What is Sociology?

Sociology is a critical thinking discipline. Its founder Auguste Comte was an eccentric French philosopher of the 1840’s who wanted to study human behavior scientifically. Sociology is the scientific understanding of human behavior and the institutions that mold that behavior (Kendall, 2014). Comte used the term “positivism” to denote studying human behavior scientifically. At the core of the definition is how institutions mold human behavior. The institutions sociologist study includes the family, law enforcement, religion, media, government, education, health, prisons, and the military.

While studying human behavior scientifically sociologists bring to light disturbing figures. Suicide historically was the favorite study of the early sociologists. Following Comte’s model of positivism Emile Durkheim wrote the first sociological classic, “Suicide” in the early 1890s. This masterpiece is relevant today. It was Emile Durkheim who coined the four types of suicide: altruistic, anomie, fatalistic, and egoistic (Durkheim 1897). These types of suicide are used today amongst sociologists and psychologists has talking points. Altruistic suicide is committed by terrorists out of a sense of duty in order to retaliate against the perceived enemy. Often sociologists discover facts that don’t go with common perceptions. For example, with altruistic suicide over 80% of the suicide bombers that killed our troops in the Iraqi war came from the country of Saudi Arabia not Iraq. (Hafez, 2008).  According to the Center for Disease Control a federal government agency in Atlanta suicide is in the top ten causes of death for Americans. Also according to the CDC suicide is the second leading cause of death among young adults and teenagers, while accidents are the first. What I find especially disturbing is that the facts show that many suicides are disguised has accidents.

Over 41,000 Americans killed themselves in 2014 http://www.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus14 pdf) According to this federal data suicides account for two thirds of all gun deaths. Catherine Baker a suicide prevention specialist at Harvard points out that gun owning homes have a much higher risk of suicide than homes without guns. Simple put a suicide attempt is more likely to involve a gun since firearms succeed 85 percent of the times versus other methods. Within the institution of the military suicide rates are staggering. Virginia Cervasio a sociologist who is the CEO of the non-profit CARES (Suicide prevention) of which I volunteer knows this first hand. Her son returned from Iraq and killed himself with a handgun in 2006. According to Virginia Cervasio, “Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem”. Divided into day and time 22 veterans are killing themselves each day or one every one hour and fifteen minutes (http://www.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus14 pdf). Over the last eight years all of the veterans that I have counseled suffer from PTSD.  So often the medications diagnosed for PTSD are ironically a suicide cocktail especially when mixed with alcohol. More of our brave troops die from suicide then combat.

Sociology for college students is an eye opener. The discipline exposes homicide rates, incarceration rates, police brutality rates, rape rates, illiteracy rates, poverty rates and homelessness to mention a few. For college freshman a mind boggler is that 1 out of every 4 people behind bars in the whole world is in the United States (Parenti, 2009).  The United States is only 5% of the world’s population which makes that figure surreal. The facts on other social problems go on and on with Sociology at the forefront of bringing them to the public’s attention. The pictures that emerges from Sociology classes are not pretty. This should not be taken as an attack on the United States for there is no way we can solve these problems without knowing the extent to which they exist. Sociology is a critical thinking discipline that can be provocative, engaging, disturbing and even humbling. I see the discipline of Sociology has the blending of history, theory and facts which makes for powerful critical thinking. A major component of critical thinking is to cognitively go where one does not want to go. Common barriers to critical thinking include wishful thinking, cognitive dissonance, pride, selective memory, provincialism and egocentrism. Debunking is a critical thinking skill students learn in Sociology classes. Many distinguished college professors are noted for the following quote, “when the need to believe increases the ability to distinguish between fact and fiction decreases”. One of the noble goals of Auguste Comte was for Sociology to cure “false consciousness”. False consciousness is a subjective interpretation of reality that doesn’t go with the objective facts (Kendall,2014). Through positivism Sociology uncovers those objective facts. 

Michael Granata

References:

Kendall, Diane “Sociology in Our Times 9^th Edition”, (Wadsworth Cengage learning 2014)

Hafez, Mohammed “Suicide Bombers in Iraq”, (United States Institute of Peace 2008)

Durkheim, Emile “Suicide”, (New York: The Free Press 1951)

Parenti, Michael “Democracy for the Few 8^th Edition” Thomson Wadsworth Publishing 2009)