What
is sociology?
Every
human being sometimes or the other has some questions like: How were the things
when their parents or grandparents were young? Why is that the teachers do not
give out the real story about something that has happened in the school? Why
some friends think and/or act differently? Why there are few families that are
rich, few that are poor; why few people commit crime while other people don't
and why few students are popular whereas few are not? If someone really has
questions like this in their mind, then sociology is the right subject for
those people as this is a branch of studies which deals with questions like
this that comes in everybody's mind.
If
we define "sociology", we can say that it is the methodical study of
human society. When we talk about human society, it is actually a very big
topic. Sociologists study every aspect of a society from dyads, organisations,
culture, groups as well as networks, communities, society and also
international relations. If you see it otherwise, one could say that sociology
is about studying almost anything and everything (Macionis and Plummer, 2005). Sociology
is not about studying a particular topic but it is about how one thinks about a
topic and how he studies it. It is the study of individual social relationships
and organisations. The subject matter of sociology has a vast range which
ranges from religion to crime, and from the family to state as well as from the
different section of race along with social sturdiness to a complete change in
the entire society.
Sociology
is one of a very exciting as well as a field of study that illuminates one's
mind along with analysing some of the most important problems in our lives,
communities as well as world (Gibbs, Jack P. & Erickson, Maynard L., 1975).
At the personal level, sociology looks into the public causes and repercussions
of such things as love, identity at racial and gender level, family issues,
deviant nature, ageing, and spiritual trust. At the social level, sociology
investigates and describes matters like criminal activity and law, hardship and
prosperity, tendency and discrimination, educational institutions and
education, business companies, community in the urban area, and social motions.
At the international level, such phenomena are studied under sociology like inhabitants'
development and migration, war and serenity, and financial development (Macionis
and Plummer, 2005).
Sociologists
highlight the careful collection and research of proof about public interaction
to develop and enhance our understanding of key public processes. The research
techniques sociologists use, are different. Sociologists observe the lifestyle
of different groups, perform large-scale surveys, understand traditional
documents, evaluate census data, study video-taped communications, interview
members of groups, and perform lab tests. The research techniques and concepts
of sociology generates powerful ideas into the public processes forming human
lives and public problems and prospects in the contemporary world. By better
knowing those social procedures, we also come to comprehend more clearly the
causes forming the individual experiences and results of our own lifestyles.
The capability to see and comprehend this relationship between wide social
forces and individual experiences, called the sociological imagination by C.
Wright Mills, is a very useful educational planning for living effective and
fulfilling personal as well as professional lifestyles in a modifying and
complicated society (Gibbs, Jack P. & Erickson, Maynard L., 1975).
Those
students who have been well qualified in sociology know how to think seriously
about the social life of a human being, and how to ask those questions which
are important. They know the way of designing good projects for social research,
properly gather and assess scientific information, and plan as well as present
the findings of their research. Students who are qualified in sociology also
know how to help others in understanding how the social world performs and how
it might be modified for the better (Brent, John J., 2012). Most usually, they
have discovered how to think, assess, and connect clearly, successfully, and creatively.
These are all capabilities of remarkable value in an extensive range of
professional callings and careers.
Sociology
offers a unique and informative way of seeing and knowing the social world in
which we live and which forms our lifestyles. Sociology looks beyond normal,
taken-for-granted opinions of reality, to provide further, more lighting and
complicated knowing of social interaction. Through its particular systematic
viewpoint, social concepts, and research methods, sociology is a
self-discipline that increases our attention and research of the individual social
connections, culture of the societies, and organizations that significantly
shape both our lifestyles as well as our history (Zevallos, Zuleyka, 2013).
Sociologists
create ideas and concepts in order to help expose the structure of social
interaction and they take part in numerous different forms of scientific
research to test and create these ideas. They are enthusiastic about how people
connect and create significance and understanding, but they are also
enthusiastic about questions of power and inequality. They use a variety of
sources such as traditional records, findings, study research to help create
straight answers about how community functions. Sociology is a topic that
attracts those who are ready to go beyond sound judgment details and also
challenge their presumptions. It requests of us to look at the acquainted with
clean sight, to question approved understanding of the world and to seriously
assess commonly organised concepts that might otherwise go unquestioned (Crossman,
Ashley).
How
does sociology help us to understand 'sex and gender' as important social
phenomenon?
Sex
and gender both perform a very important part in how community interprets an
individual and how others will usually respond to a person’s actions, as well
as how they present themselves to the words. As sex and gender are both
different, it is possible to distinguish between which social inequalities and
objectives occur from each. A person’s sex is recognized biologically; whether
an individual is from a physical standpoint recognized as being female or male (The
sociology of Gender, 2008). This is compared or accompanied by a person’s
gender; whether an individual recognizes themselves as being sociologically
female or male, dealing with the culturally incorporated factors of either of
the gender, regardless of their sex. This type of recognition of gender is
usually made by recognizing by the upbringing of a person and activities.
Within community there are various inequalities among men and women for both
sex as well as gender roles. As a person’s gender can at times conflict with
their sex, greater part of the society does not agree to the actions of people and
often even further inequality can occur as a consequence of this social
judgment (Brent, John J., 2012).
Gender
is described as ‘the evaluation of someone’s ‘sex’ which is drawn upon by social
actions rather than scientific or even physical ones. The social communications
and experiences that will form a person’s gender identification and
consequently how society will consider them, take place from the time a person
is born. A child’s first social experience is with that of their parents; who eagerly
wait to welcome him or her into the world with love and passion, usually vowing
to not treat them with any kind of bias without thinking about their sex so
that their child can turn into his or her own individual person. However, as
mother and father wait for the information of which sex their baby is, in the
same way the wait for the indication as to how to behave towards their baby. As
soon as a child has been recognized biologically as being a woman or man, they
will come in contact with various social components in an attempt to shape them
towards their specific genders (The sociology of Gender, 2008). Kids will also
look towards their same-sex mother or father for assistance as to how they
should act; emulating their mother and father and taking in their social
actions as his or her own. This sex recognition procedure has no specific
finishing point, but rather will proceed right through a person’s life. As
people’s sex identification is designed, various positions and objectives will
be thrown upon them by community, which can include inequality and some way of
elegance. While no published rules binds them to it, it is usually predicted
that men will do the work of providing for their loved ones through work or any
other means and that females will execute family tasks such as food
preparation, washing and doing the laundry. A person’s sex identification is
not set within their biology, but rather is reliant on social as well as
cultural aspects that have are throughout the history. According to Davies
(1989) and MacNaughton (2000), the specific role of both the genders should be
distributed across both sexes; with men able to take on positions and actions
that are sociologically approved to be feminine, such as looking after their
children, caring, shaving, dance and growing of long ‘head hair’; and some
women able to take on positions and actions that are sociologically approved to
be that of a man, such as development or technological innovation work and
professional game. As a gender role start to go over to the other sex, community
starts to throw verdict and discrimination upon those who accept gender positions
generally associated with those of the other sex (Gibbs, Jack P. &
Erickson, Maynard L., 1975). This indicates that sex positions are imbedded
sociologically into their specific genders. Due to these almost entirely sex
based gender positions, those discovering themselves connecting with gender
roles generally pertaining to their opposite sex might discover themselves
confused; often desperate for a stability between their own character and
person the society desires them to be.
Gender
signifies whether a person is naturally recognized as being female or male,
whereas sex is a more very subjective phrase that can be implemented to both the
sexes; the organization with particular positions that have been sociologically
recognized as being either ‘masculine or feminine’ that both men as well as
women is capable of doing (Crossman, Ashley). It is also possible for a man or woman
to recognize with both genders. Being associated with a particular sex or gender
brings along with it social verdict, inequality as well as stereotyping,
impacting all associates of all events. As sex and gender both are different,
it is possible to see the inequalities arising from both, and affiliate with
stigmas and unjust objectives and presumptions are created from each.
What
is state power and how might it be important in the sociological study of one
of: aboriginality, health, religion, deviance, media, popular culture or the
networked society?
A
main issue of sociology is that of power - how people and categories protected
their objectives through connections with others. Connections of power can be
structured around a wide range of organizations, state power seem to be of major
importance (Gibbs, Jack P. & Erickson, Maynard L., 1975). The state power
is the right to implement instructions with the support of the law. It has
become progressively persistent through many different places of public
interaction and is also known as political power.
The
term “deviance” is used by sociologists to make reference to behavior which
changes, in some way, from a social standard. In this regard, it is clear that
the idea of deviance represents a breach of social standards and represents
concept splitting behavior. Deviance represents those activities which go
against the standards, principles as well as beliefs of common lifestyle. Each society
describes what is deviant and what is not, and explanations of deviance vary
commonly between cultures. For example, some cultures have much more strict
guidelines regarding gender positions than there is in the US, and still other
societies’ guidelines regulating gender positions are less strict than the
Americans (Macionis and Plummer, 2005).
In
America, females who cry publicly in reaction to psychological circumstances
are not usually regarded deviant including the females who cry regularly and
quickly. This perspective of females has stayed relatively continuous. Half a
century ago, however, society's understanding of men who cry has been modified.
A man who cried openly in the nineteen fifties would have been regarded
deviant. Nowadays, men who cry in reaction to excessive psychological
circumstances are considered within the society’s standards. Politicians who
are men cry when they announce about their defeat, male sportsmen cry after winning
a tournament, and male stars cry after winning a prize. By today’s
requirements, none of these men is choosing a deviant act (Brent, John J.,
2012).
One
opportunity to discover the legitimation of deviance is to analyze how it is
mentioned, created, and served upon. Discussion, that is, represents the way
people think and discuss different factors. With a focus on language, the
problem of discourse comes from the structuralism custom. For Foucault,
however, language and discourse is not restricted to the published or verbal
term (Foucault, 1972). Rather, it represents languages, actions, and methods.
Foucault’s purpose is to look below term option and methods to analyze why they
are employed and what is the significance that they offer. Given that discourse
places the factors for what is possible and difficult, analyzing power,
significance, and language becomes more powerful than at the first appearance.
At this
point, one cannot help but to activate the writings of Harvey (2006) as he
claims that the primary operation of the condition is to make profitable
circumstances for the industry. In characterizing the neo-liberal condition, he
states that the essential objective of the neo-liberal condition is to make a
‘good company climate’ for public well-being. The neo-liberal state looks to
further the cause of and to accomplish and activate all company's interests (Macionis
and Plummer, 2005). Here, the primary capability of the condition can be found
within its reliable discussion, monopoly of power, coercive impacts over
regulation, and capability to offer clean investment for the industry. Each
meaning used for deviance by prominent components has effects for the public’s
response. For example, deviance described by the economic system and not the state
is an unexpected action that provides something to be served against and
managed. However, actions that are described by the economic system and the state
become appropriate actions and entertainment that can be used (Zevallos,
Zuleyka, 2013).
It seems
that the legitimation methods of the state offer the means required to
vindicate once questionable illegal actions. Here, state supported
organizations may have an aspect in guaranteeing the success and approval of
deviance in two methods. First, they offered the ways that moved the
development of illegal actions from being wrong to lawful and therefore
culturally palatable. Secondly, they responded to the marketplaces contact to
set up circumstances enabling for the development and commercialization of
deviance. It is obvious that the requirements of the industry and the
discussion of the state (together) were efficient in changing the development
of deviance from being ‘criminal’ to being genuine (Gibbs, Jack P. &
Erickson, Maynard L., 1975).
The
sociological viewpoint of deviance gives a consideration of some description to
deviance and gives their perspective. However, it differs based on the various
techniques. For an act to be believed to as deviance it differs from position
to position and every now and then. Sociologists evaluate government and state
guidelines with regards to their impact on people and larger social systems
(Gibbs, Jack
P. & Erickson, Maynard L., 1975). Power is a business or individual’s
ability to control or immediate others, while energy is effect that is
predicated on identified credibility. Max Weber examined power, identifying
between the two concepts and creating a system for determining the different
types of power.
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