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EMILE DURKHEIM
Training Handout
A Very Brief Summary
The general approach of
Durkheim
could be described in various ways.
He wanted sociology to be a science,
distinct from other sciences and from other academic disciplines.
He wanted to avoid "reductionism,"
meaning to reduce answers explaining social phenomena by referring to psychological
or individual causes.
He gave us a first understanding
of the sociological perspective, that although culture and society are
carried inside us as individuals, it behaves as a level of reality that
transcends, or cuts across, individuals.
His studies of
suicide
are important to us in their revealing that sociological
perspective.
Suicide is not an act that is easily
studied by asking individuals ––
those who are successful at it tend to be dead, while those who attempt
it unsuccessfully do so perhaps as a cry for help, and may not lead us
to understanding those who are successful.
He looked at rates of suicide, and
saw they varied by country, religion, gender, marital status, and religious
affiliation, but that the rates stayed consistent for each
category.
He coined the term "social fact,"
referring to those rates, and said we should explain social facts by social
facts, not by psychological or biological facts.
He said that our degree of being
connected to the small groups around us, leads to being more connected
to the larger society.
Those with low levels of connectivity,
which he called "anomie," were more likely to have fewer forces making
us conform to social values and expectations, and thus more likely to commit
suicide or engage in other disapproved acts.
The concept of social fact lies behind
the thinking of Kroeber who coined the word
"
superorganic."
He looked at the "glue" that held
society together, which he called
"solidarity"
and suggested that in simpler societies that solidarity was based upon
sameness and conformity, which he called "mechanical solidarity."
In more complex societies where there
was not only greater division of labour in the productive or economic areas
but a greater diversity of roles and responsibility in general, we are
or were held together by our interdependence upon each other.
He led us to our first sociological
understanding of the relationships between individuals and society, in
that he contradicted common sense notions or perspectives.
From common sense, we feel that society
is made up of and controlled by individuals, whereas Durkheim showed us
that individuals are products of society, and that society has various
characteristics that go beyond the individual, and can not be explained
by individual behaviour.
The classical perceptive,
functionalism,
derives from the writing of Durkheim.
Another important point (not Durkheim's,
but mine) is that we should not
anthropomorphise
society or culture.
I write about that word in my
"
key
words" section on this site. Society cannot
think, it can not feel, it can not judge, it can not see, or do many things
that individual human beings can and do.
This is part of the sociological perspective.
See keywords: Social
Fact.
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