Meaning of Sociology - What it is, Definition and Concept

Sociology is a social science whose object of study is the social groups and the relationships between individuals in the social historical context in which they live. The analysis of the forms of organization of these groups, their components, their cohesion, the norms that regulate them, the system in which they are inserted are some of the topics of their concern.

Sociology was sketched in its origins by Karl Marx, Auguste Comte, Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, among others who made sociological reflections.Later thinkers such as Merton, Goffman, Marcuse, Bourdieu, Luhmann, and among the most innovative were highlighted in the 20th Century.Today we can mention Ritzer, Giddens, Castells, Bauman, among others.

As a source of study of the diversity of social relations , Sociology has produced opposite currents that confronted knowledge enriching this Science and its theoretical body.

The symbolic interactionism (defines social action as symbolic), the theory of social conflict (Karl Marx was its main maker), the socio-constructionism (states that reality is a social construction) the functionalist theory (considers institutions as instruments to meet the needs of society) and the phenomenology are some of the perspectives most used by Sociology.

Some sociologists have deepened theoretical concepts based on authors such as Benjamin, Foucault and Barthes, focusing on the study of the understanding of the subject from broad perspectives based on philosophy and history among others, achieving a more complex sociological theory.

Sociology can be approached from a quantitative approach , which provides a statistical analysis of social variables; and a qualitative approach that focuses on a descriptive account of situations and behaviors.