SOCI 102 Final Textbook

The Sociological Imagination

The ability to connect individual experiences to the wider society and historical context.

Figuration

The practice of analyzing the individual and society simultaneously because they shape one another.

Social Facts

The external rules, values, and customs of a society that influence an individual's behavior.

Verstehen

A research goal of understanding social behavior from the perspective of the people involved.

Structural Functionalism

A perspective that views society as a system of parts working together to maintain social order.

Critical Sociology

A perspective that views society as a struggle for power and resources between different social groups.

Conflict Perspective

A sub-set of critical sociology that emphasizes how social structures promote the interests of powerful groups.

Symbolic Interactionism

A perspective that studies how individuals create shared meaning through face-to-face communication.

Manifest Functions

The recognized and intended consequences of any social pattern or institution.

Latent Functions

The unrecognized or unintended consequences of any social pattern or institution.

Dysfunctions

Social patterns that have a negative or disruptive effect on the operation of society.

Positivism

The belief that society should be studied using the same objective, scientific methods as the natural sciences.

Reification

The error of treating an abstract concept (like "The Government" or "Culture") as if it were a physical, living thing.

Disenchantment of the World

Max Weber's term for the replacement of magical or traditional thinking with rational, scientific, and bureaucratic logic.

Standpoint Theory

The idea that a person's social location (gender, race, class) provides a specific perspective on how the world works.

Anomie

A condition of social instability where people feel disconnected because society lacks clear norms or values.

Hunter-Gatherer Societies

Societies that rely on hunting wild animals and gathering uncultivated plants for survival.

Horticultural Societies

Societies based on the use of hand tools to cultivate plants

Agricultural Societies

Societies that rely on farming using plows and animals, leading to large food surpluses and social classes.

Industrial Societies

Societies characterized by a reliance on mechanized labor and the growth of urban centers (cities).

Post-Industrial Societies

Societies where the economy is based on the production of information and services rather than physical goods.

Social Integration

The strength of ties that people have to their social groups

Mechanical Solidarity

A type of social order maintained by the collective consciousness of a culture (common in pre-industrial societies).

Organic Solidarity

A type of social order based on interdependence and specialized work (common in modern industrial societies).

Base and Superstructure

Marx’s idea that a society’s economic system (base) determines its culture, law, and government (superstructure).

Bourgeoisie

In a capitalist society, the owners of the means of production (the ruling class).

Proletariat

In a capitalist society, the laborers who sell their labor power to the bourgeoisie for a wage.

Alienation

Marx's term for the feeling of separation from one's work, the products of that work, other people, and one's own human potential.

False Consciousness

A condition in which the beliefs of the oppressed work against their own interests (Marx).

Class Consciousness

The awareness of one's rank in society and the realization that the working class needs to unite to create change.

Rationalization

Weber’s term for the shift toward logic, efficiency, and predictability instead of tradition or emotion.

The Iron Cage

Weber’s metaphor for the way modern bureaucracy traps individuals in a system based purely on efficiency and control.

Habitualization

The idea that society is created by humans and human interaction, but is often repeated until it becomes a pattern.

Institutionalization

The act of implanting a convention or norm into society so that it is perceived as an objective reality.