William

What is the social?

”We never encounter sociability as such” – Durkheim.

Sociology will be very theoretical, but the social itself can be studied at a wide range of levels.

eg. Relations, structures, systems, interactions and communication – perhaps even on the micro/macro-level

Generally society is thought of as ”nation-states”, but this is quite strange, and a very ideologically colored lens to view society from. Importantly, this might not be a very scientific way in which to describe society.

We can discribe society as a ”world society” perhaps, such as world systems theory.

Marx on the other hand speaks of ”Social formations”, Parsons with functional systems (systems theory), Mead talks about patterns of meaningful interaction.

— additional note: what we call society is an essentially changing thing: Marx and Lukacs, die gesellschaftung der gesellschaft.

”In a feudal society, it was agrarian mainly, and people had quite a lot of autonomy, they produced for themselves, their level of wealth might have been low but they could provide for themselves. They did not require external input. Now a days however, we are made to be basically incapable to provide for most of our needs, like our clothes, our food or this computer. Modern people are fundamentally dependent on others for essentially everything. Even the ideas we have. – So in a way, modern people are more dependent on society than for example medieval peasants. So in history, there has been a process in which people have become more dependent on each other, at least compared from then to now. ”

Sociology disrupts our individualistic, human-centered view of the world.

Shows the extent to which our social behaviour is predicatble, certainly an uncomfortable situation.

”Give me the degree that you obtained, and tell me what job to do. I can predict with a very high probability what newspapers you read, what books you have, how you treat your childre, how your partner dynamic is etc.”

It is possible to predict what different categories of people will do, but maybe not so much on an individual level.

→ our actions are to a very high extent conditioned by our social surrounding.

-I am a free conscious individual?

• Or just a product of society? A node in a web of relations of interdependence.

• Sociology decenters the individual.

”Love is blind” is not really true. Most people find their partner within the same social class. If there is a class different, it is usually the case that the woman is at least a bit inferior.

→ in the end it is socially conditioned. Sociology removes the mysticism around our actions.

We do make free decisions, however, these are basically sociologically conditioned.

Society creates the conditions in which our choices are made, and in which we desire to make a set of decisions.

Paradox: Individualisation as a social process

• The idea that we are individuals who create our own lives

• Individualisation is a social product, or process

• Individualisation changes our society

Individualisation is imposed upon us, whether to choose or not is not a choice.

Sociology can be said to be guided by one fundamental question:

How is social order possible?
(Alternatively, what is the role of crisis in society? – generally lines of thought followed by revolutionary thinkers)

• It is sometimes more interesting to study disruption of order, rather than the order itself.

Durkheim tried to unify sociology, however, the disciplines stays essentially pluralistic.

It contains many different approaches, or paradigms.

Sometimes you speak about ”the ongoing crisis of sociology” because in sociology everyone disagrees with everyone – thus it resembles philosophy in a way.

There is a

• different emphasis on different themes or subfields within sociology

• Methodological approaches like qualitative or quantiative (How do we gather real, or good, data?)

• political or ideological differences (It is science so people would hope these do not play a role, however a big part of sociology is the study of these phenomena as well, and that requires some degree of self-reflexivity.)

— Depending on what you want to study, there is a political agenda behind that, about what questions and problems we pose.

One example of a studium that might require qualitative data, could be racism, something that is quite difficult to capture the essence of in a questionnaire.

Themes of study for sociology:
Social change, social structure, order, institutions, power, conflict, social meaning, action

Sociology is self-referential.

→ sociology is a part of its own object of study: society.

• sociology is itself a social phenomenon: one can stuy its social formation, institutionalisation, influence and social impact or development.

In sociology, the common correspondence theory of truth is not enough to explain how it really functions.

Instead, sociology is entirely concluded in its object of study.

The object of study inherently influences the subject doing the studying.

”Theories about society, but society influences the theory.”

”The questions we ask are those that society asks us.”

In most sciences there is a split between the subject doing the studying and the object of study.

Doing chemical research is not a chemical activity but doing sociological resarch is a sociological activity.

One example of sociological impact is the USA’s emphasis on political realism in politics, a sociological approach.

If there is no separation between subject and knowledge, it is very difficult to separate theory and practice as well.

”New social problems arrise out of every solution to social problems”

The ide of ”society” has a history

• why did this study emerge at a particular moment in time

The self description of a society as a ”society” is a sociologically important phenomenon.

Some hypotheses:

• The emergence of ”civil society”

• Separation of the idea of society from government or the state

• What happens in society is important (eg. emergance of economics)

• In most societies there is a split between economy and religion, these are not related to each other in any relevant way. The terms that are used to describe acitivty are changed, we get economics, society etc. all for use of study. (Study-use)

• Link with democracy of and revolution

• Emergence of capitalism (Marx): a mode of production that integrates society into a whole.

• Loss of ”community”, or in a sense, the effects of globalisation, leads to society and the study of it: Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft (Tönnies)

• Society starts to ressemble a sort of abstract machine where it is impossible to know anything close to you. Alienation from base-line goods and who actually produces them.

Key: The changes related to Modernity leads to the concept of sociology.

• In modernity, society becomes a problem that needs to be answered.

Guillotine: it is more than just execution, it is a highly symbolic act.

Premodern societies:

• There is a higher foundation or guarantee of social order: God, nature, reason.

• Society cannot change, only accord better with its foundational essence to God.

• Here we did not see a science of society.

Modernity (and the Enlightenment):

• Social order emerges through social mechanisms.

• French revolution topples the king and by it the natural order of society.

• The construction of a different society becomes possible.

→ New area of reflection: what is the social, what is social change and what is social order.

Society is usually not necessary; it is however, in many cases, contingent.

The Enlightenment

• Can human reason make sense of the social world (as a whole)?

• Can it change the social world or make it better?

Quick conservative reaction against these Enlightenment ideas:

• An emphasis on community, tradition, religion, the family and the ”whole”.

• Gemeinschaft vs Gesellschaft (Ferdinand Tönnies)

The inventor of the term sociology is Auguste Comte.

• Considered history as split into three stages. (Religious stage, some stage, Positivistic stage)

• Thought we need a discipline that studies the facts of society.

Later Herbert Spencer:

• Brought evolutionary theory into sociology, with ”social darwinism”

• Growth and differentiation: from simple to complex social ”organisms”

→ mainly led to defending imperialism and colonialism

Reactions to evolutionary and positivistic approaches introduced

• Wilhelm Dilthey: The division between the natural sciences and the spiritual science

• Max Weber: human action is intentional.

Three great figures that most sociologists agree are ”founding fathers”

• Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim, Max Weber

Weber and Durkheim were important for institutionalisation of sociology

Overview of course:

karl Marx

Emile Durkheim (Marcel Mauss)

Max Weber

Classical authors:

• Formal Sociology - Simmel

• Systems theory - Parsons

• The social construction of the color line – Du Bois

• Structuralism – Levi-Strauss

• Practice and reproduction – Bourdieu

• Actor Network Theoy – Latour

(This cannon is established both from inclusion as well as exclusion. It feels like the teacher is trying to open up the cannon despite being quite strained.)

Lectures will be recorded (I am still going tho)

We will have primary texts from authors in a completed reader.

Exams in January:

• Oral exam

• Two questions, one of which is formulated by the student, one by the teacher.

• Open book (ie. The reader, no text on the reader)