Sociologist, Sociological Methods & Sociological Theory

1. Sociologist, Sociological Methods & Sociological Theory

2. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • August Comte (1798-1857) • Father of Sociology • Positivism • Humanity can be bettered through science and its application to society.

3. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • Herbert Spencer (1820 – 1903) • Stressed how each part of society is interrelated, similar to living organism. • Advocated Social Darwinism, and the idea of the survival of the fittest.

4. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • George Herbert Mead ( 1863 – 1931) • Developed “philosophy” of role play – people learn to behave correctly in society through playing different roles during childhood • Example: As a child, playing game of teacher & pupil, one learns the appropriate behavior for each role. • This process also teaches empathy. • His work lead to the rise of symbolic interactionists- they examine the way people go about daily life and engage socially.

5. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • Emile Durkheim (1858 – 1917) • First one to get sociology recognized as specific discipline • Social Integration • Your connection to society relates to your actions. • Suicide those more connected are less likely to kill themselves. • Believed a “collective consciousness” (shared set of social values) controls society. • Anomie - when control breaks down, or collective consciousness weakens • Social Facts: Patterns of behavior that characterize a social group. Marriages in June

6. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • Karl Marx ( 1818 – 83) • Society exists when people come together to produce necessities of life. • Basis of society is economic production. • His writing led to the development of critical sociology which examines the ways it is believed that the ruling class dominates society.

7. The Founders of Sociology (the big 6) • Max Weber ( 1864 – 1920) • Did not believe economics was central force, but that it was religion instead. • Example: • Durkheimer and Marx would view a family as a structure – father, mother, children, each linked in certain physical or legal ways. • Weber would view the family as a set of actins – the action of living together and sharing activities. • Used the term verstehen to describe the need for seeing an action through the eyes of the individual involved (the individual’s perception of the situation) • His work can easily be partnered with the work of Durkheim, you need both.

8. Methods of Social Research • Natural observation– a researcher watches the behavior of groups in their natural setting. • Experimental method– a research method conducted in a carefully controlled setting to determine relationships between variables. • Participant observation– a researcher participates in the group life of the subjects of the study.

9. Methods of Social Research • Case study– an extensive, in-depth study of a single case – a person, work group, etc. • Content analysis– a study of any form of communication to determine characteristics such as social trends and patterns of a culture by counting the number of times specific words or ideas appear. • Historical analysis– a study of the records of the past (leaflets, laws, letters, diaries, newspapers, etc) to prove or disprove a hypothesis.

10. Methods of Social ResearchThe Subjects… • Random Sample– a sample in which every person in the total group has an equal chance of being chosen (ex: researches may choose every 5th shopper) • Quota or representative sample– a representative cross-section of the population being studied (ex: the number surveyed in a factory must have the same percentage of males & females as does the whole factory).

11. Methods of Social Research • Interview method– a researcher asks questions directly of a number of subjects to determine opinions, attitudes, behavior, etc. • Questionnaire method– a researcher distributes handouts listing questions to subjects to determine opinions, attitudes, behavior, etc

12. Theories to know • Functionalist Perspective: Every group, action, or institution in society serves a purpose! (a function!) • Conflict Theory: Karl Marx’s theory that society is driven by one group trying to maintain dominance over another. • Symbolic Interactionists: Society is the sum of all the individual relationships and reactions that make up the greater society. (This is more of “grass roots” sociology, or society’s norms and values are formed from the ground up!)

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