Topic > Sociology Education - 729

Human needs and sociological trends are constantly evolving, and there was a demand for a science that could provide a less fact-based and more flexible examination of society. The nature from which social interactions should be studied is a matter of debate. Society can be examined at a macro or micro level. “Sociologists do not study individuals in isolation from each other, but instead focus on how people interact with each other, either directly or indirectly (on a face-to-face level) or indirectly (through internalized rules and expectations, the products of human activity ), awareness of others and institutionalized behavior models).” (Wotherspoon, 2014, p.6) Another problem of perspective arises with the question of how much we are shaped by our social environment. Does each unique human create society, or are humans shaped by pre-existing social structures and processes? This is debated by competing extremist theories of human agency and social structures. Also notable are discussions of whether to look at sociology through a necessary stable framework or with the lens that conflict and change are vital to social development. Sociology is analyzed from an assortment of perspectives using the above debates. First; Structural functionalism, which