What is sociology?
It may be that you have an idea that sociology is 'about' people.
Sociology is one of the human sciences and as such it is a subject to be distinguished from the so-called "physical sciences". Sociology is the study of humanity.
To say that sociology is about people and humanity is not enough to distinguish it from the other subjects in the human sciences. Psychology, Social Policy, Economics and Social History, amongst others, are all in some sense about people and humanity.
We might also suggest that sociology is "about" society.
But again all of the aforementioned human sciences are not only about people and humanity but about society too.
Sociology is also concerned with human culture. A provisional definition of culture used by sociologists is that of " a way of life".
We can define sociology as the subject that deals with and explains social interaction. Here sociology is characterized by the fact that it examines the informal and formal social relationships engaged in by individuals.
However the inclusion of social interaction does not establish sociology's distinctiveness when it is considered alongside, for example psychology. Psychology, just like sociology, also involves the study of human interaction.
There may be a way of differentiating sociology. We could suggest that whereas Psychology studies human interaction of individuals; sociology studies the interaction that occurs within and between social groups.
In this sense sociology would be described as a subject that places individuals in their social context as members of social groups, communities and as members of social institutions such as work or their place within a family or again their position within an educational institution.
Psychology on the other hand appears to examine individuals as solitary and somewhat isolated beings.
Indeed one might formalize the differences of approach by suggesting that psychology takes as its starting point the individual whereas sociology begins with the idea of the wider social networks and societies within which individuals are to be found.
This idea falls in nicely with the widespread perception of sociology as being a subject which takes "the wider context" or "the wider picture" into account and seeks to place individuals into that wider social context.
We have begun to distinguish sociology as a social science; furthermore we have already amassed a number of key terms associated with sociology.
So far we have a number of components of a definition:
Human/Humanity
Individuals
Interaction
People
Social Groups
Society.
We have also noted a number of key ideas within sociology:
Culture
Community
Education
Family
Social Institution
Social Network
Work
But our definition is still inadequate and for at least two reasons: Social Psychology, a specialism within Psychology, does study social groups. Furthermore a social science such as Political Science does seek to contextualise the (largely political) relationships of human interaction.
We might alternatively propose that sociology is the study of the external relations which individuals engage in. That is the relationship with other people as well the relationships individuals have with social institutions.
Whereas Psychology examines the internal workings of the individual in terms of their mental processes.
But again there are aspects of psychology which examine external relations whilst there are aspects of sociology which examine the "internal" workings of individuals' minds.
Psychology and Sociology experience significant and sufficient overlaps so as to conclude that they are so close that we cannot finally distinguish them in any complete sense.
For it seems to me that sociology is to be defined as the "study of social order".
Sociology is a subject made up of competing theories on society. All the differing theories within sociology are best described as basically involved in the project of describing and explaining "social order".
In other words sociology has always sought to understand how the components of society, the social relationships and the social institutions, contribute to, or deflect from the continued existence of "society".
This is not to suggest that sociology is not concerned with social conflict and social change too. However these concerns are essentially one's which derive from, and supplement, the major objective of understanding social order.
When & How did Sociology begin?
Firstly it can be argued that sociology is a development of, as well as a reaction to, two significant events which occurred in 18th century Europe:
The first was "The Enlightenment". "The Enlightenment" was a revolution in ideas, which started in the European cities of Edinburgh in Scotland and Paris in France. Philosophers and social theorists of the period were seeking to overthrow the dogma of the Church and in particular of the clerics and to devise an alternative view of humanity based upon rational thinking and empirically based sciences.
The term "sociology" is not coined until after the second great event of the 18th century; the French Revolution, which shook not just France and the rest of Europe to its foundations, but North America too.
The term "sociology" is coined by a man named Auguste De Comte.
Along with his countryman Henri Saint-Simon they set about devising a "science of society". A "science" in the manner set down by the scientists and philosophers of the Enlightenment, like Immanuel Kant.
Sociology became institutionalized as a professional discipline that we know today by the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. And this is an extremely uneven and gradual process. It begins in France largely through the efforts of one of the so-called "founding fathers" of sociology Emile Durkheim.
