Introduction

Welcome to sociology! I've written this book to introduce you to one of the biggest and most fascinating disciplines in all of science. Yes, you read that right: Sociology is a science. Sociologists don't use beakers and test tubes, but like natural scientists, they do seek to learn about the world by creating theories and testing them with systematic observations.

I wrote the first edition of this book in 2009. Since then, sociologists have made many fascinating new discoveries, and you'll find lots of them in these pages. The biggest change in the world since that first edition was published, though, is the extraordinary new intensity with which people across the planet are asking questions about our social world.

• Why are problems like racism and sexism so persistent? Will they ever go away?
• Why does it increasingly seem like people on two sides of the political spectrum aren't even speaking the same language?
• Is it possible to understand the patterns of human activity that cause climate change, and to prepare for life on a warmer Earth?
• How are smartphones and social media changing our economy, our governments, and our daily life?

Spoiler alert: Sociologists can tell you a lot about society, but they can't solve every social problem - or tell you what your society ought to look like. You still have to decide for yourself what kind of world you want to live in, and learn how to communicate with people whose views differ from yours. The better you understand your social world, though, the better equipped you'll be to act responsibly and effectively in these changing, challenging times. Sociologists have been studying society for over 100 years, and they have a lot to teach us about how (and why) things change and how (and why) they stay the same.

Sociology can answer a lot of your questions about the social world, but it's most important as a tool for learning how to ask the right questions in the first place.

The achievements of sociologists are among the great achievements of the human race because in sociology, people from all different walks of life come together to understand society objectively - so that, in the long run, it can perhaps be made to work better for everyone. However you've come to sociology, I hope this book leaves you with a greater respect not just for sociologists wearing lab coats (yes, some of them actually do) but for your entire species, the first species on Earth capable of conscious self-analysis. What sociologists see when they look at society isn't always pretty, but that fact makes sociology all the more important: Just like you need to know how a car works before you can fix it, you need to understand how society works before you can change it.

About This Book

I've written this book to introduce you to sociology as a body of knowledge about society, but much more importantly to introduce you to sociology as a way of thinking about the world.

With a subject as vast and as frequently changing as human society, it would be foolish to try to write a "user's manual" - it would be outdated before the ink was dry. If this book makes you curious about a specific aspect of society - say, the job market in the United States or the changing class system - that's great. Your local library and the Internet are full of specific studies on these subjects, written by sociologists and other scholars, and I hope this book makes that information more accessible to you.

What I aim to do in this book is to introduce you to sociology as a discipline so you have the tools and understanding you need to succeed in a sociology class or to apply sociological concepts in your professional or personal life. The book is organized to take you from general questions (what is sociology? where did it come from? who does it, and how?) to more specific topics (how do sociologists study culture and socialization? how do sociologists define "class" and "race"?) to applications of those ideas (how can you use sociology in your everyday life?).

Sociologists study a lot of things - in fact, they study just about everything that has anything to do with people interacting - which means that most things studied by sociologists are also studied by people who don't consider themselves sociologists. What is special about sociology is precisely the fact that it involves the study of all those things together, not just some of them in isolation. The fact that sociologists consider all aspects of the social world together means that they are able to see connections that people who study only part of the social world cannot. Throughout this book, I emphasize what is unique about the sociological view of the world.

To make the content more accessible, I divide it into six parts:

• Part 1, "The Basic Basics": This part gives you the what/who/how: what sociology is (the scientific study of society), where it came from (the tumultuous 19th century), who does it (sociologists in academia as well as people outside academia who can benefit from its tools and insights), and how it's done (with a range of complementary methods, none of which are perfect but all of which have value). Reading this part will help you wrap your mind around what this thing called "sociology" really is.
• Part 2, "Seeing Society Like a Sociologist": No matter what aspect of social life you're interested in, there are some key sociological insights that will help you on your way. In this part, I explain how sociologists understand culture (what it is, and what it's not), the micro-macro link (what does "society" have to do with individual people interacting face to face), and the importance of social networks (what's the difference between your "society" and the people you actually know and interact with?). These fundamental insights are of value across all of sociology.
• Part 3, "Equality and Inequality in Our Diverse World": Just about everyone who studies society is in some way or another concerned about social inequality. Inequality doesn't have to mean stratification - that is, just because two people are different doesn't mean one is in a better or more powerful position than the other - but very often, it does. This part is devoted to that subject in all its various forms. I begin by explaining the general idea of social stratification (who's up, who's down?), then I go into some of the specific lines that divide social groups: race, ethnicity, sex, gender, religion, and the law (in the sense of being on "the wrong side" or "the right side" of the law).
• Part 4, "The Ins and Outs of Social Organization": People are always interacting, all the time - but as any parent of young children knows, "interacting" is not necessarily the same thing as "being productive." Corporations, nonprofit organizations, governments, social movements, and other social organizations represent people's deliberate attempts to band together to accomplish tasks, and in this part, I explain what sociologists know about when those attempts work and when they don't. Cities are a slightly different form of social organization, but people who live together in a city are together in a social organization whether they like it or not; at the conclusion of this part, I look at urban (as well as suburban and exurban) life.
• Part 5, "Sociology and Your Life": Your life is inextricably tied to your society - the life you've lived, the life you're living, and the life you will live. Understanding society can help you understand your own life. In this part, I first explain how sociologists think about individuals' life courses (including childhood, old age, health, and family life) and then look at what sociology can tell us about life in the future.
• Part 6, "The Part of Tens": This final part contains three chapters that get very specific: What interesting and readable sociology books are out there besides this one? How can you use sociology in your everyday life? The book concludes with the chapter that was my favorite to write: "Ten Myths About Society Busted By Sociology." Flip to that chapter to see how sociological insight will change the way you think about the social world around you.

Foolish Assumptions

Obviously, I can't possibly know each and every person who reads this book, but I can reasonably guess that you're living in the early 21st century, that you have some reason for being curious about sociology, and that you're likely - but not necessarily - living in an English-speaking country. I have not written this book under any further assumptions about who you might be or why you might be reading it.

I've drawn examples and illustrations from a wide array of social situations, but you may notice that there are especially frequent examples from the contemporary United States. In part that's because it's where I live, so that's what I know best. I've written the book in the first person, and often refer to my own life and personal history. Sociology is an objective science, but any given sociologist is a particular person...