Sociology Super-Notes >> Class XI - Introducing Sociology >> Sociology and Society

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Sociology and Society
M S Ahluwalia

Introducing Sociology

Copyright © 2020, by M S Ahluwalia
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Let’ start…

Contents
1. How are an individual and the society related?
2. What are ‘plurality’ and ‘inequality’ of society?
3. What is the nature of sociology?
4. What went into the making of Sociology?
5. Why do we study European sociology?
6. What influenced emergence of Sociology in India?
7. What is the scope of Sociology?
8. How is Sociology related to other disciplines?
Introducing Sociology – Sociology and Society

Neither the life of an individual nor the
history of a society can be understood
without understanding both...
C. Wright Mills, 1959

• Society’s Issues
• Matters beyond the local
environment of the individual and
the range of his/her inner life
• Individual’s problems/troubles
• Occur within the character of the
individual and his immediate
relations with others
• They are linked to his self and to
areas of social life of which he is
directly and personally aware
11
• Mills vision of the sociological imagination is set in the unravelling of how the
personal and public are related.
• The individual and society are dialectically linked – with a distinction between:
‘Personal
troubles of
the milieu’
‘Public issues
of social
structure’

2.1. What is plurality of society?
• In today’s world, we humans belong to more than one ‘society’
• This diversity leads to difficulty in mapping of society.
• Our reference to ‘our society’ may mean different things depending on the context
– it may refer to ‘Indian society’ or ‘Punjabi society’ or ‘Muslim society’ or anything
else from the following list:
• For example, one person can be:
Country Region Religion
Linguistic
community
Ethnic
Community
Caste Tribe …
Indian Muslim
Keralite
Well-educated
Malayali
Pathan
Urban
Middle-class

2.2. What is inequality of society?
• Inequality is the cause of differences amongst societies.
• There are different kinds of inequality, and each of them requires serious
attention, Amartya Sen (2005):
Money Education Lifestyle
Political
Power
Opportunity Respect
Dimension
High
Low
Rich
Poor Illiterate Toiling
hard for
little
money
Can’t
influence
anything
No
opportunities
Treated
like dirt
Well-
Educated
Easy lives
of luxury
Can
influence
national
policies
Great
opportunities
for
advancement
Treated
with
respect
by police

Sociology is the study of
human social life,
groups and societies.
Its subject matter is our own
behaviour as social beings.
3. What is the nature of sociology?

3. What is the nature of Sociology?
1. Only Observes and Understands
• Sociology is concerned with
observation and collection of
data regarding norms and values.
• It is not concerned with prescribing
what they should be like.
2. Concerned with Ethics
• Sociologists have the responsibility
to ask about the goals of his/her
study and the work to which the
sociological findings will be applied
3. Sociology is a Science
• Sociologists are bound to follow
scientific methods
• This ensures that their work can be
validated by others
4. A Structured Profession
• Sociology is more than common-
sense: it has a body of concepts,
methods and data.
• Sociology is reflective, unlike
common-sense.
The Nature of
Sociology

4. What went into the making of Sociology?
Theory/
Ideas
Material
Issues
Sociology

4.1. Intellectual Ideas involved in making Sociology
• Darwin’s ideas about organic evolution were a major influence - Society
was compared with living organisms.
• Findings about pre-modern societies by early travellers and colonial
administrators were another major influence
• Sociologists and anthropologists made efforts to trace the growth of
society through stages, similar to those of organic life – they categorised
societies into types distinguished by their stages of social development
• Example: societies were classified into:
− Pre-modern societies such as hunters and gatherers, pastoral and
agrarian, agrarian and nonindustrial civilisations.
− Modern societies such as the industrialised societies
• This way of looking at society as a system of parts, each part playing a
given function influenced the study of social institutions like the family or
the school and structures such as stratification.

4.1. Intellectual Ideas… contd.
• The Enlightenment, an European intellectual movement of the late 17th and
18th centuries, emphasised reason and individualism.
• Thinkers of the early modern era were convinced that progress in
knowledge promised the solution to all social ills.
• They believed that social issues could be studied - social survey was based
on the belief that human phenomena can be classified and measured.

4.2. Material issues involved in making Sociology
Industrial revolution and capitalism caused permanent changes to the
social structure, and consequently had a profound impact in shaping
Sociology as several issues related to the changes surfaced:
• Chief occupation changed from agriculture and textiles to factory
workers, marked by degradation of labour
• From villages to urban cities
• From small societies to large cosmopolitans
• From hierarchical setup to mixed free-floating defined by current
economic status
• From close interaction to distanced individuals
• From work-rhythms decided by phase of daylight, constraints of
deadlines and other social duties, to clock time as a basis of social
organisation

5. Why do we study European sociology?
Two major reasons:
• The issues and concerns of sociology that came to the fore with the advent
of capitalism and industrialisation in the European society are pertinent
even now, and relevant to all modern societies.
• For Indian sociologists it is even more important to understand the
beginning and growth of sociology in Europe considering India’s modern
history is closely intertwined with that of its colonial ruler England, and
England was the hotseat of most of these changes

6. What influenced emergence of Sociology in India?
1
A Colonial Past
• India’s colonial past
impacted the
emergence of
sociology
• Impact of
industrialisation in
India was not the
same as in the west.
• Example: the people
displaced due to
industrialisation were
not necessarily able
to get jobs and a
better urban lifestyle
2
Incorrect Western
Understanding
• Emergence of
sociology in India
was impacted by
incorrect western
writings and ideas.
• The western view of
the Indian village as a
‘remnant or survival’
from ‘the infancy of
society’
3
Social Plurality
• The difference that
exists between
Sociology (industrial
societies) and Social
Anthropology (simple
societies) in the
western world does
not exist in India
considering its
extreme plurality.

7. What is the scope of Sociology?
From the perspective of the content that Sociology is studying i.e., the
focus of its analysis, scope of Sociology includes:
Global Issues
National Issues
Individuals’ Issues
Focus on the examination of global processes.
Example: impact of media on the young, impact
of foreign universities on Indian education
system.
Focus on national issues.
Example: unemployment, caste conflict, effect of
policies on tribal population, rural indebtedness
Focus on meaningful interactions between
individuals. Ex: between shopkeeper and
customers, teachers and students, two friends or
family members.

• Sociology is one of
a group of social
sciences which also
includes other
disciplines
• These sciences
share common
interests,
concepts, and
methods.
30
8. How is Sociology related to other disciplines?
Social
Sciences
Anthropo-
logy
Economics
History
Political
Science
Psychology
Sociology

8.1. Sociology and Social Anthropology
The Difference
• Content: Sociology is the study of
modern, complex societies while social
anthropology is the study of simple
societies.
• Focus: Social anthropology studies simple
societies in all their aspects, as wholes.
The specialisation is on the basis of area.
Sociologists focus on either parts of
society like the bureaucracy, religion,
caste or a process such as social mobility.
• Research Method: Social anthropology
was characterised by a long field work
tradition, living in the community,
studying and using ethnographic
research methods. Sociologists have
often relied on survey method and
quantitative data using statistics and the
questionnaire mode.
The Change
• Assumption behind studying a simple
society was that it was bounded. Today,
we know this is not true.
• It was feared that with decline of simple
societies, anthropology would lose its
specificity and merge with sociology. But:
• There have been fruitful interchanges
between the two disciplines and today
often methods and techniques are
drawn from both.
• There have been anthropological
studies of the state and globalisation,
instead of the traditional subject matter.
• Sociology started using anthropological
quantitative and qualitative techniques,
macro and micro approaches for
studying the complexities of modern
societies.

8.2. Sociology and Economics
How Sociology views economics
The sociological approach looks at economic behaviour in the broader context of
social norms, values, practices and interests. The large investment in the
advertisement industry is directly linked to the need to reshape lifestyles and
consumption patterns.
How Economics contributes to Sociology
The defined scope of economics has facilitated its development as a highly focused,
coherent discipline, which can translate the results of theoretical work into practical
suggestions having major implications for public policy.
How Sociology and Economics complement each other
• Economists’ predictive abilities often suffer because of their neglect of
individual behaviour, cultural norms and institutional resistance, things which
sociologists study.
• Sociology unlike economics usually does not provide technical solutions. But it
encourages a questioning and critical perspective.

8.3. Sociology and History
The Difference
• Content: Historians study the past,
sociologists are more interested in
the contemporary or recent past.
• Focus: Earlier, historians were
content to delineate the actual
events, to establish how things
actually happened, while in
sociology the focus was to
establish causal relationships.
• Level of Depth: History studies
concrete details while the
sociologist is more likely to
abstract from concrete reality,
categorise and generalise.
The Change
• Historians now use sociological
methods and concepts in their
analysis.
• Earlier, history was about the
history of kings and war. Less
glamorous or exciting events as
changes in land relations or
gender relations within the family
were not studied by historians, but
formed the core area of the
sociologist’s interest.
• Now, history is far more
sociological - it looks at social
patterns, gender relations, mores,
customs and important institutions
other than the acts of rulers, wars
and monarchy.

8.4. Sociology and Political Science
The Difference
• Content: Conventionally, political science was focused primarily on
two elements: political theory and government administration.
Neither branch involved extensive contact with political behaviour.
Sociologists like Max Weber worked in what can be termed as
political sociology which focused on the study of political behaviour.
• Focus: Sociology focuses on interrelationships between sets of
institutions including government, whereas political science focuses
on processes within the government. Studies have also been
conducted in membership of political organisations, process of
decision-making in organisations, sociological reasons for support
of political parties, the role of gender in politics, etc.

8.5. Sociology and Psychology
• The two disciplines complement each other, and Social
Psychology serves as a bridge between the two
• It maintains a primary interest in the individual but concerns
itself with the way in which the individual behaves in social
groups, collectively with other individuals.
• Sociology attempts to understand behaviour as it is
organised in society, that is the way in which personality is
shaped by different aspects of society.

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