INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY
The Birth of Sociology
Auguste Comte (1798–1857),
widely considered the “father of sociology,” became interested in studying
society because of the changes that took place as a result of the French
Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. During the French Revolution, which
began in 1789, France’s class system changed dramatically. Aristocrats suddenly
lost their money and status, while peasants, who had been at the bottom of the
social ladder, rose to more powerful and influential positions. The Industrial
Revolution followed on the heels of the French Revolution, unfolding in
Western Europe throughout the 1800s. During the Industrial Revolution, people
abandoned a life of agriculture and moved to cities to find factory jobs. They
worked long hours in dangerous conditions for low pay. New social problems
emerged and, for many decades, little was done to address the plight of the
urban poor.
Comte looked at the
extensive changes brought about by the French Revolution and the Industrial
Revolution and tried to make sense of them. He felt that the social sciences
that existed at the time, including political science and history, couldn’t
adequately explain the chaos and upheaval he saw around him. He decided an
entirely new science was needed. He called this new science sociology,
which comes from the root word socius, a Latin word that means
“companion” or “being with others.” Comte decided that to understand society,
one had to follow certain procedures, which we know now as the scientific
method. The scientific method is the use of systematic and specific
procedures to test theories in psychology, the natural sciences, and other
fields. Comte also believed in positivism, which is the application
of the scientific method to the analysis of society. Comte felt that sociology
could be used to inspire social reforms and generally make a society a better
place for its members. Comte’s standards of “research” were not nearly as
exacting as today’s, and most of his conclusions have been disregarded, as they
were based mostly on observation rather than serious investigation.
In the United States,
sociology was first taught as an academic discipline at the University of
Kansas in 1890, at the University of Chicago in 1892, and at Atlanta University
in 1897. Over time, it spread to other universities in North America. The first
department of sociology opened at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, in
1922, followed by sociology departments at Harvard University in 1930 and at
the University of California at Berkeley in the 1950s.
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