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A Sociology Exhibit

Organizing Relationships

Introduction to the Science of Sociology (by Park, Robert Ezra)
Village Life in China; A Study in Sociol... (by Smith, Arthur Henderson)
Domesday Studies, Being the Papers Read ... Volume 2 (by Domesday Commemoration)
The Principles of Sociology : Volume 1 (by Spencer, Herbert)
The Sexual Life of the Child (by Moll, Albert)
The Laws of Imitation (by Tarde, Gabriel)
Democratic Ideals and Reality : A Study ... (by Halford John Mackinder)
Almost a Woman (by Wood-Allen, Mary)
Almost a Man (by Wood-Allen, Mary)
Manifesto of the Communist Party (by Marx, Karl)
Folkways (by Sumner, William Graham)
Theories of Social Progress, A Critical ... (by Todd, Arthur James)
Conception Control and Its Effects on th... (by Barrett, Florence Elizabeth Perry, Lady)
Six Thousand Country Churches (by Gill, Charles Otis)
The Challenge of the Country: A Study of... (by George Walter Fiske, Young Mens Christian Associat...)

Organizing Relationships: A Sociology Exhibit

Many disciplines beyond Sociology, such as Mathematics and Psychology and Economics, are utilized in the Social Sciences. In our Collections under these and other topics, contain hundreds of titles by writers and theorists who have dedicated to their lives to the study of human society. Featured books in the following collections include Herbert Spencer, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Talcott Parsons and David Emile Durkheim.

Sociology of Past Power Structures

Throughout history, all sub-disciplines of Sociology, as well and religious and government groups have been studied and experimented with different methods of social organization of population. Sometimes, these attempts at social definitions and control have been tempered, but at other times, rigid – some men have use groups for their own gain. Ultimately, however, if social organization is to be implemented, it has to be understood.

From the beginning of time, both men and animals have used verbal and non-verbal cues and strategies to enforce hierarchy. With chimpanzees, it is the Alpha Male. With men: Domesday Books, mathematics and accounting, psychology and linguistics. The word “organization” is derived from the Greek word organon, which means "organ." Therefore, studies of how groups of people (with a common goal) structure themselves, is the study of mankind and its relationships as a collective.

The Domesday Book, created under the reign of William the Conqueror, has been studied to understand the role of documentation in asserting authority and also to facilitate taxation. According to Young Folks’ History of England, William the Conqueror was a Norman who conquered England. In 1086, he ordered the documentation of land, livestock and taxes under the administration of the previous rulers, to find out what would be transferred over to Norman rule. Whatever was recorded in the Domesday book could not be appealed. The data that William the Conqueror collected into the Domesday book revealed his tendency for control. In the book titled, William the Conqueror, it is said that “William would not set...over any part of his dominions before his time, and it was his policy to keep his children dependent on him. While he enriched his brothers, he did not give the smallest scrap of the spoils of England to his sons” (William the Conqueror, World Heritage Encyclopedia). Robert, his son, was angry about this and fought his father in a battle, but later asked for his pardon. Today, the Domesday Books is considered an artifact of sociological research. Domesday Studies, Being the Papers Read at the Meetings of the Domesday Commemoration 1886 examines how this document changed the course of history in the United Kingdom (Domesday Studies, Being the Papers Read at the Meetings of the Domesday Commemoration 1886, Edward P. Dove).

Debates in Defining Sociology

Lambert Adolphe Jacques Quetelet was a 19th-Century Belgian mathematician, statistician and sociologist who introduced statistical methods into the social sciences. He assigned variables to the complexity of social phenomena, in order to measure the statistical laws underlying crime, marriage or suicide rates. Other scientists thought his ideas were controversial because it contradicted freedom of choice (“Lambert Adolphe Jacques Quetelet,” World Heritage Encyclopedia).

The author of Adolphe Quetelet, A Statistician discusses Auguste Comte as another researcher of social physics and sociology, but that Quetelet invented the method of investigation for “social physics” (Adolphe Quetelet as Statistician, Frank Hamilton Hawkins). So Comte reinvented the term sociologie (sociology) to differentiate it from Quetelet’s collection of statistics (“Adolphe Quetelet,” World Heritage Encyclopedia). Comte believed that there was an order of nature, not of man, which could be scientifically understood by unifying history, psychology and economics. Social ills could be remedied through sociological positivism, or using a broader philosophy that methodologically orders scientific observations (Outlines of Sociology, Lester Frank Ward). In this book, Ward writes Comte’s use of the term “hierarchy” did not imply subordination. “There is genetic affiliation without subordination. The more complex and less exact sciences may be regarded as the children of the more simple and exact ones, but between parent and offspring there is no difference or rank.” Additionally, he wrote that Comte “laid the foundations for understanding the more complex sciences by acquainting himself with the simpler ones upon which the other sciences successively rest” (Outlines of Sociology, Lester Frank Ward). Other social scientists like Karl Marx also mixed scientific methods to measure social impacts of industrialization occurring in Europe, documented in his work Wage Labour and Capital ("Wage Labour and Capital," Karl Marx).

Studying Social Life

David Émile Durkheim was a 19th century French sociologist who believed that sociology should study phenomena attributed to society at large, rather than being limited to the specific actions of individuals. Barbara Anne Mendheim however, applied sociology differently in The Sociology of Gender in a Kindergarten-First Grade Classroom. She writes that people gain knowledge of the social world by identifying typicality and finding language to order their social experience. For example, girls understand that being a girl means being personally relevant and intimate with other people. Boys understand being a boy through being powerful and competent in the world (The Sociology of Gender in a Kindergarten-First Grade Classroom, Barbara Anne Mendheim). However, in Woman: Her Charm and Power, Robert Downes uses sociological methods to explore how women in Egyptian and Iranian society were given opportunity for education and in leadership. But in Roman culture, women’s roles were to birth children. Women’s positions in society are influenced by the dominant culture’s definition of their functions and role in society (Woman: Her Charm and Power, Robert Downes).

Sociology has also been used to study group relations. Max Weber’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism discusses how entrepreneurs used religion to spread the system of capitalism. By tapping into religious belief systems, he proffered, people could work toward their profit making motive.

Works Cited

"August Compte." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

“David Émile Durkheim.” World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

"Domesday Book." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Dove, P. Edward. "Domesday Studies, Being the Papers Read at the Meetings of the Domesday Commemoration 1886." London: Longmans, Green and Company, 1886.

Downes, Robert. Woman: Her Charm and Power. London: The Epworth Press, 1900.

Hawkins, Frank Hamilton. Adolphe Quetelet as Statistician. New York: Columbia University Press, 1877.

“Lambert Adolphe Jacques Quetelet.” World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Marx, Karl. "Wage Labour and Capital." Neue Rheinische Zeitung, April 1849. Reproduced: World Public Library, 2002. Web.

Mendheim, Barbara Anne. The Sociology of Gender in a Kindergarten-First Grade Classroom. Diss. University of Florida, 1979.

“Norman People.” World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

"Sociology." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Ward, Lester Frank. Outlines of Sociology. New York: The MacMillan Company, 1921.

Weber, Max. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. New York: Scribner, 1930

“William the Conqueror.” World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Yonge, Charlotte Mary. Young Folks’ History of England. Boston: Estes and Lauriet, 1879.

Sociology Collections

"Organizing Relationships: A Sociology Exhibit" demonstrates how sociological methods have been used to study the configuration of power, through documentation, analysis of order, and social effects. Sociology brings together different methods of thinking, to understand the complexity of society more accurately, and why we should always be vigilant of power.

Learn more about how the discipline of sociology is used, in these collections:

Top 100 books on Sociology

Introduction to the Science of Sociology (by Park, Robert Ezra)
Village Life in China; A Study in Sociol... (by Smith, Arthur Henderson)
Domesday Studies, Being the Papers Read ... Volume 2 (by Domesday Commemoration)
The Principles of Sociology : Volume 1 (by Spencer, Herbert)
The Sexual Life of the Child (by Moll, Albert)
The Laws of Imitation (by Tarde, Gabriel)
Democratic Ideals and Reality : A Study ... (by Halford John Mackinder)
Almost a Woman (by Wood-Allen, Mary)
Almost a Man (by Wood-Allen, Mary)
Manifesto of the Communist Party (by Marx, Karl)
Folkways (by Sumner, William Graham)
Theories of Social Progress, A Critical ... (by Todd, Arthur James)
Conception Control and Its Effects on th... (by Barrett, Florence Elizabeth Perry, Lady)
Six Thousand Country Churches (by Gill, Charles Otis)
The Challenge of the Country: A Study of... (by George Walter Fiske, Young Mens Christian Associat...)

Top 100 books on Psychology

Totem and Taboo (by Freud, Sigmund)
Applied Psychology : A Series of Twelve ... (by Warren Hilton)
The Psychology of Beauty (by Puffer, Ethel D.)
Malignant Self Love (by Vaknin, Sam)
The Nervous Housewife (by Myerson, Abraham)
Crime and Punishment (by Dostoevsky, Fyodor)
Why Worry? (by George Lincoln Walton)
Psychology from the Standpoint of a Beha... (by Watson, John B. (John Broadus))
Talks to Teachers on Psychology, And to ... (by James, William)
The Art of War (by Tzu, Sun)
Talks to Teachers on Psychology, And to ... (by James, William)
An Introduction to the Theory of Mental ... (by Thorndike, Edward Lee)
Studies in Forensic Psychiatry (by Glueck, Bernard)
The Principles of Psychology (by William James)
Mind and Motion and Monism (by Romanes, George John)

Top 100 books on Economics

The Conquest of Bread (by Kropotkin, Petr Alekseevich, Kniaz)
Letters of David Ricardo to Thomas Rober... (by Ricardo, David)
Annie Besant : An Autobiography (by Annie Wood Besant)
Wage-Labor and Capital (by Marx, Karl)
Profits, Wages, and Prices (by David Friday)
Autobiography of Mother Jones, The (by Jones, Mary Harris)
On Liberty (by John Stuart Mill)
The Trade Unions : An Appeal to the Work... (by Robert Somers)
Looking Backward from 2000 to 1887 (by Bellamy, Edward)
The Way to Wealth; Or, Poor Richard Impr... (by Franklin, Benjamin)
The Theory of the Leisure Class (by Veblen, Thorstein)
The Wealth of Nations (by Adam Smith)
A synopsis of the first three books of J... (by Mill, John Stuart)
The Acquisitive Society (by Tawney, Richard Henry)
In Praise of Poverty

Top 100 books on Government

The Petition of Right (by Relf, Frances Helen)
Discourses Concerning Government Volume 1 (by Sidney, Algernon)
Assize of Arms
The Mayflower Compact
Das Kapital (by Karl Marx)
The American Democrat : Or, Hints on the... (by James Fenimore Cooper)
Introduction to the Principles of Morals... (by Bentham, Jeremy)
The Principles of Natural and Politic La... (by Burlamaqui, Jean Jacques)
The moral crusader, William Lloyd Garris... (by Smith, Goldwin)
An Essay on the History of Civil Society (by Adam Ferguson)
The Prince (by Machiavelli, Niccolò)
Discourses on the First (by Niccolò Machiavelli)
The Rights of the British Colonies Asser... (by Otis, James)
Japan and Her Destiny My Struggle for Pe... (by Mamoru Shigemitsu)
Of the Law of Nature and Nations : Eight... (by Pufendorf, Samuel, Freiherr Von)

Top 100 books on Law

Ancient Law (by Maine, Henry Sumner, Sir)
The Foreign Relation of China: A History... (by Pao, Ming-Chien)
Sacred Text : Common Sense, Volume I (by Paine, Thomas)
Federal Civil Rights Enforcement Effort;... Volume Year 1970 (by United States Commission On Civil Rights)
Fulfilling the Letter and Spirit of the ... (by United States Commission On Civil Rights)
Two Centuries' Growth of American Law, 1... (by Yale Law School)
The Cyclopedic Law Dictionary : Comprisi... (by Shumaker, Walter A)
The Case of the Cherokee Nation against ... (by Cherokee Nation)
Meditations (by Aurelius, Marcus)
The Critique of Practical Reason (by Kant, Immanuel)
The Critique of Practical Reason (by Kant, Immanuel)
Constitution and Laws of the Cherokee Na... (by Cherokee Nation, Oklahoma)
The Social Contract, Or Principles of Po... (by Rousseau, Jean Jacques)
The Simma Theologica Volume I (by Aquinas, Thomas, Saint)
Report on the Right of the Government of... (by United States. Division of Insular Affairs)

Top 100 books on Politics

Political Ideals (by Russell, Bertrand)
On War (by Von Clausewitz, Carl)
Art of War, The (version 2) (by Sun Tzu)
Utopia (by More, Thomas, Sir, Saint)
An Introduction to the Principles of Mor... (by Bentham, Jeremy)
The Gettysburg Address (by Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865)
Proposed Roads to Freedom : Socialism, A... (by Russell, Bertrand)
The Origin and Growth of the Common Law ... (by Hamilton, Peter Joseph)
The Iron Heel (by London, Jack)
Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death (by Henry, Patrick)
The History of the Russian Revolution Vo... (by Leon Trotsky)
The Iron Heel (by London, Jack)
The Jungle (by Sinclair, Upton)
The Origins of Totalitarianism (by Arendt, Hannah)
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Dougl... (by Douglass, Frederick)

Top 100 books on Anthropology

The Golden Bough : A Study in Magic and ... (by Frazer, James George, Sir)
Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity of... (by Morgan, Lewis Henry)
The Journal of the Royal Anthropological... (by Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ire...)
The Positive School of Criminology (by Ferri, Enrico)
Social Anthropology (by Evans-Pritchard, Edward Evan)
Chinook : An Illustrative Sketch (by Franz Boas)
Story of Man: from the First Human to Pr... (by Coon, Carleton Stevens)
Ancient Art and Ritual (by Jane Ellen Harrison)
Anthropology; An Introduction to the Stu... (by Tylor, Edward Burnett, Sir)
An Anthropologist's Life in the Twentiet... (by Foster, George Mcclelland)
The Dynamics of Culture Change : An Inqu... (by Malinowski, Bronislaw)
The Andaman Islanders; a Study in Social... (by Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. (Alfred Reginald), 1881-195...)
African Systems of Kinship and Marriage (by Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. (Alfred Reginald))
Modern Theories of Criminality (by Bernaldo De Quiros, Constancio)
Pedagogical Anthropology (by Montessori, Maria)