telling this information to becomes either excited or sad, they might also become excited or sad and that is when the gestures that they are using becomes significant. A strength that Mead had about his theory is his thoughts about human actions. “Humans act – they don't react. As Mead characterizes it, the distinctly human act contains four distinct elements: impulse, perception, manipulation, and consumption” (Allan 2014:160). This is a strength, because it defines what people will do when they perceive that something is going to happen to them. Humans act to protect themselves, an example of this is where a criminal will be trying to hurt another person and that person will act to get away from the criminal. In my honest opinion, I do not believe that Mead has a weakness in his theory. George Mead has contributed to the discipline of sociology, by going into more detail about what humans will do and what society needs. The last theorist that I found interesting in this course was Lewis Coser. I found him interesting, because he made some great contributions to conflict theory. One of the ideas that I found interesting was Coser's idea about relative deprivation. “Relative deprivation, however, refers to a sense of being underprivileged relative to some other person or group” (Allan 2014:261). An example of this is at a place of work, one person might be not getting the raises that others are and they feel as if they are losing out …show more content…
on something that could be good for them. A strength that Coser had about his theory is his idea about external conflict. “As a group experiences external conflict, the boundaries surrounding the group become stronger, the members of the group experience greater solidarity, power is exercised more efficiently, and the group tends to form coalitions with other groups..” (Allan 2014:264). When one group has fought with an external conflict they will tighten the reigns on who can come around their group. When they do find another group that they feel will keep them safe, they will form an alliance with them so that they can become a more powerful group. A weakness that Coser's theory has is the idea of predicting the level of violence. Someone cannot just predict if a conflict will be a small level of violence. There are times when there will be two people involved in a conflict and they will be fighting. Some people would believe that this would just be a small level of violence, but they could never predict if someone involved in the conflict said something wrong and the other person turned on them and then killed them. You can predict levels of violence most of them, but there are those times where the level you predicted goes way off the chart. The idea that Lewis Coser has contributed to the discipline of sociology is that we find conflict everywhere. Coser contributed that conflict is just a normal part of human life and we have to live with it. Sociological theory has been a wild ride.
I have learned a lot from being in this class and throughly enjoyed the learning experience. This analysis was the perfect way to show what I have learned from taking this course. Even though the class only once a week for not a large amount of time, there was still a lot of information that was gone over. Overall, the main thing that I gained from taking sociological theory is that even though there are many different theories, they all work together in one way or another to make society
work.
When I first decided to take the Introduction to Sociology class I wasn’t quite sure what to expect or even what to think. I had never taken any classes on sociology so I was quite sure that this would be an adventure. Well, as things turned out it was an adventure, this class was fun and very insightful. This class taught me a lot about what the rest of the world is like and how the American culture is different from the cultures around the world. What america accepts as the norm is different than say what Germany accepts as the norm.
Conflict theory is used to help recognize the inequality and conflict between upper, middle and working poor and each have their own materials and resources.
Sociology is a part of everyday life. People experience sociological changes when they get married, get a new job, or get discriminated against. All of these things can alter a person’s perspective on a group of people or even the world. Since the beginning of this class, I have personally endured several sociological changes in my life. I recently started a new job. I’m meeting new and wonderful people and I no longer dread having to go to work. I have also begun setting plans for my wedding to the one girl who I know will make everyday better than the one before. But, perhaps the one instance that has affected me the most and the deepest was when my parents got a divorce.
The sociological imagination enables an individual further to go beyond the limitations of both their life experiences and understandings and build a sense of objectivity in relation to social situations.
When I First signed up for this class I can honestly say I had no idea what sociology was this was just one of those classes I had to take to get into Saint Martin’s. The first day of class I wasn’t sure what to except but as Carlos introduced the class to sociology I was excited to learn some new things but I had no idea what was in store. The information in this class has opened my eyes to so many different ideas of what today’s society truly is and how we are trained not to see it. I feel like a blindfold was removed from my eyes in the duration of this class and the events of this year have been perfect modern examples of what we were learning in class. I can’t imagine going through the past couple of months without being in this class
Ultimately this assignment was beneficial to my perspective on class issues. It exposed me to multitudes of informational sources ranging from mainstream to alternative. It was also interesting to see the ways in which issues are portrayed differently, and as I mentioned other the lack of blaming the system is extremely interesting. The various sources opened my eyes to the reality of media impact and control over our lives and opinions. It is difficult to see beyond the obvious appeal of corporations such as Wal-Mart, but this should be apparent to me after all these years of sociology. I think this assignment really helped me to think outside the box, and really analyze who has control; it isn’t me or you. That’s for sure.
Sociologists take a unique approach when observing and evaluating social situations. According to C. Wright Mills (1959), we need to take a “sociological approach” to situations to better grasp the full meaning behind them. Mills states, “neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.”
At first I didn’t know what to really expect from taking an online sociology class for class. To be completely honest, I thought I would be reading a lot of boring articles and then writing about them. It turned out that I was wrong. I was able to see what sociology pertains to and how it relates to our lives. It’s funny to think that almost everything in your life is controlled by someone else. Your interests, hobbies, and even clothes aren’t really solely your decision. You may be thinking “no way I am being influenced and I make all of my decisions consciously” but in fact that is not the case.
The study of Sociology has helped me see the cultural differences even more clearly and I am confident that I can apply the acquired knowledge to achieve better result and more comfortable situations in the future. There is a lot of truth to the saying “Never assume, always ask when in doubt (unknown author/ unknown
My first class in my link was sociology, initially I wanted to take psychology, but I still wanted to learn the sociological aspect to define people’s actions. I passionately enjoyed taking sociology, because it helped me study people and understand who they are by observing their actions. I enjoyed learning from Professor Parker, sociology is a hard subject to learn, however Professor Parker had the patience to explain all his lessons slowly and carefully for his students. As well as providing extra help by continuously responding back to e-mails students have sent him over the semester with meaningful help. The hardest lesson I had in Sociology is writing a clear thesis. Professor Parker has continuously helped me develop clear thesis statements, and I believe without his help I wouldn’t have been able to write many of my essays. I do still need extra practice until I’m a professional at writing thesis statements. Howeve...
A high-level definition of sociology is the study of society and human behavior; yet, taking a deeper dive, it is the “study of groups and group interactions, societies and social interactions, from small and personal groups to very large groups” (Keirns et al., 2015, p. 6). Sociologists observe these groups by the means of the sociological perspective, which involves looking at particular behaviors and drawing conclusions from them like never before. When executed correctly one can derive a deeper grasp of behavior. Utilizing your sociological imagination you are able to theorize how one’s macro-level, the broader aspects of life such as family, and their micro-level, the individuals self, fuse to form the person they are. Applying my sociological
Sociology was a very effective course that I enjoyed, the topics we covered helped me understand different situations better. There were many things that caught my attention and made me want to know more throughout the semester such as the correlation with rich and poor throughout most of the chapters along with the power that comes with money.
Sociological methods include the same methods used in other social science disciplines, such as experimentation, observation, surveys, experiments, content analysis and focus groups. Sociological researchers use both quantitative and qualitative methods to test hypotheses. Sociology gives us both an understanding of the world we live in, and can also help us to better understand ourselves in terms of the roles we play within our society, our ideas, and human culture. We can learn immensely about ourselves through the social encounters we have all encountered. We learn where ideas come from, why and how we react in certain ways to situations, what are the advantages and disadvantages in our reactions, why and how we adapt to certain norms and not others. We learn to see ourselves as an actor whose role is influenced by the outside social world. We try to learn how to face and interpret people, not with our own emotional judgment, but with an objective, reasonable
Sociology had never caught my attention prior to choosing my A-level options. I chose to study the subject on a whim, and it wasn’t until half way through the first term had the subject sparked my interest. Learning about gender differences in AS Sociology had fascinated me as it explored the differences between males and females within the education system and the family. This is why I think Year 2 of the degree course will appeal to me the most, as it will allow me to explore the topic deeper. Since taking Sociology as an A level, I have become more analytical in my thinking whilst observing everyday life.
Theory is a system to explain the many different aspects of social interactions such as events, interactions or patterns that can be tested with intentions of creating a hypothesis. Knowledge goes hand-and-hand with theory, since theory explores the challenges of understanding in the social world that we live in today. This builds a framework used to assert knowledge. Sociological theory not only examines, build upon and refines these frameworks to make a clearer assumption better incisive, and useful in knowledge.