Chapter 1 Sociology and Society | class 11th | ncert quick revision notes sociology

Sociology Class 11 Notes Chapter 1 Sociology and Society

• A society is a group of people who share a common culture, occupy a territorial area and are bound to each other by a common history.
• Societies may be simple, may be complex. It is natural to human beings. We all are social beings. We cannot survive without society. We human beings cannot attain our goals alone, we want society. The society provides us security, relationship, identity and sense of belonging ness.
• Society is mandatory not only for mere survival but also for a good life.
• Society is a continuous process. It is not imposed upon people. It goes on as a natural process. Social relations are the base of social structure. Society can be understood in its abstract as well as concrete form.
• The main characteristics of the society are interdependence, cooperation and conflict, mutual awareness, similarities and differences, abstraction in terms of relationship and dynamism in nature.
• Individual and society are directly related to each other. Both are complementary. The individuals live in collective activities not due to compulsion but by necessity. Human beings and their societies are inseparable although we all individuals are compliant and rebellion, conventional as well as unorthodox, submissive and aggressive i.e. all sort of contradictions and functioning with opposites.
• Biological, ecological, psychological and social factors significantly influence all of us. These influences cause variation in individual and with all commonality in cultural factors each individual becomes unique with different physical and psychological attributes.
• All human beings are social beings. We all belong to some culture which determines the individual’s economic maintenance system for personality development. The society basically promotes a particular system to everybody in which individual develops different terms of relationship.
• In this perspective human society is different from animal society. Human beings have its own culture and a dynamic communication system whereas the animal society has no culture and they have no dynamic form of speech. Animal
• behavior is instructive whereas we are social beings. Human society is dynamic and interdependent, having common goals and interact among one another whereas animals’ society is static.
• Sociology is a scientific and comprehensive study of society.
• The very origin of the word ‘Sociology’ comes from the Latin word ‘Socius’ (companion) and the Greek word Ology (study of), to indicate its nature as a hybrid discipline.
• August Comte, a French philosopher coined the term Sociology in 1838 and called it the science of human associations. He is known as the ‘Father of Sociology’. The contributions of Durkheim Spencer and Max Weber is significant to develop Sociology as a separate discipline.
• Sociology is a scientific study but due to its relationship with social life it can neither be specifically defined nor its boundaries can be marked. According to Bottomore, “Sociology is a modern science, not a century old.” Sociology is a new science.
• Emile Durkheim said that Sociology is the study of collective representation. Human personality i.e. cognitive (Thinking), conative (Behavioral) and Affective (Feeling) constitute social facts. These social facts are external dimension of human mind which controls human behavior to maintain the social network. According to Durkheim, “All that which is a social fact constitutes the subject matter of Sociology.”
• According to Hobhouse, “Sociology studies the interaction of human minds.”
• Park and Burgese said that Sociology is the science to study collective behavior. According to Max Weber, human activities are goal directed, which fulfills some objectives. All human beings engage in actions for the realization of given goals. Sociology asserts the importance of the community and the comparatively limited possibilities that exist for social change.
• It has often been taken up by the social reforms.
• In the present form, Sociology embraces a range of different views concerning both what a social science should comprise, and what might be the proper subject matter of Sociology in particular.
• There are three general conceptions of the object of sociological interest:
  • Social ‘Structure’ in the sense of patterns of relationships which have an independent existence, over and above the individuals or groups that occupy positions in these structures at any particular time e.g. the positions of nuclear family may remain same from generation to generation.
  • Collective Representations: Meaning and ways of cognitively organizing the world which have a continued existence over and above the individuals who are socialized into them.
  • Meaningful Social Action: According to this view, there is no such thing as society; merely individuals or groups entering into social relationships with each other.
• By and large Sociology as a scientific discipline has certain characteristics. It is a social science, not a natural science, which studies social groups and social relations. It is a categorical science, not a normative science because it deals with ‘what is’ instead of ‘Who ought to be’.
• Sociology is a pure science, not an applied science. It simply collects the knowledge about human society. It is an abstract science not a concrete science. It simply deals with the design and norms and interested in the fact that despite the differences in their origin and culture people live in a common human society.
• Sociology is a science of generalization and not specialization. It simply makes generalizations about human groups, social actions, societies and their structure. Sociology is both a rational and empirical science. It draws facts, classify them and derive their mutual relationship which are verified with empirical evidence with minimum error and maximum accuracy.
• Sociology analyses society. It focuses on the emergence of society. It deals with major social units and their dynamics.
• There are two main schools of thought to determine the scope of society.
  • Formal School: According to this perspective, sociology studies the forms of social relations. The propounders ofthis approach are Weber, Simmel, Vierkandt Ward and Von Wiese.
  • Synthetic School: This school mainly emphasizes on the need of social science which studies general conditions of school life. It studies society as a whole. Main propounders of this school are Durkheim, Hob house and Sorokin. Sociology is a comprehensive study of society. It is positively related with other social sciences particularly with economics, history, psychology and political science.
• Sociology and history are positively related as both are social sciences and concerned with each other. But Sociology is a general science.
• History is a special science dealing with events only. It focuses on description of historical events using historical facts. Sociology uses scientific methods to derive facts.
• Sociology analyses the social problems and provides solutions whereas history simply provides description of facts.
• Sociology is an analytical discipline whereas history is a descriptive discipline.
• Sociology is concerned with the present and to some extent with future whereas history studies only the past. Sociology deals with the similarities in different events whereas history focuses on differences in similar events.
• Sociology is an abstract science. It studies the social processes and relationships, whereas history is a concrete science, which focuses on social events occurred due to social interaction.
• Sociology and political science are related to each other being social sciences but both have different domains.
• Sociology is a general science whereas political science is a special science, dealing with political aspect of human life.
• Political science focuses only on one form of human association, the ‘state’ but sociology deals with all forms of association.
• Sociology is considered a broader form of political science.
• Political Science treats human beings with a political perspective whereas Sociology explains how the people change as a political animal.
• According to Barnes, “The most significant thing about sociology and political theory is that most of the changes that have taken place in the political theory in the last 50 years have been suggested and marked out by sociology.”
• Sociology and social psychology have a positive link.
• Sociology studies the society while psychology studies the individual in the society.
• Sociology focuses on organisations of group while psychology studies the individuals.
• Sociology deals with social processes whereas psychology is the study of mental processes like Attention, Memory, Learn up etc.
• Sociology and Anthropology are closely related because anthropology is the study of man and its development of human race and sociology studies modem society in which the people live.
• Anthropology studies culture which is small and static while sociology studies the dynamic and vast culture.
• Sociology is a comprehensive study of whole society whereas economics studies only the economic part of the society. Sociology is an extensive science as it focuses on all the aspects whereas economics mainly deals with economic view point.
• Sociological approach is collectivistic to deal with people whereas economics has individualistic approach .
• Social behavior is explained in sociology through social norms but in economics activities of people are dealt from rules of economics.
• Sociology is related with social relations in general terms whereas economics being special science focuses only on economic relations.

Important terms:

• Anthropology: The multidisciplinary study and analysis of the origin and characteristics of human beings and their societies, customs and beliefs. It is the study of primitive society and studies man and the development of human race.
• Bourgeoisie: The middle class, especially regarded as politically conservative and socially self interested.
• Capitalism: An economic system based on private rather than state, ownership of businesses, factories, transport services etc, with free competition and profit making.
• Dialectic: The existence or action of opposing social forces.
• Feminism: A belief or movement advocating the cause of women’s rights and opportunities particularly equal rights with men, by challenging inequalities between the sexes in society.
• Gemeinschoft: A kind of society in which life intimates, a community in which everyone knows every one else and people share a sense of cohesiveness.
• Gesellschaft: A form of society characterized by impersonal relationship, individual accomplishment and self-interest.
• Macro Sociology: The study of large social groups, organisation and social systems.
• Micro Sociology: The study of human behavior in context of face to face interaction.
• Positivism: Method of scientific inquiry and given emphasis on empirical research rather than introspection method.
• Praxis: Practice to find solution of human problems.
• Society: Web of social relationship.
• Values: Ideal mode of behavior i.e. what ‘ought to be’ or should be aspect of life.
• Sociology: A recently developed academic discipline, based upon the tenet that all animals and human behavior is ultimately dependent upon genetic encoding moulded through evolutionary history by the process of selection.