social perspective

essay

Kenneth Williams

Sociology: The Sociological Perspective

            If God -- our Creator -- had not given us rational minds, a capacity to reason, to know compassion, and to express love and to demonstrate love’s superlative perspective, then I submit that we humans would have nothing worth thinking about or doing that would negate the animosity we have toward one another, and we would be as the animal remaining ever primal in our being. Without the “God-Perspective,” we humans would kill each other off more quickly than ever before, for in this very modern era of our humanity and its ever-advancing science and technology, the magnificent of love still takes a backseat to our ignorance and contempt of each other. If at this time - for Auguste Comte states - we are in the stage of science, and we still have not discovered love to be the best perspective to have and to use, how then shall we ever advance above science, and if we keep advancing within science alone, with no advances in our capacity to love, what shall we be evolving into?

Sociology - the scientific and systematic study of society - is now some one-hundred and seventy-two years old. Auguste Comte (1798 " 1857) is considered to be the founding father of the scientific study of sociology; in1838 he coined the term “sociology”. Now let us jump ahead to 1963, when Peter Berger advanced the idea of the “sociological perspective,” the special

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 point of view of sociology that sees the general patterns of society in the lives of particular people, between these two historical dates and these sociological terms - which came out of that period - the ideas and theories about our social institutions, their structures and functions have undergone a great deal of academic scrutiny, scientific dissections and analysis. In fact, the sociologists of today are equipped with several major theoretical frameworks of perspective that have come out of this relatively new category of academic and scientific study - in comparison to other sciences such as physics, philosophy, astronomy, economics, and others sociology is very young.

The theoretical frameworks which sociologist use to view and analyze society in a scientific manner are (1) the structural-functional approach (2) the social-conflict approach and (3) the symbolic-interaction approach, and these approaches to investigating and assessing our society are again broken down into two major and very particular levels of viewing human interaction. The first two categories of theoretical approaches to seeing our society are consider to be at a “macro” level, that is, they view society in larger over-all patterns of it many diverse structures and the function of them such as the institutions of government, religion, economy, family, marriage and so forth; while the last approach looks more closely and specifically at our individual relationships " “micro” level - within our society. And, even this last approach to looking at patterns within society has many sub-categories more specific in their theories of how our individual human relationship patterns and behaviors manifest themselves.

Although it seems since sociology’s conception our societies have made no miraculous progress in the specific art and science of “fair play,” as a species we are still very fearful,

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selfish, and self-centered creatures; however, in comparison very profound advancement have been made in the science and art of war and weapons technology " a sort of going backward in terms of a sociological perspective. And, even today, the rich get richer and the poor keep getting poorer. Still with the advent of sociology, a better means by which we understand ourselves, the societies we live in, and how our societies categorizes and shapes our lives " locally and globally " is made manifest.

In Auguste Comte’s time the societies of Europe were changing in dramatic fashion, the old ideas and traditions of living and making a living that had framed the lives of men and women for ages were breaking down.  Auguste Comte believed that societies needed to stay unified; in fact, Comte had formulated a three stage tier of man’s advancement in knowledge of himself and the world around him. Comte believed that man had moved along in three stages (1) the theological stage based in God and the Church (2) the metaphysical stage of enlightenment (3) the scientific stage, in which society is now positioned. Comte was not alone in such new and untraditional methods of thinking, actually he was building upon the ideas of philosophers and scientist that had come before him, and who had also come to the conclusion that there was more to the lives of men and their society than just an ideology of service to God, the King, and the Church. And the industrial age was a major driving force that urged men to think with more of an eye toward society, individualism, and individual liberty.  

Through what is called positivism " knowledge and understanding based in positive facts of science as opposed to speculation, Comte believed men should examine the meaning of their existence and the pattern of their lives within society. He believed that society’s woes could be

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 readily accounted for and deciphered in the scientific continuum of positivism. Auguste Comte’s approach to sociology was based in what is become known as the structural-functional framework for analyzing society. Another sociologist, who also used the structural-functional approach as a basis for his study of society and who helped to institute sociology as a science of disciplined study in the universities of France was Emile Durkheim (1858 - 1917). Durkheim’s method of investigation not only included study but also relied upon research; the collection of facts from historical records, and also research gathered first-hand by himself about his society, in this way he believed it possible to assess, define, and formulate theories accurately about society’s structures and functions. Emile Durkheim’s research and investigation into suicide rates in France concluded that what he called the “social integration” of an individual into society played a major role in his or her personal behavior pattern, and the data he collected showed that specific categories of people who did not integrate well in society committed suicide at a greater rates than those that did. This was verifiable proof that society does greatly shape our thinking and consequently our behavior.

Herbert Spencer (1820 " 1903), who is noted as the man that founded the phrase “survival of the fittest,” is another famous structural-functional sociologist. Spencer advanced the theory that our societies were structured and functioned as does the human body, individual parts performing individual task and making the whole a unified and stable platform. Sounds like St. Paul’s analogy in the New Testament book of first Corinthians when he speaks about the body of the believer in Jesus Christ. Also among this line of structural-functional sociologist was Robert K. Merton (1910 " 2003) who added that within the structure and function of our society there are manifest, latent, and dysfunctional qualities. The manifest

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 functions are recognized and intended, while the latent functions and the dysfunctional qualities of our social structures are sometimes unrecognized and unintended, appearing afterward in various antisocial behaviors and social patterns.

In the social-conflict theoretical framework of approach to sociology " another macro level view of society - marginality and social crisis form the basis for building theory about our society’s growth; here gender conflict, racial conflict, class struggle, which is probably the oldest of all social inequalities that cause conflict, mark and set the guiding standards for assessment, but it is within conflict and the changes caused by conflict that these sociologist see the social-conflict theory as the major means by which our society form in their structure and function, and how our societies moves toward change, either for better or for worst. Karl Marx was instrumental in developing the social-conflict approach. And he saw it as a means not just to view society, but as the means to change it. W.E.B. Du Bois, and Jane Addams (1931 Nobel Peace Prize winner) were both sociologists that view society in its social-conflict state.  W.E. B. Du Bois was African-American, and a Harvard University graduate at a time in our American society when most blacks barely obtained high school diplomas, Du Bois was also a co-founder of the NAACP. Another social-conflict theorist, C. Wright Mills, who is credited with the term “social imagination”, saw that people who used a sociological perspective fared better in times of social crisis, and he believed that it was the “social imagination” that turn social crisis into the means by which people bring change to bear upon public policies.

Within sociology’s symbolic-interaction theoretical approach " a framework of theories that are built upon the product of everyday human interaction between individuals " we find

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 the names of other famous and influential men of sociology such as Max Weber (1864 " 1920) who at one time study under Karl Marx, but Weber parted with the social-conflict theorist, and moved to advance his own theories centered around symbolic-interaction as being the major influence in society’s workings and the human pattern of behavior stemming out of it. Weber thought it was the prevalent protestant work ethic and the reigns of capitalism that shape the society of Europe, and therefore human patterns and behavior more so than social-conflict. Max Weber wrote the very first sociology-religion academic textbook. Symbolic-interaction proponents include George Herbert Mead (1863 " 1931) who proposed that personality developed out of social experiences. Erving Goffman (1922 " 1982) from the symbolic-interaction perspective saw that people performed as actors on a stage in their individual relationship patterns " I believe he is quite right. And my favorite theory which seems even closer to coming to truth about us humans is from the symbolic-interaction sociologist point of view, that being of George Homans and Peter Blau - that we all act and pattern ourselves according to what will work best for us, so that we get what is best out of the deals we make with one another - within the categories we find ourselves, in other words, “ fair exchange ain’t robbery” to quote an old proverb, and that proverbial truth works even within the “global” sociological perspective.

A personal social pattern that seems to have developed in our human society, at least in America, I do not know about globally, that is a pet-peeve of mine and infuriates me at times. One which I believe should fit into the category of the symbolic-interaction model and/or the social-conflict model of framework. And, unfortunately, has to do with you ladies’ purses. No! I am not gay, besides, that is a psychological disorder … oops, sorry, and I should not have said

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 that right? Well, anyway, this is the what, how and why of the issue. We all steal that is manifest and/or latent dysfunction common to every human-being in every society it comes out usually right after we learn how to crawl. Now a woman can enter any department store anywhere in America with the biggest, most humongous, purse that will straddle her bony shoulder. But if you are a man you can hardly breach the entrance without being accosted and told to leave your little, brown, paper lunch bag at the customer service counter. Now just how did such an inequality of gender specific, socially structured, latent and/or dysfunctional societal behavior get started and to this day, still remain most stores policy. They never ask women to leave those gigantic bags at the service counter. Why women are credited with so much more department store honesty than we men their social counterpart? There is something deeper than any social perspective can decipher in that, and I do not think all the social imagination in the world will ever change that policy.