SOCIOLOGY

SEMESTER 1

NOTES FOR SOCIOLOGY BS PSYCHOLOGY

 SOCIOLOGY
DEFINITION:
Sociology is an attempt to understand how membership in one's social group affects
individual behavior. The first social scientist to use the term sociology was a Frenchman by the name of
AUGUSTE COMTE who lived from 1798-1857. As coined by Comte:

the term sociology is a combination

of two words. The first part of the term is a Latin, SOCIUS that may variously mean society, association,
togetherness or companionship. The other word, logos, is of Greek origin. It literally means to speak
about or word. However, the term is generally understood as study or science. Thus, the literal
definition of sociology is that it is the word or speaking about society. A simple definition here is that it is
the study of society and culture.

REFERENCES:
The first social scientist to use the term sociology was a Frenchman by the name of
AUGUSTE COMTE who lived from 1798-1857. He was the sociology’s founding father. He believed that
sociology can be studied in a same way as a natural world.

More others are KARL MARX and MAX WEBER who have wrote about the class conflict, historical
materialism and social action as well.

Society and culture:

Society:
“society is a group of people who live within some type of bounded territory and who share
a common way of life”.

Culture:
“culture is a common way of life shared by a society or a group”.

Basic features of culture:

• Culture is implicit and explicit

• Culture is stable and changing

• Culture is overt and covert

• Culture is learned and shared

• Culture is symbolic

• Culture is ideal and manifest

ELEMENTS OF CULTURE:
It includes symbol, values, norms, and language.

Symbols:
symbols are the central component of culture. symbols are words, objects, gestures,
sounds or images that represent something else rather than themselves. Symbolic thought is unique and
crucial to humans and to culture. It is the human ability to give a thing or event an arbitrary meaning
and grasp and appreciate that meaning.

Values:
Values are essential elements of non-material culture. They may be defined as general,
abstract guidelines for our lives, decisions, goals, choices, and actions. They are shared ideas of a groups
or a society as to what is right or wrong, correct or incorrect, desirable or undesirable, acceptable or
unacceptable, ethical or unethical, etc., regarding something.

Norms:
Norms are also essential elements of culture. They are implicit principles for social life,
relationship and interaction. Norms are detailed and specific rules for specific situations. They tell us
how to do something, what to do, what not to do, when to do it, why to do it, etc. Norms are derived
from values. That means, for every specific norm, there is a general value that determines its content.

Language:
Language, specifically defined as a system of verbal and in many cases written symbols
with rules about how those symbols can be strung together to convey more complex meanings, is the
distinctive capacity and possession of humans; it is a key element of culture. Culture encompasses
language, and through language, culture is communicated and transmitted. Without language it would
be impossible to develop, elaborate and transmit culture to the future generation.