Books.
ISBN 1-56000-667-6
- Ritzer, George and Douglas J.
Goodman. 2004. Sociological Theory, Sixth Edition.
McGraw Hill. ISBN 0-07-281718-6
- Wallace, Ruth A. & Alison Wolf. 1995. Contemporary
Sociological Theory: Continuing the Classical Tradition, 4th
ed., Prentice-Hall. ISBN 0-13-036245-X
- White, Harrison C.. 2008.
Identity and Control. How Social Formations
Emerge. (2nd ed., Completely rev. ed.) Princeton,
Princeton
University Press
. ISBN 978-0-691-13714-8
- Willis, Evan. 1996. The Sociological Quest: An introduction
to the study of social life, New
Brunswick, NJ
, Rutgers
University Press. ISBN 0-8135-2367-2
External links
- Professional associations
- Other Resources