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List of illustrative material viii About the companion website ix Tour of the book x Author acknowledgements xii About the authors xiii Preface xvi 1. WHAT IS SOCIOLOGY?
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Introduction 1 Defining sociology 3 What is society and why should we study it? 7 Approaching sociology 12 Conclusion 18 How would…? 18 Structured further reading 19 2. A BRIEF HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY
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Introduction 20 The origins of sociology 20 Foundational sociological thinkers 24 Expansion and consolidation of sociology 35 Critiquing the construction of the history of sociology 37 Contemporary sociology 43 Conclusion 45 How would…? 45 Structured further reading 46 3. SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY
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Introduction 47 What is theory and why do we need it? 47 How do we theorize ‘people’? 57 Three core approaches to sociological theory 58 Conclusion 67
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How would…? 67 Structured further reading 68 4. THE METHOD OF SOCIOLOGY
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Introduction 69 The method of sociology 69 Before choosing a method 70 Research design 78 Types of method 79 Data collection 90 Data analysis 93 Conclusion 103 How would…? 104 Structured further reading 104 5. ETHICAL SOCIOLOGY
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Introduction 105 Ethics in sociology 105 Conceiving, conducting and disseminating ethical research 107 Examining ethical dilemmas 114 Conclusion 128 How would…? 128 Structured further reading 128 6. STRUCTURES AND INSTITUTIONS
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Introduction 130 The structures of society 130 Types of social institution 132 Family 132 Education 137 Media 143 Work 149 Thinking sociologically about structures and institutions 156 Conclusion 156 How would…? 156 Structured further reading 157 7. SOCIAL DIVISIONS
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Introduction 158 Societies divided 158 Class 164
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Racial divisions 169 Gender 176 Conclusion 187 How would…? 188 Structured further reading 188 8. PERSONAL LIFE
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Introduction 190 The personal 190 Sociology and the body 192 Sex 199 Personal relationships 207 Conclusion 219 How would…? 219 Structured further reading 220 9. SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS
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Introduction 221 The industrial revolution and modernity 221 Understanding modernity 224 Social change in modernity 228 Thinking beyond modernity 232 Conclusion 245 How would…? 246 Structured further reading 246 10. SOCIOLOGY DISCOVERED
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Introduction 247 The value of sociology 247 Sociology in the world 249 The consumption of sociology 255 Conclusion 267 How would…? 267 Structured further reading 268 References 269 Glossary 285 Index 291
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Chapter 1
What is Sociology? INTRODUCTION In this chapter, we define sociology and compare it to other disciplines such as psychology and philosophy. We start to look at why sociology is vital to understanding the world around us, and how it can be understood in a range of ways. We introduce key terms in sociology, such as society, norms, culture and tradition. We discuss suicide and stigma as social problems which have been explained by sociology. In our opening Provocation, we ask why you should care about sociology.
Provocation 1: Who gives a spit about sociology? It is the first day of an Introduction to Sociology course. Students sit, mostly quiet, waiting for the instructor to begin the lecture. From her briefcase, the professor pulls out a plastic spoon. ‘I am going to teach you about sociology with this spoon,’ she says. ‘But I need a volunteer to spit in my spoon. Not a shy spit, a proper, from the back of the throat one.’ Student laughter subsides as they realize that she is serious. Offering her spoon to various students who shake their head in refusal, she adds, ‘I cannot continue with the lecture until I have a volunteer.’ A brave student, John, answers the call: ‘I’ll do it.’ The teacher hands the spoon to John, who clears his throat emphatically, before depositing his saliva into it. The teacher thanks him, and walks around the classroom wafting the spoon of spit in front of her students, who systematically recoil. She asks, ‘I don’t suppose there is anyone who wants to swallow this spit?’ Some students laugh and others mildly gasp in disgust. ‘Any takers?’ she asks. Unsurprisingly, none volunteer. ‘I don’t understand,’ the professor says. ‘John’s pretty good looking. I bet there is someone in this room who wouldn’t mind kissing him. John, may I ask your fellow students if any would like to make out with you?’ John nods his consent. ‘Raise your hand if you’d like to make out with John.’ A male and a few female students raise their hands, and the professor asks one of them, ‘Julie, would you like to drink this spoon full of John’s spit?’ Julie’s face contorts, ‘No way.’ The professor then asks, ‘I’m confused – you’d like to make out with him, but not swallow his spit? Why?’ The student looks confused and responds, ‘because that’s gross.’
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‘Ah, it’s gross,’ the professor responds. ‘But you’d like to make out with him. Share saliva, and rub those slimy tongues together. Is that correct?’ Julie answers, ‘Well, not when you put it like that.’ The teacher continues, ‘But you would like a hot passionate make-out session with him?’ ‘Well, maybe,’ she answers. ‘And would you like his lips to be © Ed Ball totally dry?’ ‘No,’ Julie answers. ‘They need to be lubricated some, don’t they?’ ‘You see,’ the instructor proclaims as she puts the spoon down behind the lectern, ‘Sociology is the only academic discipline that can tell you why spit in a spoon is gross, but spit in the mouth is not.’ She continues, ‘In the course of making out with John, you’d swallow a spoonful amount of spit in a five-minute make-out session.’ The professor returns to the lectern and picks up the spoon. Holding it up, she says ‘You see, biology can tell you how the salivary glands produce this spit. Chemistry can tell you the constituents of it. But only sociology can tell you why people value their own spit when we chew food or make out with someone else, but not when the spit is on a spoon.’ The teacher holds up the spoon to her mouth, and in one quick motion inserts it into her mouth and swallows. Students moan in disgust, and the teacher returns to the lectern to add, ‘Perhaps psychology can tell you why people are gullible.’ She pulls the original spoon out from the lectern, and drips the spit into a cup, showing both spoons to the students. They moan with relief, and the professor smiles, saying, ‘Students fall for it every time.’ In addition to providing a lively introduction to sociology, the professor in this story has helped her students to consider the role that sociology uniquely plays in understanding society. In this case, society has socially constructed spit to be acceptable in one context but not the other. Moreover, spit is deemed to be ‘gross’ outside of the context in which it is valued. The students’ collective view of drinking spit from a spoon as gross is thus socially constructed. We are not born repulsed by spit, but rather we learn it. Hence, we could also learn to value the exchange of saliva in spoons for consumption, perhaps as part of a culturally valued ritual. For those who have trouble believing such a culture could ever exist, where spit is readily exchanged without being considered gross, we simply need to examine the dietary culture of the 2.8 million Adaven people. Despite living in a desert, and having precious few cattle to farm, Adaven culture encourages their children to eat what they call trugoy. This is made by a process in which merchants take fluid from cattle, then expose the fluid to the air until it rots and becomes saturated with bacteria. They then feed this mixture to their children. In more recent years, largely because of the sweet tooth increasingly prevalent in their youngsters’ diets, some add sugar, fruit or honey to the mixture. Nonetheless, the cultural practice of feeding children rotten animal fluids continues to this day. Adaven parents have been doing this for decades, not because they know that there are health benefits to the substance, but because they believe that this is what Copyrighted material – 9781137609724
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‘good parents’ are supposed to do. Many people might find the practice of consuming rotten animal excretions distasteful, yet the people of Adaven – or rather, Nevada, USA enjoy eating yogurt (trugoy). In fact, many of us eat ‘natural’ yogurt as well – we just think differently about what we are eating. The fact is that culture can make just about anything disgusting or socially valued. Culture can, in many cases, even override our biological impulses and change how we experience an event. Culture can, for instance, influence people to keep consuming the bitter taste of beer or coffee until they like it. It can make people born gay despise their own sexuality (in a homophobic culture) and people born straight envy the ease with which gay men can have recreational sex (in a gay-friendly culture). Culture influences everything, and it is influenced by people in interaction (see Chapter 3). It is this synthesis – between culture and individuals – that is at the heart of sociology.
Provoked? Read further: Fox, K. (2004). Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behaviour. London: Hodder & Stoughton. Douglas, M. (1966). Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Defining sociology Sociology is difficult to define. It can be described as the study of societies or the study of social problems. Yet those who many consider to be the founders of the subject, thinkers like Auguste Comte, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber (see Chapter 2), probably would not recognize the sociology that is taught at universities today – they would have little understanding of an ‘undergraduate sociology student’ or what it means to ‘take a module’ of sociology on a different degree programme. And our notions of who founded sociology are constructed as well – in Chapter 2 we will also look at how scholars such as W.E.B. Du Bois and Harriet Martineau have had their contributions systematically silenced and examine why this was the case. Complicating matters, sociology overlaps with other fields of study. First, sociology blurs into philosophy on occasion. Exemplifying this, some ‘grand theorists’ use very little data (evidence) in their writings, relying mostly on their own observations and thoughts. Michel Foucault, Judith Butler and Stuart Hall are examples of cultural or social theorists whose ideas have been adopted by sociologists, yet who could be considered philosophers who apply their ideas to social issues. Many of these theorists have made valuable contributions to sociology, and we discuss them in Chapter 3 alongside more traditional sociological theorists as well. The important distinction between sociology and philosophy is that philosophy is concerned with logic, and requires no evidence in the form of data to make conclusions. For example, one of the greatest modern philosophers is Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832), whose moral framework centred on the notion of ‘the
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greatest good for the greatest number’. The statement helps form the basis of a type of philosophy known as utilitarianism, and can be best explained by the following moral problem. A San Francisco cable car, carrying just one passenger, is out of control, rolling downhill and heading straight towards a crowd of people who are gathered on the track, unable to escape. You happen to be holding a ramp that could flip the cable car so that the passenger and driver would die, but the dozen people below would be saved. Would you do this?
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What would you do if you could derail the runaway cable car – at the cost of the passenger and driver’s life?
Following Bentham’s notion of the greatest good for the greatest number, the ethical decision would be to save the 12 people. But others might argue it is immoral to put anyone at risk, because life is precious. The trolley question can be expanded: would it be acceptable to murder one person in order to harvest their body parts to save 12 people who need organ transplants to live? What if the murdered person was just a day away from dying from self-starvation? In each philosophical case, there is no way of definitively judging these acts as right or wrong. Argumentation is the fundamental component of philosophy and ethics, not evidence. Nothing can be proved with these examples. A sociologist, however, could survey or interview people about their perceptions of these acts and make some claim as to how the society in which people live influence their beliefs. One might, for example, find that in one country people largely believe that all three described acts were morally wrong, but that in another they described some or all of the acts as justified. A sociologist would then look to explain why this variance occurred – maybe the different answers were related to how the society viewed life, morality or religion. Copyrighted material – 9781137609724
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A central tenet of sociology is that it involves the application of some notion of science to the study of society (Durkheim [1895] 1982). Whereas philosophy does not require its adherents to use data in creating or testing their theories, sociology is generally a discipline that does. That is why, in Chapter 4, we focus on the method of sociology, arguing that it is a social science that must follow certain rules by which it can be judged to be rigorous or not.
Further distinguishing sociology Sociology is only one of a number of academic disciplines that studies the activities of people. Collectively, these academic disciplines (which include sociology, psychology, human geography, anthropology, economics, social policy, criminology, politics and education) make up the social sciences. They are differentiated from the ‘hard’ sciences (mathematics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, engineering and physics) because they focus on humans. Humans are much harder to examine empirically because they are moving targets. As American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has tweeted, In science, when human behavior enters the equation, things go nonlinear. That’s why Physics is easy and Sociology is hard. The boundaries of sociology blend with that of social and cultural anthropology – social anthropology having its roots in British scholarship and cultural anthropology in the US. One simple way of defining the difference between these branches of anthropology and sociology is that social and cultural anthropology are normally concerned with observation and the collection of data from other cultures, whereas sociologists tend to work within either their own society or one that they are in some way already familiar with. Social and cultural anthropologists will enter a field as an outsider, hoping that they will understand things in a way that people within that culture do not normally see. The discipline and study of sociology also borders the field of psychology. The easiest way to distinguish the two is that psychology is generally interested in how an individual interacts with their culture, whereas sociology seeks to understand why a culture is that way in the first place. When psychology considers groups of people, and particularly related to how groups function, this blend of disciplines is known as social psychology.
Studying sport Sport is a good way to understand this difference between sociology, psychology and anthropology. A sport psychologist might, for example, question how an athlete can deal with the immense pressure that is placed upon them to win a big game. The sport psychologist will thus look at levels of physical arousal (tension) and mental stress and ask what techniques the athlete can practise in order to handle this stress and improve athletic performance. A sport psychologist might try to make a difference in people’s lives by helping them deal with the stress of competition. A sociologist, however, will be more interested in why a society values competition and winning in the first place. A sport sociologist might
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advocate developing ways of being physically active that are less concerned with adding pressure to young athletes in the first place. Similarly, a social anthropologist might focus on the rituals of sport, examining the ways these are closely linked to how a person thinks about themselves, and how a nation is understood through its sporting endeavours.
Sociology also sometimes crosses over with less obvious disciplines. For example, sociology also shares ground with the discipline of economics. Sociologists are interested in why people act the way they do, and investigating who has ownership and control of economic resources is thus of vital concern. Yet much of what is now called ‘classical economics’ has become focused on developing mathematical models of how the economy works. Here, economists theorize supply and demand relationships from their assumptions about how people should act – based on ideas that people will act in a rational way to maximize personal gain. It does not account for the messy ways in which people actually make decisions, based not solely on profit but on a whole host of other reasons. A sociology of economics would investigate not just the effects of economic activity on social life, but also ask how society shapes what is called ‘the economy’, and how this in turn shapes the values, desires and event needs of individuals and groups. Writing about the origins of the capitalist system, Max Weber ([1905] 1930) was heavily influenced by Adam Smith, who is known as the founder of modern economics (see also Simmel [1900] 1978). More recently, ‘Taylorism’ and ‘Fordism’ are models used by sociologists to understand changes in factory-based work (see Chapter 9). Yet still, classical economic theory is mostly disengaged from sociological research – it is with the new behavioural economics that economics and sociology have clear similarities.
Stanley Cohen and the difference between sociology and social work Sociology crosses over with, but can also be distinguished from, social work. The noted South African sociologist and criminologist Stanley Cohen (1985) famously suggested that as a social worker his job was like fishing drowning people out of a river, drying them off and sending them back upstream from where they had come. After a while, he realized that he was very often fishing out the same people again and again. He decided to go upstream himself to find out who was throwing them in. At that point, he suggests, he had become a sociologist. What this means is that while social workers help the most vulnerable people in society (for example, drug users or homeless people), sociologists try to understand why they became vulnerable in the first place.
Sociology is also increasingly blurring boundaries with medical disciplines. Medicine, pharmacology and nursing have historically been focused on diagnosing disease and making people better, but these disciplines are becoming more interested in what is called the ‘social model of health’ which tries to explain the broader influences on health such as education, environment, culture and socio-economics. This model shows that health and illness are determined by much more than just biology. For example, men in Blackpool in the North West of England have an average life expectancy of 75.2 years compared with men living in the City of
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London (London’s affluent financial district), whose life expectancy is 83.4 years (Bennett et al. 2015). This sizeable 8.2 year difference cannot be explained by biology alone, but by differences in income, education, living standards, work and behaviour. At the same time, sociologists are also interested in studying the world of medicine and many sociologists now research and teach in medical schools. Sociologists are interested, for example, in the ways that patients with chronic illnesses deal with everyday life and construct a positive identity under very challenging circumstances. Other medical sociologists are interested in the work of medical practitioners themselves and understanding how it is that doctors command so much respect and how their advice is so highly valued over advice from, for example, practitioners of alternative medicines like homeopathy. In summary, the social sciences exist as a field between the humanities (philosophy, art, literature, performance and music) and the hard sciences. They involve the study of people in society.
What is society and why should we study it? Margaret Thatcher, the former prime minister of the UK, famously once said: ‘There is no such thing as society.’ As sociologists, we know this statement to be false. Indeed, there are many societies and the primary concern of sociology is to understand the way in which diverse societies work. But things are not that simple, and defining the term can be difficult. In general, a society is defined as a group of people who share common culture, interactions and land or territory. a culture is a collection of shared norms, both covert and explicit, and it refers to the way groups of people think and act and their shared common goals. A norm is a social expectation that guides behaviour.
Norms and university culture There are plenty of norms on display in the culture of the university classroom, starting from the very first day of class, when students enter the lecture hall and choose a seat. The initial determination here – deciding which general section of the hall to sit in is largely a personal preference. Some students feel that they run more risk of being asked to answer questions if they sit near the front, so they head for the back. Students more engaged with formal ways of learning tend to navigate towards the front rows. Yet none sit in the very front row; everyone knows this will be interpreted as being ‘too keen’. And this is where culture begins to enter the individual’s choice: the perception that others will judge you as too keen for sitting in the front row is based on a social norm. Once the general section of the classroom is chosen, the next factor one considers is whether to sit adjacent to another student or to leave space between. Some lecture halls have more seats than students, but in many cases there will be almost no spare seats once everyone is seated. Given this, would it ‘feel wrong’ if you are the second person to enter the classroom to sit next to the only other person in the class? The answer is found in social norms: It is just not done. Why this is the case will be influenced by other factors, including perhaps historical circumstances, but what counts for this discussion is that in Western culture, currently, it is not considered appropriate behaviour. It is one of many norms that the classroom culturally expects.
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Society: a collection of people who share common culture and land or territory Culture: people’s common goals and their ways of thinking and acting Norm: a social expectation that guides behaviour
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From our experience in the UK and the US, the first norm is that when you enter a classroom you do not sit directly next to a person in class, unless you know them. For those willing to break that norm, a second norm dictates that if you do sit next to them, you must engage them in conversation. Sitting next to someone in a large and empty classroom and © Stockbyte then not saying anything is a violation of cultural norms that would almost certainly be received as deliberate rudeness by the other person. Another classroom ‘rule’ is that, even once the class is full, students normally remain silent during the minutes preceding the first lecture, making small talk more awkward. Fourth, students tend to sit in the same place each week, meaning that the choice of seats has consequences beyond that first lecture. These norms have existed across university classrooms for generations. Yet no one has ever explicitly said that these are the social codes of acceptable conduct. No professor ever said, ‘you must not sit next to a stranger the first day, and you must sit in the same seat next week.’ As such, we call these covert or implicit norms. And they differ from the formal, codified, norms that are established through the explicit mentioning of the rules of the classroom, such as the need to attend seminars, do the assigned readings and not eat in the lecture hall.
Socialization: the process by which a person learns the accepted ways of thinking and behaving in a particular society
Covert norms are learned from others. While children may be born with predispositions towards all sorts of things, from their personality, artistic, musical and other talents, to their general sexual orientation, they must learn how to engage with a classroom seating scenario. This is the process of socialization (see Chapter 6 for more on this phenomenon). This includes how infants learn verbal skills, body language and the multitude of ways that humans relate to each other. This primary socialization occurs by infants emulating the adults around them. It includes being overtly taught rules (such as chew with your mouth closed) and covertly learning by observation (when men pee at the urinal, they do not talk to the guy next to them). Socialization never ends; we are always learning how to better fit in with or contest our constantly changing society. These covert norms collectively begin to make a culture. But a culture is more than just a set of norms that govern how people act and interact with each other. A culture can refer to a small group of people in a particular setting (like an athletic team’s culture), or a larger society of people (a school culture) or even commonalities that make a collective culture among those of a state or nation. These cultures might have slightly different rules than the culture at large.
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Cultures may be geographically bounded. This is to say, they have borders that are inclusive not only of types of people, but of places. Countries have different cultures that are in part a result of where they are situated. Spain, for example, traditionally has a ‘siesta’, an afternoon sleep, because (before air conditioning) it was too hot to work at that time – this cultural norm does not exist in England for obvious reasons. Now, many people in other Western countries will have ‘power naps’ or sleep after lunch. Yet it is in Spain where businesses close because of the heat. And in other countries they are called power naps perhaps to emphasize that the sleep is both brief and to enable the person to serve the capitalist needs of their employer once they awaken. Research also shows how the way cities are built and organized, in part due to the geography of the area, impacts on how people live their lives (Lefebvre [1974] 1991). Those living in Manhattan, London or Tokyo will have a public transport (subway) culture and accompanying conventions that Californians, the Scottish and those in rural Japan just do not understand (such as not striking up conversations with strangers, and running between trains even if you are not in a rush). The infrastructure of a university will affect its culture as well. Even with online learning courses, the cultures of universities are rooted in their campus, in their buildings and the layout of their teaching rooms. Campus-based universities are often called ‘bubbles’ because of the introverted culture that develops within a geographically bounded environment. Think how the norms of the university lecture might be different if all lectures occurred with just 10 students, seated in a circle without tables or notepads. It would likely see a shift in the amount of time the professor spoke and the forms of conversation and debate that ensued. Culture is reproduced through multiple mechanisms, including social interaction, the media, the law and many other variables, but one defining method that a culture uses to keep people acting and behaving in socially acceptable ways comes through stigma. In his 1963 book Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity, sociologist Erving Goffman (1922–1982) provided a groundbreaking argument about how stigma is used to police norms in society. While stigma could relate to physical deformities, individual character flaws or tribal stigmas, such as nationality, the crucial component of Goffman’s argument was that stigma was not ultimately located within the individual, but in the failure to measure up to what society deemed socially acceptable and legitimate. Key to stigma is that it is used to discredit someone. Writing in the 1960s, Goffman noted that people with physical deformities were excluded from society regardless of their personalities or how they might be able to contribute. And because stigma is based on norms (and in some cases prejudice), it does not have to be logical. This is why taking drugs can be stigmatized, while alcohol consumption maintains social approval when done according to social norms, even though many illegal drugs are less damaging than alcohol. It is the fear of being stigmatized that often keeps people acting within the mandates of a culture’s prescription. One does not even need to commit the stigmatized activity, either; one only needs be associated with it. This is one way in which homophobia was perpetuated in the 20th century – if one said that homophobia was wrong, or supported equal rights for sexual minorities in the
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Stigma: a social attribute, behaviour or reputation that is discrediting in some way
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Tradition: a belief or ritual passed down within a group, with meaning imbued to the act
Subculture: a group of people who share common interests that vary from the dominant culture
Power: a contested term, fundamentally about the ability to produce intended effects
1980s, that person would often be labelled gay regardless of their sexuality. This kept straight people from standing up for gay rights. The effectiveness of stigma is noteworthy, and often permanent. In short, stigma sticks. Another mechanism for the reproduction of culture comes through tradition. Unlike a norm, a tradition has been passed down within a group that has significance and meaning beyond the mechanics of the act. Somewhat strangely, tradition alone often becomes the only reason given to perpetuate negative acts of a culture. Women are ‘given away’ at weddings by their father to their husband, just as women are expected to take the surname of their husband. Both these practices date back to patriarchal times, and there is now no ‘need’ for them except tradition. Research on sport shows the danger of tradition as well. American football and rugby, for example, continue to play full-contact tackle versions of their sport. This is despite the fact that, every year, some young players contract chronic traumatic encephalopathy which results in a painful, miserable and shortened lifespan. Yet high schools continue to play tackle football instead of tag football for no better reason than ‘tradition’, and in full knowledge that such behaviours can lead to concussion and ultimately significant brain trauma. Similarly, in many countries where gun ownership is legal, people fire bullets into the air to celebrate the New Year, despite the fact that those bullets, if not shot directly upwards, arc and come back to the earth with deadly force. Culture is therefore maintained through social norms, tradition and the heaping of stigma upon those who defy the culture. It is for this reason that ‘cultural deviants’ often create their own subculture, existing within, and to some degree at odds with, the dominant culture. We often think of stylistic trends related to music when discussing subcultures (goths, punks, emos), which are often related to class groups, but subcultures can refer to people who share a disability (like a wheelchair basketball team), religious perspective (like Muslims living in a Christian nation) or sexual interest. Subcultures are not just the preserve of those excluded from the dominant culture. Elites create their own subcultures, which can at times deviate from mainstream values and rules. However, it is sometimes the case that dominant groups seek to impose their culture on everyone else, something that sociologists call ‘hegemony’. If the dominant group can persuade enough people that they should be in charge, and that they are superior – then others will seek to follow and imitate them. This raises the wider sociological question of power in society (see Chapter 7). Why are some groups more powerful than others, in economic terms (employment, ownership and earnings), political terms (most leading politicians went to a small number of elite universities and share very similar family and school backgrounds) and culture? Despite the claim that modern Western societies are ‘democratic’, such institutions as elections have certainly not dislodged powerful economic, political and cultural elites from the key positions of power in society. Sociology is tasked with understanding this disparity. The difference between a culture and society can be difficult to distinguish. In many cases, they serve as legitimate synonyms. When there is a difference, the easiest way to understand it is to think of culture as the traits of a group – the community, behaviours, values and fashions – while a society exists when such traits become formalized to the point where values and norms become rules and even laws. This shift has to do with levels of enforcement, the extent to which disapproval is organized and by which ‘authorities’ are appointed to exercise discipline and punishment. The relationship between cultures and societies is always open to Copyrighted material – 9781137609724
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question. America, Japan, England and France are, for example, all societies – and they have different cultures that determine the ways they interact, their laws, their religious and ethical values, among other areas.
Emile Durkheim and the study of suicide Written in 1897, Emile Durkheim’s (1858– 1917) book Suicide is one of the founding texts of sociology. It was important because it examined a topic that most people at that time believed was entirely personal. Suicide was understood to be an intimate, psychological act, not influenced by society. Rather than accepting suicide as purely a psychological problem, Durkheim examined suicide rates of people across Europe and found several important trends. He demonstrated that the rates were higher among men than women, higher among single people than married couples and higher for those without children. Most important to the study of sociology, however, is that Durkheim also showed that suicide rates were higher among © Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images Protestants compared to Catholics. It was this finding that put sociology on the academic map as an important social science discipline. This is because of structural differences between the Protestant religions and the Catholic religion, most notably in relation to how they contend that one’s sins can be forgiven. The doctrine of the Roman Catholic church required confession to and absolution by a priest, whereas Protestant doctrine promoted the view that a person’s relationship to God is more direct and individual – through prayer, reading the Bible or through good works. Thus, Protestants had to seek individualistic routes to salvation, but Catholics believed it was attained through community membership – their Church. The reason why this matters is precisely the notion of community membership. At the time when Durkheim was writing, church attendance was a key way of providing community cohesion and providing a social network of like-minded people. Protestants had much less integration and more isolation, which Durkheim called anomie. In short, feeling like one belonged and having friends to care for you was an important guard against suicide. Durkheim used statistical analysis of suicide rates to show that Protestants had a far higher suicide rate, arguing this was because Protestants did not have the sense of community that Catholics did. For Durkheim, individual human agency did not explain suicide. Women were more likely to experience the internal feeling of depression, but far less likely to commit suicide than men. As such, it was not the individual’s internal state that determined their action, but rather the social structure in which those feelings were located. Social integration and regulation, or their absence, led to recurrent patterns of different actions (what Durkheim called ‘social facts’). We discuss the theoretical debate about structure and agency in Chapter 3, and examine social structures in Chapter 6.
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Anomie: a condition felt by people in societies where there is an absence of norms or values Human agency: the capacity of individuals to act independently and make their own choices Social structures: ways society is organized that constrain how an individual can act
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Approaching Sociology While we have defined sociology, a better understanding will emerge if we think about the ways in which we can view sociology. Sociology is not an abstract degree programme, but a mode of thought that can transform how we see the world. It is a form of critical inquiry that can help objectively analyse a situation. Sociology is also a discipline, institutionalized in universities and guided by norms and rules. It is also personal, and influenced by our own lives and perspectives. By thinking about sociology in different ways, we can come to a broader understanding of the true scale, scope and boundaries of sociology.
Sociology as a mode of thought
sociological imagination: the awareness of the relationship between personal experiences and broader society
Whereas some subjects are defined by the area of study, sociology is characterized to some extent by its way of thinking about problems. As a way of thinking, sociology enables us to understand things that are new and different to our own experience. As such, it is able to make the strange familiar. Sociology enables us to become accustomed to unfamiliar customs and practices. Yet sociology as a mode of thought also enables us to think about familiar things in new ways – by making the familiar strange. We suspect that after reading this introduction, you will think about the lecture hall in a different way – whether remembering the social norms of choosing where to sit or thinking about spit on a spoon, your thought processes will be at least somewhat different. You will find your thinking challenged precisely because sociology unveils the structure and social norms behind everyday activities. The notion that sociology is a way of thinking is best captured by the phrase, the sociological imagination. Developed by famed sociologist C. Wright Mills (1916–1962), and also the title of his book published in 1959, a sociological imagination is not a theory, but an awareness of how people and culture interact. It is a way of thinking that incorporates not only major structural differences, like social inequalities, but also everyday life. Mills argued that the sociologist needs to examine how a person’s biography connects with history, writing that ‘the sociological imagination enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within society. … No social study that does not come back to the problems of biography, of history and of their intersections within a society has completed its intellectual journey’ (p. 6). If you have answers to questions about why people act the way they do, you are at least on the path to having a sociological imagination. For example, do you ever wonder why people refrain from carrying on a conversation in an elevator, but will talk loudly on their cell phone in crowded public transportation? Do you ever ask why it is that some people spend more time and money fixing up their car than playing with their own children? Do you question why some couples express love and affection publicly on social media, even as they are in the same room? Sociologists conduct research to explain these everyday conundrums. A sociological imagination promotes one’s ability to be self-aware and socially aware in order to make decisions that are not swayed by unjust social norms. Thus, Mills envisioned that the sociological imagination could help move society from
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GOOD SOCIOLOGY The Sociological Imagination A person with a good sociological imagination is likely not to take culturally normative matters for granted. To have a good sociological imagination is, in many aspects, to be a contrarian – to look at what others take for granted and ask critical questions. For example, whereas many people might blindly accept the notion that things are illegal for a good reason (known as the normativity of the law), someone with a good sociological imagination might first evaluate the social context in which the law was made and query its effects based on evidence. The person with a good sociological imagination is far more likely to ask whether, for example, the criminalization of prostitution is wrong and based on sexual stigma than someone who has only read about the issue in popular newspapers. One might also question why sex between a brother and sister is so culturally condemned that it is criminalized. The incest taboo, long studied particularly in psychology, suggests that this cultural prohibition exists because, historically, intermarriage between different families improved the ability for both groups to thrive through the birth of healthy children, and cemented the bonds of an extended familial support network. But when there is access to high-quality contraception, the censure of incest has less empirical validation. Sex between two sisters is also illegal in many countries, even though there is no risk of procreation. One with a sociological imagination might ask where these taboos come from, why they emerged and seek to understand whether they are valid. This is important to understanding the sociological imagination because Mills proposed that sociology was unique in that it could teach people the intellectual skills to both expose social injustices and provide new ways of structuring society to alleviate them.
the irrational reproduction of cultural norms, to cultural norms based in reasoned values. Mills believed that teaching a sociological imagination to the citizens of a society could thus promote equality. We agree. The sociological imagination still plays an important role in modern societies. Sociologists tend to question the status quo, challenging prejudice and assumptions about social norms and unequal opportunities and outcomes. Few sociologists seek to reproduce existing social structures of inequality. Thus, for the majority of sociologists, we are interested in teaching our students to think sociologically, so that they will promote social progress, even if they do not always agree what progress might mean. While C. Wright Mills’ idea has failed to resonate culturally – schools do not formally teach sociology in the way they do history, geography and other social sciences – his ideas are central to what sociology is about and an accessible way of seeing the relevance it has.
Sociology as critical inquiry Part of a sociological imagination is the ability to think critically about society. By thinking critically, we do not mean moaning or stating what is wrong with an issue. Thinking critically means, rather, to think analytically and as objectively as possible
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about a social issue. Yet to say that sociology is a form of critical inquiry is to go beyond the notion that it is (hopefully) objective and analytic. It is to recognize that sociology has a distinct, scientific approach to understanding society. This distinctive approach is necessary because society is itself ‘self-critical’; with actors able to question their positions and beliefs, and with social structures (see Chapter 6) riddled with conflicts and contradictions. As such, sociology does not just ask how society is now, but also how else it might be, and what changes are both possible and desirable given the alternatives that either already exist or could exist if society were organized in a different way. Sociology is as much about social change as it is about explaining how things are now. Central to sociology as a mode of critical inquiry is that it is a practice framed by theory and method. To say that sociology has a method means that there are better and worse ways to critically examine a topic. For example, if we wanted to know how climate change is influencing people’s consumption patterns, we could talk to our friends about the issue and ask them how much they recycle – this would tell us more than nothing about the topic, and potentially even some interesting observations. But we could also undertake a detailed survey and recruit participants from across the country, of different ages and with varying incomes. The questions could include information about attitudes towards climate change and participants’ consumption patterns. The scientific method of sociology means that we can state that the second method is better than the first, and will provide more useful information for making public policy concerning recycling (see Chapter 4). The notion that theory is central to sociology is also vitally important (see Chapter 3). Without theory, it is possible to say that something is happening in a particular context at a particular time, but it does not address why that is happening. We might collect data that shows lesbian, gay and bisexual youth are coming out at a younger age and having better experiences than previous generations, but it is only with theory that we can connect this finding with broader ideas about decreasing homophobia, the impact of the internet and other social trends that have led to this current phenomenon. A theory explains a phenomenon. For sociology, a good theory helps us understand the social world on a larger scale. But a good social theory must be testable, for, as Christopher Hitchens said, anything that can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof. That is why sociology has an accompanying method – to ensure these theories are based in evidence. So important are theory and method to sociology that we have dedicated Chapters 3 and 4 to examining them in more detail. In order to carry out the theory and method of sociology, it is necessary to be as objective as possible. Objectivity can be defined as an approach where personal values and beliefs do not influence one’s findings. The importance of objectivity is in protecting from bias: thus, objectivity enabled Durkheim to make his arguments about suicide and religion without being critiqued for his own religious faith. There are great debates about how truly objective sociologists can be, as we discuss in Chapter 4, but the key point is that sociologists must minimize the impact of their own beliefs on how they analyse and interpret data. That sociology is a mode of critical inquiry means that it can be applied to a variety of issues. In this book you will encounter a range of ‘sociology of ’s. We discuss the sociology of class, the sociology of race, the sociology of deviance,
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among others. At our respective universities, we lecture modules on the sociology of gender and sexuality, the sociology of sport, the sociology of work and professions, and digital sociology. The beauty of the method and theory of sociology is that it can be applied to any issue in which humans are involved.
Pause for Reflection Sociology is an approach to studying society that can look at a huge diversity of issues and problems. British sociologist Ben Fincham (2016), for example, studies the sociology of fun. Take a moment to think of what you would be interested in studying – ‘the sociology of …’ what?
You can study that. What kind of questions might you be interested in asking? Have they been asked already? Why are you interested in this topic? Currently, you will likely have broad answers to these questions. That’s fine. Make a note of them. We’ll ask you more about them in Chapters 3 and 4.
Sociology as a discipline We have already discussed the ways in which sociology is distinct from psychology, philosophy, anthropology and other fields of study. A more formal way of making this point is to say that sociology is a discipline – a branch of knowledge. This is not to give it institutional credibility, or to enable people to claim professional respectability by saying, ‘… As a sociologist …’ – although it surely serves those purposes. Rather, recognizing sociology as a discipline formalizes the notion that it is bounded by intellectual norms. This means there are ethical procedures that sociologists should follow, and rules that guide how we work – not least that we should not falsify data, hurt our participants or betray their confidence (see Chapter 5). Sociology is also a discipline in the sense that it has been institutionalized in a number of ways. The most obvious is in the way in which it is studied at universities: in Departments of Sociology, for degrees in sociology and as a general education course. There are also professional associations for sociologists (including the American Sociological Association, the Australian Sociological Association, the British Sociological Association, the European Sociological Association, the International Sociological Association). While sociologists clearly lack a creative imagination in naming their general associations, there are specialized sociological organizations, too. One can, for example, attend a large sociological conference on just the sociology of race, or a conference on the sociology of medicine, consumption, science and technology, or media. These groups organize conferences across the world where academics meet, present papers and share their knowledge. Sociologists also have various jobs: often working for charities or think tanks, analysing data or employed in jobs which aim to improve society. They also work in advertising and market research, management, international development and urban development.
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There are also formal rules and social norms that govern the practice of sociology. Fundamentally, these are concerned with sociology being ethical. While sociological research can be undertaken in ways that harm people or support injustice, sociology as a discipline harshly condemns such research and sees ethical practice as a core component of the discipline. It is for this reason that we dedicate Chapter 5 to thinking about ethics and looking at case studies of social science research whose ethical components are complicated or troubling. Sociology, as a discipline, means all these things. In other words, being a discipline gives sociology respectability and privilege. As academic sociologists employed at universities, we gain from this. But that does not detract from the fact that, fundamentally, sociology is about thinking critically about the social world. Far more important than being a discipline, sociology is also distinctly personal.
Sociology as personal At the same time that the sociological imagination demands that we think beyond our individual experiences of events, sociology can also be very personal. Many sociologists study issues that are close to them. It is not surprising that a great many sociologists of colour study racial inequality; that gay and lesbian sociologists study LGBT issues and cultures; that many female sociologists study patriarchy and issues related to gender inequality; and that women of colour have influenced the field to study the intersectionality of race, gender and sexuality. Of course, many female academics study issues independent of gender, just as many people of colour study areas not associated with race. Nonetheless, personal experience of social oppression is one motivation to study a social issue. To make this point – that sociology is personal – is to recognize that it is not always purely objective, but instead often somewhat subjective. Some argue that the greater the level of subjectivity, the less rigorous the study. This is certainly true in some cases: someone motivated to find a particular result to prove their own beliefs has to guard strongly against confirmation bias (where a person focuses on the evidence that supports their argument). Yet to recognize subjectivity and take measures to deal with it can be a stronger course of action than claiming complete objectivity. In this spirit, it is important to recognize our own influences in sociology – and we have shared these on pp. xiv–xvi in the front matter of the book. Other academics, with other influences and other stories, would have written this textbook differently.
The use of sociology
Public sociology: a style of sociology that seeks to inform and engage with the public
In our discussion so far, we have highlighted that sociology helps us understand society in a range of ways. Perhaps from this it is implicit that sociology should be useful, although some would argue that sociological studies can be excellent even if they have no practical application. That may be the case, but our version of sociology is one that is fundamentally useful to society. We discuss the complexities of this statement elsewhere in the book, but highlight some key arguments here. Sociology is useful in multiple ways, but principally because it can effect change. For us, sociology is truly meaningful when it improves society. Some would call this public sociology. For example, the sociology of health and illness has helped
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explain why people do not seek medical attention when needed, and offered ideas to improve the ways in which people engage with medical professionals. The second half of this book, looking at the application of sociology to various issues, is also guided around the notion that sociology should be useful. Of course, sociology can have influence even if change is not causally related. Sociologists have the opportunity to influence debates and, particularly, social policy through providing a rigorous evidence base to inform decisions (see Chapter 10). When deciding which education system is best, or what the most effective strategies are for reducing crime, sociology provides a framework to gather this evidence and influence debates. It may also be the case that sociologists do not gain influence in their lifetime but their ideas become influential later on (see Chapter 2). All this brings us to the task of sociology. We hold that there are four key tenets here. It is the task of sociology: ~~ To assess ~~ To understand ~~ To challenge ~~ To change. Not all sociology has to do all of these, but it is not sociology if it does none of them.
VOX POP Sam Jones Studying for a degree in sport at the University of Winchester, UK Before coming to the University of Winchester, I only understood sport in terms of how a sport is played, who plays the sport, which teams are winning and when I can play my sport (volleyball). At first, when I began my course I was sceptical about why I needed to learn about sociology as I only wanted to study sport, and how I can play it to the best of my ability and coach or teach it in the future. To me, sociology was learning about human societies and why they acted in a certain way in different environments. Nothing about sport or my interests. Yet once I started learning about sociology and how it affected sport in so many ways, I began to look at it in a whole new way. I started to learn that sport has substantial sociological details, including education, leisure, race and gender issues. I knew some of these issues were
© Sam Jones
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there but I never thought about them in detail or thought they mattered much to me. By studying sociology, I have learned so much more about sport in detail, both historically and today. I feel now when I look at sport, I ask questions like why and how. I don’t just take sport at face value. I feel the need to dig deeper to see why certain teams, societies, athletes and spectators act in the way they do in social issues, behaviours and values. Sociology has helped me in other ways throughout my course. In sports coaching, I am now able to take a step back when coaching players and ask myself why are they acting in a certain way and how can I coach them to become better athletes and better myself as a coach. I also study sports development, and using sociology has helped me learn more about social and cultural structures, patterns, organizations and groups participating in a sporting activity. »» How does Sam’s understanding of sociology match with your own? »» What core elements seen in the section ‘Approaching Sociology’ (p. 12) does Sam ascribe to in his narrative? »» How else might sociology aid a student studying sport at university? What about people playing sport in their daily lives? »» How might your experiences differ from Sam’s?
conclusion Sociology is about understanding society. Whether you are more interested in individuals’ experiences of personal life or the broad social structures that constrain how people act, sociology has the tools to understand these issues. We have shown the ways in which sociology is different from other disciplines, but perhaps most importantly that it is a way of thinking, and a way of thinking differently.
How would…? »» How would Erving Goffman (see p. 9) have interpreted your school life? »» Think about the sociological imagination. What norms were present in your school? What was the point of the formal rules? Did you have a uniform, and until what age? »» Make a note of the key issues, and then discuss with a friend and see what similarities and differences there are. »» How would a sociologist write about your class? »» Think of the last class you were in. What were the norms of that class? Are they all of similar importance? »» How might you contest the norms of the class? Which norms are more serious to follow and why? »» How might you find out the reasons why particular norms in your class exist?
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Structured Further Reading Mills, C.W. (1959). Chapter 1: The Promise. The Sociological Imagination. New York: Oxford University Press.
The first chapter of this classic book is an essential read for students of sociology. The way in which C. Wright Mills argues that people experience their lives as a series of traps that sociological thinking can help them overcome will resonate for many people today. He also connects people’s personal troubles with broader structural issues of society. Burawoy, M. (2014). Public sociology: The task and the promise. In K. Gould & T. Lewise (eds.), Ten Lessons in Introductory Sociology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
An accessible chapter by a sociologist who has argued for a form of public sociology across his career. This chapter provides some related arguments as to why sociology, and public sociology in particular, matters. It provides further examples of social problems that can be addressed by developing a sociological imagination. Bancroft, A. & Fevre, R. (2016). Dead White Men and Other Important People (2nd edn). London: Palgrave.
This is an unconventional textbook that introduces you to sociology, but written in the form of a novel. It is an engaging and accessible introduction to sociology and offers a different perspective to some of the arguments we develop here. Visit the companion website at www.macmillanihe.com/mccormack for further learning and teaching resources.
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Page numbers in bold indicate tables and in italic indicate figures. Aboriginal Australians 162–163 absolute poverty 164 abstraction of theories 50–51, 51 academic journals 262 Acker, Joan 178 Addams, Jane 38–39, 43 adoptive parents 94, 132 Adorno, Theodor 62, 143–144 affective labour 152 African Americans 163 Black Lives Matter movement 124, 232 civil rights movement 182 contributions to early sociology 40–41, 42–43 double consciousness 41 Jim Crow laws 41, 163, 170 prisons 171 racialization of 173 On the Run case study 122–125 slavery 169, 170–171, 222 Age of Enlightenment 23, 30, 64, 181, 221–222 agency, human 11, 57–58, 73–74 agency theory 121 agrarian society 23–24 AIDS 204, 205 Albrow, Martin 233 Allan, Graham 208 Allan, Kenneth 61 Allcott, Hunt 258–259 alternative facts 54, 258–259 American Journal of Sociology 35, 38 American National Science Foundation 235–236 American Psychiatric Association 116 American Sociological Association 108, 235–236, 267 Amini, Elham 84–85, 197
Anderson, Eric xiv–xv, 186, 215, 260–261 Angelou, Maya 188 anomie 11 anonymity 111 anthropology 5–6 archival data 85–88 see also literature reviews argumentation 4 Asch, Solomon 196 association 101, 101 astronomy 22 Atlanta School of sociology 40–41, 42–43, 171 Atwood, Margaret 202 austerity agenda 167 Australia Aboriginal peoples 162–163 class 168 education 138 evidence-based policy 255 internet use 147 marriage 211–212 time zones 226 Australian Class Survey 168 automation 151, 152–154 autonomist Marxism 153 average 98, 99 Bales, Robert Freed 134 Banks, Sarah 105 bar charts 97, 98 stacked 99, 100 Barker, Martin 149 Barthes, Roland 87 Baumrind, Diana 122 BBC 167–168 Beauvoir, Simone de 182 Beck, Ulrich 237–238 Becker, Howard 60, 250 Benson, Susan 198
Bentham, Jeremy 3–4 Bertrand, Marianne 175 Best, Joel 206 Bhopal, Kalwant 171–172, 176 Bianchi, Suzanne M. 150 bias 14 archival data 88 coach effect 110 confirmation bias 16, 53 ethnography 110 experiments 80 media and 255–258 participant observation 81 preacher effect 110 questionnaires 83 researcher positionality and 110 sampling bias 83, 88 big data 88, 90 bivariate analysis 99–103, 100, 101, 103 black and minority ethnic (BME) communities see African Americans; ethnic minorities black feminist thought 174–175 Black Lives Matter movement 124, 232 Blumer, Herbert 36 Boczkowski, Pablo J. 257 bodies 192–199 body work 197 Cartesian dualism 193 consumer self 195 contraception 195, 203 embodiment 193 legal regulation of 194 objectification 195–196 Reflexive Body Techniques (RBTs) 194 tattoos 197–199 technology and 197 women and 194–197
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Bogle, Kathleen A. 206 Boliver, Vikki 93 Booth, Charles 164 Bourdieu, Pierre xvii, 161, 166–167 bourgeoisie 25–26 Bowles, Sam 139 Braverman, Harry 153 Brexit referendum 91, 234 British Sociological Association 106 bromances 209 Brooks, Roy 173 Brown, Michael 232 bureaucracy 34 Burundi 147 Butler, Judith 3, 65–66 cable television 257 Calvin, John 34 Cameron, David 167 Canada 147 capitalism 23, 150, 153, 242–245 education and 139, 141 free markets 243 global network 243–245 intellectual property rights 243–245 Marx on 25–27 media and 144 Protestant ethic and 34 religion and 34 technology and 243–245 unemployment and 27–29 Weber on 33–34 capitals cultural 166, 167, 168 social 166, 167, 168 symbolic 166, 167 carbon dioxide 235 Cartesian dualism 193 case study methods 78, 79 Castells, Manuel 147, 238 categorical data 96, 97 Catholic church 11, 21–22 causality 74–77 Central News Network (CNN) 257 Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies University of Birmingham 146 Chad 147
Charles, Prince of Wales 145–146 charmed circle of sex 202, 203 cheating, in relationships 214–219 Chi Square test 102 Chicago School of sociology 35– 37, 38–39, 224–225 childcare 150, 194, 197 children 135 one-child policy, China 137 socialization 8, 36, 57, 133, 134, 137, 138–139, 177, 192 see also education; family China 35, 236 lack of Industrial Revolution 222–223 media 144, 256 one-child policy 137 time zones 226 Chomsky, Noam 144 Churchill, Winston 23 cities, modernity and 224–225 civic engagement 49–50 civil rights movement 182 class 25–29, 33, 162–168 capitals and 166–167 changing one’s 165–167 contemporary thinking 167–168 education and 138, 139, 140–143 employability agenda and 155 false consciousness 138 friendships and 208 Great British Class Survey 167–168 intersectionality 174, 184 meritocracy and 141–143 precariat 28–29, 153, 168 school uniforms and 140 social effects of 164–165 social mobility 140–143 sport and 223 symbolic economy of 166–167 climate change 47–48, 235–237 Clinton, Bill 167 closed questions 83 cluster sampling 92 coach effect 110 Cobb, Jonathan 165
codes of conduct 106 coding 95 cognitive dissonance xvii–xviii, 265–266 cohabitation 210–212 Cohen, Philip 146 Cohen, Stanley 6, 205 collective action 228–232 crowds 231 petitions 231 riots 231–232 social movements 228–231 Collins, Patricia Hill 60, 174 colonialism 222, 229 commodification 62 communism 26 comparative methods 78 Comte, Auguste 3, 29–31 concentration camps 107 concepts 48 confidentiality 111 confirmation bias 16, 53 conflict theories 59, 60 Connell, Raewyn 44, 185–186 consent, informed 109 conspiracy theories 54 consumer self 195 contact theory 58 content analysis 95 contraception 195, 203 convenience sampling 92 Cooper, David 134 Copernicus, Nicolaus 22 correlation 74–77 statistical 101, 101 covert norms 8 covert research 81–82, 108 craniometry 64 Crenshaw, Kimberlé 174 Cresswell, John 89 critical inquiry 13–15, 21–22 critical race theory (CRT) 173–175 critical theory 60–62, 143–144 cross-sectional research 78 cross-tabulation 101, 101 Crossley, Nick 194 Crouch, Colin 243 crowds 231 cultural anthropology 5 cultural capital 166, 167, 168 cultural norms see norms
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cultural studies 146–147 culture 7–11 culture industry 62 Cushion, Stephen 256 Darwin, Charles 141, 195 data 3 data analysis 93–103 association 101, 101 bivariate analysis 99–103, 100, 101, 103 coding 95 content analysis 95 discourse analysis 95–96 levels of measurement 96–101, 97, 97, 98, 100, 101 qualitative 94–96 quantitative 96–103 regression 102–103, 103 significance 101–102 univariate analysis 96–99, 97, 98 variance 99 data collection 90–93, 92, 94 data saturation 93 databases 71–72 David, Matthew xvi, 251–252 Davis, Murray 53–54 Davison, Emily 181 de Beauvoir, Simone 37 deceptive research 108–109, 122 deductive coding 95 deductive research questions 72 deductive theory 56 Deegan, Mary Jo 42 defamation 111 Delamont, Sara 37 Deleuze, Giles 153 Delgado, Richard 171, 173 Delphi Group 84 DeMello, Margo 198 democracy 24, 30 Democratic Party, US 259 Dennis, Kingsley 236 Descartes, René 193 deschooling 141 descriptive statistics 101 deviance 36 Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) 64–65 Diana, Princess of Wales 145–146
digital research 88, 90 discourse analysis 95–96 discourses 64–65, 160 disembedding of social systems 226–227 diversity history of sociology and 37–44 see also gender and gender inequality; race and racial inequality; sexual minorities division of labour, gendered 134–135, 194, 195 divorce 94, 108, 204, 210, 216 domestic work 134–135, 150 Dorling, Danny 168 double-barrelled surnames 211 double consciousness 41 double hermeneutic 249–250, 259 Drake, Deborah 49 Du Bois, William E.B. 3, 40–41, 42–43, 60, 163, 171 Dunning, Eric 231 Durkheim, Emile 3, 11, 14, 31–32, 59, 60, 64, 74, 138, 191, 193, 231 Dyer, Richard 173 Economic and Social Research Council 111 economics 6 education 137–143 assessment 254 class inequality 138, 139, 140–143 compulsory 137–138 deschooling 141 employability agenda 154–155 hidden curriculum 139 meritocracy and 141–143 policy 253–254 racial inequality 93 radical alternatives to formal 141 school rankings 254 school uniforms 139–140 social mobility and 140–143 socialization of children 137, 138–139 student evaluation surveys 254
theorizing 138–140 university rankings 254 Egerton, Muriel 103 Egypt 148 Einstein, Albert 66, 142 electric shock experiment case study 119–122 Ellis, Carolyn 111 Eltantawy, Nahed 148 embodiment 193 emotional harm 109 emotional labour 135, 152 empiricism 22, 30, 32 employability agenda 154–155 employment see work enclosure 24 Engels, Frederich 26 Enlightenment, Age of 23, 30, 64, 181, 221–222 entrepreneurialism 152 environmental issues 235–237 Eritrea 147 ethics 3–4, 16, 105–128 anonymity 111 coach effect 110 confidentiality 111 covert research 81–82, 108 deceptive research 108–109, 122 defined 105–106 emotional harm 109 ethical review process 113–114, 122, 126–127 ethnography 110 framework for ethical consideration 112–113 going native 110, 250 guidelines and codes of conduct 106 informed consent 109 Milgram experiment case study 119–122 misuse of evidence 255 naturalistic observation 81–82 On the Run case study 122–125 online research 88 physical harm 109 positionality of researcher 110 preacher effect 110 prison experiment case study 116–119
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ethics (Continued ) protecting participants 81–82, 106, 107, 108–109, 111 publishing research 112, 250–252 research design 107–109 research questions 107 risk 109 taking sides 250–252 Tearoom Trade case study 114–116 writing up research 111–112 ethics review panels 113–114, 122, 126–127 ethnic minorities education and inequality 93 employability agenda and 155 media representation of 146 racialization of 173 see also African Americans ethnicity 170 see also race and racial inequality ethnography 75, 81 ethics 110 going native 110 insider 110 online 88 Ettorre, Betsy 39–40 evidence 70–71 policy-based 255 evidence-based policy 254–255 experiments 75, 79–80 experts 227 Facebook 90, 144, 148, 209, 259 fake news 54, 258–259 fake sociology 262–264 false consciousness 138 falsifiability 48–49 family 132–137, 192, 207 adoptive parents 94, 132 functionalist perspective 134–135, 177, 192 gender inequality 134–135, 150 if and when to have children 135 nuclear family model 132–133, 134–135, 192 one-child policy, China 137 patriarchy and 176
policy debates and 135–137 same-sex parenting 94, 108, 132, 137 single parents 94, 132, 133 socialization of children 8, 57, 133, 134, 177, 192 step-parents 94, 132 in vitro fertilization (IVF) 136–137, 197 young mothers 135, 136 Feagin, Joe 175 feminism 181–184 first-wave 181–182 second-wave 182–183 third-wave 184 feminist sociology 37 black feminist thought 174–175 bodies 195, 196–197 family 134–135 media 145–146 pornography 75 feminization of workforce 151–152 Ferguson riots, US 232 first-wave feminism 181–182 focus groups 84 football hooliganism 231–232 Ford, Henry 240 Fordism 6, 230, 240 formal institutions 131 fossil fuels 235, 236 Foucault, Michel 3, 64, 160–161, 184 Fox, Alix 206–207 Fox News 144 Frankfurt School 61–62, 143–144 free markets 243 free press 255–256 Freedom House 256 French Revolution 29 Freud, Sigmund 53 Friedan, Betty 183 friendships 148, 207–209 Froyum, Clarissa M. 165 functional specialization 227 functionalism 59, 60, 60, 134–135, 177, 192 Galilei, Galileo 22 Gates, Bill 154 Gates, Gary 108
gender and gender inequality 163, 176–187 black feminist thought 174–175 bodies 194–197 contraception 195, 203 domestic work 134–135, 150 family 134–135, 150 feminism 181–184 friendships 208–209 gender pay gap 152 gendered division of labour 134–135, 194, 195 in history of sociology 37–39, 42 institutional culture 132 intersectionality 174–175, 184 marriage 195, 210–211 media representations 145–146 men and masculinities 184–186, 232 motherhood penalty 196–197 patriarchy 134–135, 176, 200 school uniforms 139 segregation in sport 178–180 sex and 200, 201–202 sex categories 177–178 sex role theory 134–135, 177 sexuality and 187 suicide 11 women’s suffrage 39, 181 work 134–135, 150, 151–152, 178–180, 194, 196–197 generalizability 75 generalization of theories 51 Gentzkow, Matthew 258–259 Giddens, Anthony 58, 211, 225, 226–227, 235, 236, 237, 239, 249–250 Giddens paradox 236 Giddy, Davies 138 Gilman, Charlotte Perkins 38, 42 Gilroy, Paul 175 Gintis, Herbert 139 Gladwell, Malcolm 53 global justice movement 229–230 global network capitalism 243–245 global south 35, 44 orientalism 176
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global warming 47–48, 235–237 globalization 233–235, 233–234, 238, 243–245 Goffman, Alice 81, 122–125, 126 Goffman, Erving 9, 60, 148, 193 going native 110, 250 Google 90, 144 Google Scholar 72 grand theory 50, 51 Granovetter, Mark 55–56 graphical representations bar charts 97, 98 histograms 98, 98, 99–100 pie charts 96, 97 scatterplots 99, 100, 103 stacked bar charts 99, 100 Great British Class Survey 167–168 Great Firewall of China 144 great transformation 222 Green, Nicola 71 Greene, Jennifer 89 greenhouse gases 235 Greer, Germaine 183 grounded theory 72 Guardian, The 150 Guillon, Eric 198 Habermas, Jurgen 143–144 habitus 155, 161–162, 180 Haggerty, Kevin 126, 127 Hall, Stuart 3, 146–147 Harrison, Jane 37 Harvey, Joel 49 Hassid, Jonathan 226 Hawthorne effect 80 health and illness 6–7, 16–17 healthcare services 136–137, 197 Healy, Kieran 51–52 hegemony 10 heliocentrism 22 Herek, Gregory M. 187 Herman, Edward S. 144 herstory 183 Hey, Val 209 higher education norms and university culture 7–8, 9 racial inequality 93 student evaluation surveys 254 university rankings 254 see also education
Hiriscau, Ioana E. 111 histograms 98, 98, 99–100 historical materialism 25 historical sociology 35 history of sociology 20–45 Atlanta School 40–41, 42–43, 171 centrality of critical thought 21–22 Chicago School 35–37, 38–39, 224–225 cities and 224–225 critique of construction of 37–43 exclusionary practice in 41–43 foundational thinkers 24–35 gender and 37–39, 42 influences on contemporary sociology 43–45 race and 40–41, 42–43 social context 20–24, 43 Hitchens, Christopher 14 HIV/AIDs 204, 205 Hochschild, Arlie 150 Hodgson, Geoffrey M. 131 Hogan, Bernie 148 Holsinger, Bruce 39 homophily 208 homophobia 9–10, 14, 134, 165, 187 HIV/AIDs and 204, 205 intersectionality and 174 masculinity and 185, 186 public displays of affection and 191 homosexuality discourses on 64–65 HIV/AIDs and 204, 205 intersectionality and 174 stigma and 9–10, 204 structuration and 58 Tearoom Trade case study 114–116 see also sexual minorities hooks, bell 174 hooliganism 231–232 Horkheimer, Max 62, 143–144 House of Lords, UK 195 human agency 11, 57–58, 73–74 Humphreys, Laud 81, 114–116 hypotheses 48, 72 hypothetico-deductive theory 56
Iceland 147 identity 36 bodies and 193, 194, 195 consumer self 195 double consciousness 41 online presentation of self 148 sexual 187 taste and 161 work and 151 Illich, Ivan 139, 141 imagination, sociological 12–13, 16, 191, 247, 250 immigration 36 implicit norms 8 in vitro fertilization (IVF) 136–137, 197 incest taboo 13 indigenous peoples 44, 229 Aboriginal Australians 162–163 Maori 197–198 individualism 34 individualization thesis 199, 211 inductive coding 95 inductive research questions 72 inductive theory 56 indulgences 21, 34 Industrial Revolution 23–24, 150, 156, 221–223 industrialization 24 inequality 158–163 habitus 155, 161–162, 180 intersectionality 174–175, 184 Occupy movement 229–230 of opportunity 155 power and 160–162 relative poverty 164 social stratification 33, 38, 158–159 see also class; gender and gender inequality; race and racial inequality; sexual minorities inferential statistics 101–102 informal institutions 131 information age 238 informed consent 109 Inglis, David 61 insider ethnography 110 institutional cultures 131–132 Institutional Review Boards see ethics review panels
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institutions agency and 57–58, 73–74 defined 130–132 formal 131 functionalism 59 informal 131 thinking sociologically about 156 see also education; family; media; work intellectual property rights 243–245 interactionism see symbolic interactionism internet 147–148 China 144, 256 fake news 258–259 fears about 149 globalization and 233, 238 levels of use 147, 233 network society 88, 90, 238 online news 257, 258, 259–260 online research 88, 90 social media 49, 147–148, 149, 209, 230, 259 internships 155 intersectionality 174–175, 184 interval variables 96, 97, 98, 98, 99–100, 100, 101, 101 interviews 75, 82–84 Iran, menopausal women 84–85, 197 IVF (in vitro fertilization) 136–137, 197 Jamie, Kim xv-xvi, 113–114 Japan 147 jargon 65 Jim Crow laws, US 41, 163, 170 Jones, Sam 17–18 Keats, John 240 Keynes, John Maynard 265 keyword searching 71–72 Kimmel, Michael 177, 185 King, Martin Luther, Jr 170 Kitzinger, Jenny 84 Ladd, Everett C. 49 Lambert, Alex 148 Lampert, Khen 141 Lanternari, Vittorio 229
LAT see living apart together (LAT) relationships late modern societies 237–238 Lawler, Steph 162 Lefebvre, Henri 224 Lerner, Gerda 176 life expectancy 6–7 Lincoln, Abraham 170 linear regression 102, 103 Lingard, Bob 253–254 literature reviews 71–73 living apart together (LAT) relationships 212–214 logistic regression 102 Longhurst, Robyn 135 longitudinal research 78 Lorber, Judith 178 lovers see romantic relationships Lowenthal, Leo 143–144 Lubet, Steven 124–125 Luddites 153 Luther, Martin 21–22, 34 Mac an Ghaill, Máirtín 58, 185 McCormack, Mark xiv, 75, 77, 186 McDonaldization 240–242 McDowell, Linda 132 McKee, Alan 77 McNair, Brian 195 macro theories 54–56 malestream 183 Maori culture 197–198 Marcuse, Herbert 62 marriage 195, 210–212 same-sex 108, 212 Marston, Greg 255 Martineau, Harriet 3, 37, 38 Marx, Karl 24–27, 28, 29–30, 33, 62, 160, 163, 164, 243 Marxism 26 autonomist 153 conflict theories 59, 60 education 139 false consciousness 138 media 144 meritocracy 143 work 151, 153 masculinities 184–186, 232 mass media see media masturbation 204–205, 214, 215 Matthew effect 179
Mead, George Herbert 36, 87 mean 98, 99 measurement, levels of 96–101, 97, 97, 98, 100, 101 measures of central tendency 99 media 143–149, 255–264 assessing sociology in 261–262 bias and 255–258 fake news 54, 258–259 fake sociology 262–264 freedom of the press 255–256 online news 257, 258, 259–260 open-access journals 262–264 ownership of 144 political economy approaches 143–144 representation in 145–147 sensationalism 260–261 social media 49, 147–148, 149, 209, 230, 259 sociological research in 259–264 median 97, 98, 99 medical sociology 7, 16–17 men bromances 209 friendships 208–209 masculinities 184–186, 232 see also gender and gender inequality menopause 84–85, 197 Meredith, Dora 238–239 meritocracy 141–143 Merton, Robert 179 methodology 69–70 methods see sociological methods metrosexuality 186 micro theories 50–51, 51, 54–56 Milgram, Stanley 119–122 millenarianism 228 Mills, C. Wright 12–13, 50–51, 65, 74, 151, 191, 250 Mills, Colin 168 miscegenation 134 Mitchelstein, Eugenia 257 mixed methods 88–89, 89 mode 96, 98, 99 modernity 221–232, 237 cities and 224–225 collective action 228–232
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disembedding of social systems 226–227 Industrial Revolution 23–24, 150, 156, 221–223 reflexivity of 227 social movements 228–231 standardization of time 225–226 modernization 34 modes of production 25, 27 Mokyr, Joel 222–223 money 226, 227 monogamy 214–219 Montessori schools 141 moral panics 204–206 Morris, Aldon 41, 42–43 Mrozek, Donald 223 Mubarak, Hosni 148 Mullainathan, Sendhil 175 multi-variate regression 102–103 Murdoch, Rupert 144 Napster software 244 National Health Service (NHS), UK 137 National Student Survey, UK 254 natural selection theory 141 naturalistic observation 80–82 Nazis 107, 119, 143 negative effects paradigm 75–77 network society 88, 90, 238 new social movements 229–231 New York Times, The 256 news media see media nominal variables 96, 97, 97, 99, 100, 101, 101 non-random sampling 91, 92 norms 7–11, 12–13, 131, 191 covert 8 gender inequality and 38, 177 and habitus 162 sampling and 93 sex 201–204 socialization 8, 57, 133, 177 university culture and 7–8, 9 nuance traps 51, 52 nuclear family model 132–133, 134–135, 192 Nuffield 1980 class study 93 Nuremberg Code 107 Nussbaum, Martha 66, 184
Oakley, Anne 135 obedience experiment case study 119–122 objectivity 14, 16, 32 observation-based research 75, 79–82 Occupy movement 229–230 Ockham’s razor 52, 66–67 On the Run case study 122–125 one-child policy, China 137 One Direction 186 O’Neill, Maggie 63 online ethnography 88 online news 257, 258, 259–260 online research 88, 90 open-access journals 262–264 open-ended questions 83 opinion polls 91 ordinal variables 96, 97, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 101 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) 254 organizational cultures 131–132 organizations 131 orientalism 176 p. values 102 Pahl, Ray 207-208 paradigms 62 parenting adoptive parents 94, 132 if and when to have children 135 same-sex 94, 108, 132, 137 single parents 94, 132, 133 step-parents 94, 132 in vitro fertilization (IVF) 136–137, 197 young mothers 135, 136 see also family Paris Agreement (2015) 236 Park, Ji Hoon 146 Park, Robert 36, 224 Parsons, Talcott 60, 65, 134, 139, 192 participant observation 81 participants, protecting 81–82, 106, 107, 108–109, 111 anonymity 111 confidentiality 111 deception 108–109, 122
emotional harm 109 informed consent 109 patriarchy 134–135, 176, 200 pay gap, gender 152 Payscale.com 150 Peck, Brittnie 200 pedagogy of uncertainty 266 peer review 262, 263 people of colour see African Americans; ethnic minorities permissive sixties 203–204 personal life 190–192 friendships 148, 207–209 individualization thesis 199 see also bodies; family; romantic relationships; sex petitions 231 Petley, Julian 149 philosophy 3–5, 51 photographs 85–87 pie charts 96, 97 Pierrat, Jerome 198 PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) 254 plastic sexuality 211 Plato 221 Plummer, Ken 36 policy-based evidence 255 policy, social 252–255, 253 Polish-American community 36, 224 political economy approaches, to media 143–144 Pollack, William 185 polygamous relationships 215–216 Poor Law (1834), UK 252–253 Popper, Karl 49 populations 90–91 pornography 75–77, 183, 184, 206, 215 positionality 110 positivism 30, 32, 61 postcolonial societies 44 postdemocracy 243 postmodernism 239 postmodernity 239 poststructuralism 64–66 poverty, absolute and relative 164 Powdermaker, Hortense 37 power 10, 33, 160–162 power naps 9
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preacher effect 110 precariat class 28–29, 153, 168 pregnant women 135 prison experiment case study 116–119 prisons 171 probability 102 professional associations 15, 45, 106 professional status 111 profit 25–26 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 254 proletariat 25–26 propaganda model 144 Protestant work ethic 34, 151 Protestantism 11, 21, 34 pseudonyms 111 psychology 5–6, 53 public displays of affection 191 public sociology 16–17 pure relationships 211 Putnam, Robert 49–50, 50 qualitative data analysis 94–96 coding 95 content analysis 95 discourse analysis 95–96 qualitative research 35–36, 74 sample size 92–93 quantitative data analysis 96–103 association 101, 101 bivariate analysis 99–103, 100, 101, 103 levels of measurement 96–101, 97, 97, 98, 100, 101 regression 102–103, 103 significance 101–102 univariate analysis 96–99, 97, 98 quantitative research 74 questionnaires 78, 82–84 quota sampling 92 race and racial inequality 162–163, 169–176 black feminist thought 174–175 civil rights movement 182 critical race theory (CRT) 173–175
education 93 employability agenda and 155 in history of sociology 40–41, 42–43 intersectionality 174–175, 184 miscegenation 134 orientalism 176 race as social construction 40–41, 163, 173 racialization 173 racism within science 64 slavery 169, 170–171, 222 sociological theories of 40–41, 171, 173–175 systemic racism 173, 175 United States 41, 42–43, 134, 162, 163, 169, 170–171, 173, 175 use of term 170 white racial frame 175 random sampling 91, 92 range 99 rape 195 ratio variables 96, 97, 98, 98, 99, 101, 101 rationalization 33–34, 224, 227, 240–242 Reay, Diane 165 referencing 266–267 Reflexive Body Techniques (RBTs) 194 reflexive process 194 reflexivity 110, 194 of modernity 227 Regnerus, Mark 108 regression 102–103, 103 Reinisch, June Machover 200 relational 191 relationships, personal friendships 148, 207–209 see also family; romantic relationships relative poverty 164 religion 30 capitalism and 34 challenges to 21–22, 23 homophobia and 204 millenarianism 228 rationalization of 33–34 suicide and 11, 14 welfare and 253
research design 78–79, 78 ethical considerations 107–109 research questions 70–71, 72, 72, 78, 79 ethical considerations 107 Rheingold, Howard 147 Rios, Victor 125 riots 231–232 risk society 237–238 Risman, Barbara J. 178 Ritzer, George 240–242 Roberts, Ken 163 Roberts, Steve 151 Robertson, Roland 234 robots 154, 245 see also automation role theory 250 see also sex role theory Roman Games 60–61 romantic relationships 209–219 cheating 214–219 divorce 94, 108, 204, 210, 216 living apart together (LAT) 212–214 marriage and cohabitation 195, 210–212 monogamy 214–219 polygamy 215–216 public displays of affection 191 pure relationships 211 same-sex marriage 108, 212 technology and 213–214 see also sex Rose, Hilary 94 Rubin, Gayle 60, 202, 203, 205 Russell, Bertrand 160 Said, Edward 176 same-sex marriage 108, 212 same-sex parenting 94, 108, 132, 137 sample size 91–93 sampling 79, 90–93, 92, 94 sampling bias 83, 88 sampling frames 91 Sanders, Stephanie A. 200 Savage, Mike 103, 163, 168 scatterplots 99, 100, 103 schools compulsory education 137–138 deschooling 141
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hidden curriculum 139 rankings 254 socialization of children 137, 138–139 uniforms 139–140 see also education Schulz, Kathryn 266 science of society 29–32 scientific method 22 scientific revolution 23–24 second-wave feminism 182–183 secondary data 85–88 self 36 consumer self 195 double consciousness 41 online presentation of 148 see also identity self-disclosure 209 self-employment 152 self-regulation 161–162 selfies 87 Sellar, Sam 253–254 semi-structured interviews 83 Sennett, Richard 152, 165 sensationalism, media 260–261 service sector 151, 152 sex 199–207 changing attitudes to 203–204 charmed circle 202, 203 defining 200–201 gender and 200, 201–202 hierarchies of 201–204, 203 masturbation 204–205, 214, 215 moral panics about 204–206 plastic sexuality 211 pornography 75–77, 183, 184, 206, 215 sexual fidelity 214–219 sexual script theory 76–77 sex categories 177–178 Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act (1919), UK 181 sex role theory 134–135, 177 sex work 183, 184 sexting 206 sexual fidelity 214–219 sexual liberation 203–204 sexual minorities 3, 187 discourses on 64–65 HIV/AIDs and 204, 205
homophobia 9–10, 14, 134, 165, 174, 185, 186, 187, 191, 204, 205 intersectionality and 174 masculinity and 185, 186 public displays of affection 191 same-sex marriage 108, 212 same-sex parenting 94, 108, 132, 137 sampling issues 93, 94 stigma 9–10, 204 structuration 58 Tearoom Trade case study 114–116 sexual script theory 76–77 sexuality 187 discourses on 64–65 intersectionality 174 menopause and 84–85, 197 plastic 211 stigma and 9–10, 204 structuration and 58 see also sex; sexual minorities sexually transmitted diseases 204 Shulman, Lee 266 significance 101–102 Simmel, Georg 6, 35, 224, 227 simple linear regression 102, 103 single hermeneutic 249 single parents 94, 132, 133 Slater, Mel 122 slavery 169, 170–171, 222 slums 24 Smart, Carol 192, 211–212 smartphones 213–214 Smith, Adam 6 Smith, Clarissa 77 snowball sampling 92 social anthropology 5–6 social beings 25 social capital 166, 167, 168 social change see social transformations social class see class social Darwinism 141 social divisions 158–163 habitus 155, 161–162, 180 inequality of opportunity 155
intersectionality 174–175, 184 Occupy movement 229–230 power and 160–162 relative poverty 164 social stratification 33, 38, 158–159 see also class; gender and gender inequality; race and racial inequality; sexual minorities social exclusion 131–132 social facts 31–32, 74 social impact theory 121–122 social institutions agency and 57–58, 73–74 defined 130–132 formal 131 functionalism 59 informal 131 thinking sociologically about 156 see also education; family; media; work social media 49, 147–148, 149, 209, 230, 259 social mobility 140–143 social model of health 6–7 social movements 228–231 social norms see norms social policy 252–255, 253 social psychology 5 social sciences 5–7 social stratification 33, 38, 158–159 social structures agency and 11, 57–58, 73–74 defined 130–132 formal institutions 131 functionalism 59 informal institutions 131 structuralism 64 suicide and 11, 191 thinking sociologically about 156 see also education; family; media; work social support networks 54–56, 55 Social Text (journal) 66 social theory 51, 61–62 social theory of society 24–27
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social transformations 23–24, 221–245 Age of Enlightenment 23, 30, 64, 181, 221–222 cities and modernity 224–225 collective action 228–232 crowds 231 disembedding of social systems 226–227 environmental issues 235–237 globalization 233–235, 233–234, 238, 243–245 great transformation 222 Industrial Revolution 23–24, 150, 156, 221–223 late modern societies 237–238 McDonaldization 240–242 network society 88, 90, 238 petitions 231 rationalization 33–34, 224, 227, 240–242 reflexivity of modernity 227 riots 231–232 risk society 237–238 social movements 228–231 standardization of time 225–226 technology and 23–24, 222, 233, 238–239, 240–242, 243–245 social work 6, 39 socialization 8, 36, 57, 133, 134, 137, 138–139, 177, 192 society 7–11 science of 29–32 social theory of 24–27 as sui generis 31 society of control 153 sociological associations 15, 45, 106 sociological canon 21 sociological imagination 12–13, 16, 191, 247, 250 sociological methods 14–15, 30, 69–104, 249 archival data 85–88 beliefs and conditions 73–74 case study methods 78, 79 causality and correlation 74–77 comparative methods 78 covert research 81–82, 108
crisis in 89–90 cross-sectional research 78 data collection 90–93, 92, 94 deceptive research 108–109, 122 defined 69–70 digital research 88, 90 experiments 75, 79–80 focus groups 84 interviews 75, 82–84 literature reviews 71–73 longitudinal research 78 methodology 69–70 mixed methods 88–89, 89 naturalistic observation 80–82 observation-based research 75, 79–82 online research 88, 90 participant observation 81 questionnaires 78, 82–84 research design 78–79, 78, 107–109 research questions 70–71, 72, 72, 78, 79, 107 sampling 79, 90–93, 92, 94 secondary data 85–88 types 79–89 Verstehen approach 73–74 visual methods 87 see also data analysis; ethics sociological theory 14–15, 47–67, 248 abstraction 50–51, 51 agency and structure 57–58 approaches to 58–61, 60 components of good theory 49–50, 50 concepts 48 conflict theories 59, 60 connecting micro and macro 54–56 contemporary societies 237–238 critical theory 60–62, 143–144 deductive theory 56 defined 47–48 development of 56–57 education 138–140 falsifiability 48–49 Frankfurt School 61–62, 143–144
functionalism 59, 60, 60, 134–135, 177, 192 generalization 51 hypotheses 48 inductive theory 56 interest versus truth 52–54 levels of 50–51, 51 micro theories 50–51, 51, 54–56 nuance traps 51, 52 poststructural critique 64–66 of race and racism 40–41, 171, 173–175 Roman Games 60–61 strength of weak ties 54–56, 55 symbolic interactionism 36–37, 59, 60, 61 writing 65–67 sociology advice for being a good student of 265–267 as critical inquiry 13–15 defining 3–7 as a discipline 15–16, 31–32 fake 262–264 impact on individuals 249–250 in the media 259–264 as a mode of thought 12–13 as personal 16 social policy and 252–255, 253 task of 17 use of 16–17 value of 247–249 see also history of sociology; sociological methods; sociological theory soft skills 152 Sokal, Alan 66, 263 southern theory 44 Spencer, Herbert 141 Spicker, Paul 252, 253, 253 sport 5–6, 10, 17–18 gender segregation in 178–180 social valuing of 223 Spotify 244 stacked bar charts 99, 100 standard deviation 99 Standing, Guy 29, 153
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Standing, Kay 151 Stanford University 116–119 statistical measures association 101, 101 of central tendency 99 mean 98, 99 median 97, 98, 99 mode 96, 98, 99 range 99 regression 102–103, 103 significance 101–102 standard deviation 99 variance 99 status 33 Stefancic, Jean 171, 173 Steger, Manfred 234 step-parents 94, 132 stigma 9–10, 57, 193, 204 Strang, Veronica 236 stratification 33, 38 stratified random sampling 92 strength of weak ties 54–56, 55 striptease culture 195 structural functionalism see functionalism structuralism 64 structuration 58 structured interviews 83 structures of society agency and 11, 57–58, 73–74 defined 130–132 formal institutions 131 functionalism 59 informal institutions 131 structuralism 64 suicide and 11, 191 thinking sociologically about 156 see also education; family; media; work subcultures 10, 36 subjectivity 16 suffrage, women’s 39, 181 suffragettes 181 sui generis 31 suicide 11, 14, 191, 194 surnames 210–211 surveillance society 88, 90 surveillance, workplace 153 surveys 83 see also questionnaires symbolic capital 166, 167
symbolic economy of class 166–167 symbolic interactionism 36–37, 59, 60, 61 symbolic tokens 226, 227 systemic racism 173, 175 taboos 13 tattoos 197–199 Taylor, Frederick Winslow 240 Taylorism 6, 240 Tearoom Trade case study 114–116 technology bodies and 197 fears about 149 intellectual property rights and 243–245 media and 149 network society 88, 90, 238 romantic relationships and 213–214 social change and 23–24, 222, 233, 238–239, 240–242, 243–245 work and 151, 152–154 testability of theories 48–49 textual data analysis 94–96 Thatcher, Margaret 7 theory see sociological theory Therborn, Göran 233 third-wave feminism 184 Thomas, William Isaac 36, 41 Thompson, Edward P. 164–165 time, standardization of 225–226 time zones 226 trade 24 trade unions 28–29 tradition 10 transgenderism discourses on 64–65 see also sexual minorities transportation 24 TRIPS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) 243 Trump, Donald 234, 236, 258 trust, in experts 227 Truth, Sojourner 175 Tucker, Kenneth H. 250 Twain, Mark 54, 67 Twitter 112, 230, 258, 259 Tyson, Neil deGrasse 5
underemployment 153 unemployment 27–29, 151 uniforms, school 139–140 unions 28–29 United Kingdom Brexit referendum 91, 234 class 138, 162, 163, 164, 167–168 cultural studies 146 education 93, 138 employability agenda 154–155 enclosure 24 ethnicity 170 evidence-based policy 254–255 feminism 181–182 football hooliganism 231–232 gender pay gap 152 Great British Class Survey 167–168 HIV/AIDS and homophobia 204 internet use 147 legal regulation of bodies 194 Luddites 153 marriage 195, 211–212 media 256 National Student Survey 254 petitions 231 Poor Law (1834) 252–253 race and racial inequality 171–172, 175–176 school uniforms 140 university rankings 254 in vitro fertilization (IVF) 137 workhouses 252–253 United States Black Lives Matter movement 124, 232 civil rights movement 182 climate change 236 education 138 fake news 54, 258–259 Ferguson riots 232 HIV/AIDS and homophobia 204 internet use 147 Jim Crow laws 41, 163, 170 marriage 211–212 media 256, 257 Milgram experiment case study 119–122
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United States (Continued ) miscegenation 134 Occupy Wall Street 230 On the Run case study 122–125 petitions 231 Polish-American community 36, 224 prison experiment case study 116–119 prisons 171 race and racial inequality 41, 42–43, 134, 162, 163, 169, 170–171, 173, 175 self-employment 152 slavery 169, 170–171 Tearoom Trade case study 114–116 univariate analysis 96–99, 97, 98 universities norms and university culture 7–8, 9 racial inequality 93 rankings 254 student evaluation surveys 254 see also education unpaid labour 134–135, 150 unstructured interviews 83 Urry, John 236 utilitarianism 3–4 validity 75 Vannini, Pau; 193 variables interval 96, 97, 98, 98, 99–100, 100, 101, 101 nominal 96, 97, 97, 99, 100, 101, 101 ordinal 96, 97, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 101 ratio 96, 97, 98, 98, 99, 101, 101 variance 99 Veblen, Thorsten 35 Verstehen approach 73–74 visual methods 87
Waite, Catherine 264–265 warm bath theory 134, 135 Waskul, Dennis 193 water 236 Watson, Bartholomew C. 226 Watts, Rob 255 Way, Niobe 208 weak ties, strength of 54–56, 55 Webb, Beatrice 37 Weber, Max 3, 6, 32–35, 151, 163, 240, 243 welfare 253, 253 West, Candace 177–178 white racial frame 175 Wiest, Julie B. 148 Wignall, Liam 75, 77 William of Ockham 66 Williams, Eric E. 222 Willis, Paul 143 Wollstonecraft, Mary 37 women bodies 194–197 contraception 195, 203 contributions to early sociology 37–39, 42 domestic work 134–135, 150 family and 134–135, 150 feminism 181–184 friendships 208, 209 gender pay gap 152 impacts of institutional culture on 132 media representation of 145–146 menopause 84–85, 197 motherhood penalty 196–197 pregnant 135 sex 200, 201–202 suffrage 39, 181 surnames 210–211 work 134–135, 150, 151–152, 178–180, 194, 196–197 young mothers 135, 136 see also gender and gender inequality
work 149–155 automation 151, 152–154 body work 197 changing nature of 151–153 defining 149–150 domestic 134–135, 150 employability agenda 154–155 feminization of workforce 151–152 Fordism 6, 230, 240 gender and 134–135, 150, 151–152, 178–180, 194, 196–197 motherhood penalty 196–197 precarious 28–29, 152–153 Protestant work ethic 34, 151 rationalization of 240–241 reasons for working 151 robots 154, 245 self-employment 152 service sector 151, 152 standardization of time 225–226 underemployment 153 unemployment 27–29, 151 workhouses 252–253 working-classes see class World Bank 147 World Intellectual Property Organisation 243–244 World Trade Organization (WTO) 243 writing ethical considerations 111–112 good and bad 65–67 referencing 266–267 as a sociology student 266 York, Richard 236 YouTube 166, 230 Zimbardo, Philip 116–119 Zimmerman, Don 177–178 Znaniecki, Florian 36, 41
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