Define sociology and Sociological imagination

Name:
Tutor:
Course:
Date
Define Sociology and Sociological Imagination
Introduction
Sociology can be defined as the study of how people live and interact with each other within specific settings. Other scholars define sociology as a science that guides our understanding of social issues (Gurero 3). These includes, people’s behavior, how social relationships affects peoples’ behavior, and the role of society in the process. Sociology can be viewed in two different ways; first from a broader perspective of society looking at structures like social status and how one relates in a group. Second, on a small scale like just at an individual family level (Gurero 6).
Social Imagination
The ability to alter one’s thinking to another way of thinking is referred to as social imagination. Social imagination, when applied helps one have a creative thought in order to find answers to all the sociological questions. Having social imagination is important because it enables individuals realize how social situations affect people in different ways through historical positions. This type of thinking helps one also understand how things in a given society have resulted to the type of outcomes that are being witnessed (Ritzer 32).
As emphasized by Wright Mills, the founder of social imagination theory, he believes that by using our sociological imagination people are able to relate to their problems like alcoholism or poverty, connecting them to the society faults, because social imagination requires people to move away from the usual thinking and start thinking differently, to have an alternative view of things (Gurero 7). Sociological imagination helps one see the deeper world and people from a different perspective, which can be meaningful. When trying to understand the world, relationships are important in uncovering people‘s behavior in a society. Relationships would exhibit how people relate to each other and the society as a whole. For example, some people may identify themselves in terms of gender, race, social class, or nationality among others. Relationships would also help people understand the connection between individuals and communities they live. By understanding relationships, people would be able to know how individuals interact with existing institutions like family, religion and law enforcement authorities (Gurero 9).
Human Relationship
Relationships are important because are the cause of problems in any society. Social structures formed because of these relationships, shape people’s world. These factors are not easily seen, but can only be viewed by deeply analyzing people’s daily way of life, meaning that things are not the way they look like. Sociology, therefore, is a way of unmasking the answer to this question (Ritzer 32). Sociology looks for the answers as to why things are not the way they look like. Sociology encourages people to look at the world from a different type of lens using social imagination to understand why the relationships individuals’ have with other people in the society give them certain status in society. To look at the sociological perspective of life, history has to be part of this view (Ritzer 34).
For one to understand why things a...