Social Science

• Branch of science that deals with human behaviour in its social and cultural aspects.

• Social Sciences include: cultural (social) anthropology, sociology, political science, and economics.

• Includes also social and economic geography and those areas of education that deal with the social contexts of learning and the relation of the school to the social order.

The focus of the social sciences is on the study of the following:

1. Change in human relationship and reinterpretation between the present and past events.

2. Human activities and spatial distributions an interaction of culture, biological and physical elements.

3. Basic social systems, institutions and recesses.

4. Relationships between individual and institutions; and among political economic and social institutions.

5. The nature of societies and authors; and the interactions of people with each other and also their social and physical environment.

Origins of the term Social Science

The term social science does not fit easily in the universe of scholarship, especially not in English, sciences and socials are somewhat happier expressions, though they too have suffered from being interpreted either too widely or to narrowly. Frequently social science is meant to define either sociology or synthetic social theory only. Everywhere the implied analogy to the natural sciences has been contested. In 1982 the British Government challenged the name of the publicly financed social science research council; arguing “inter–alia” that “social studies” would be more appropriate description for discipline of scholarship which cannot justly claim to be scientific.

Social science can be defined as study of men living in society. It was said that man is a political animal. This observation was broadened in to the view that he is a social animal. Social sciences deal with group’s activity and achievements.

Definitions of Social Science

1. According to Martin Seligman -“social sciences as those mental or cultural sciences which deal with the activities of the individual as member of the group. The term social sciences thus embrace all those subjects which deal with the relationship of man to the society.

2. According to Mitchell “the term social science is loosely applied to any kind of study concerning man and society. In the strict sense it should refer the application of scientific method to the study of the intricate and complex network of human relationship and the form of organization designed to enable people to live together in societies.

3. According to Fairchild,” social science as a general term for all the sciences which are concerned with the human affairs.”

4. According to Peter Lewis,” social sciences are concerned with the laws that govern society and the social department of man.” So, we can say that social sciences embrace all those subjects which deal with the human affairs. The social sciences overlap each other.

Distinctive Characteristics of Social Sciences

The study of man as a unique living creature may be viewed in two fundamental dimensions:

a) Man as an individual being; b) Man as a social being

History of Social Sciences

• In the period of 1760, some effort was spent on the study of man and society. Hobbes Leviathan; Lock’s Two Treatises on Government; Vicos New Science; and Montesquieu Spirit of Laws were all published in this period.

• The revival of interest in social science occurred in the middle of the 18 th century. By the middle of 18th century, capitalism had begun to outgrow its early state and gradually it became the dominant socio-economic system in western and northern Europe.

• In the second half of the 18 th century, urbanization and population growth became accelerated, and during this period slums, alcoholism, brutality of manners etc developed which were to become the targets of social reforms .In the other half of the 18 th cntury, in response to the above there is a multiplication of works with a scientific character:

• Auguste Comte ( 1798-1853) invented the term sociology .The was the first to systematized and give a complete analysis of the principles of the positive character of the social sciences

• 19th century development- At the beginning of the 19 th century, social science had attained in all the leading European countries a firm and respectable position.

• In the 20 th century we can also observe recurrent occasions when proposals for a generalized social science were made. The contribution of Auguste Comte was accepted immediately; Emile Durkheim and the sociologists of the late xix century and early xx century were influenced by him. Karl Marx gave the first general theory of social science.

• 1950s, the term behavioural sciences has often been applied to the disciplines designated as the social sciences. Those who favour this term do so in part do so in part because these disciplines are thus brought closer to some of the sciences, such as physical anthropology and physiological psychology, which also deals with human behaviour. Whether the term behavioural sciences will in time supplant “social sciences” or whether it will, as neologisms so often have before, fade away is impossible way.

• Social Sciences do not proceed the 19th century-- that is, as distinct and recognized disciplines of thought-- one must go back farther in time of the origins of some of the fundamental ideas and objectives. In the largest sense, the origins go all the way back to the ancient Greeks and their rationalist inquiries into the nature of humans, state, and morality.

• 20th Century Development- At this stage the social science has become institutionalized to a high degree. It has now become a subject of research.

Lawrence A. Kempton in his article “Social Sciences Today” states that social science as science is very young and there is confusion with regards to its limits and boundaries. History moves in to the humanities, economics becomes mathematics, anthropology and psychology ally themselves with biology and the geography is at home with physical science.

While in its initial period, it may have been the preoccupation of a group of semi-amateurs, philosopher, practical men in business and government, or gentleman of leisure; it now has become a subject of research on the part of academic specialists. In the third and the most mature stage of discipline the battles over method have subsided, the theoretical rivalries tend to be submerged in the efforts to elaborate propositions bridging the differences and contributing towards the further progress of the discipline.