Page 5 - Flipbook: Sociology Shortcuts Issue 3

“People know what they do.

They frequently know why they do

what they do.

But what they don’t know is what

what they do does”.

Although Sociology definitely is all abut the relationships and the culture, a more-provocative
way to think about it comes from Michel Foucault (1986).

Foucault’s observations - at first glance convoluted and
wonderfully-nonsensical - repay careful unpacking because
they point towards what Sociology, as an academic subject,
is designed to do:

1. As rational, reflective, beings we’re perfectly aware of
the things we do.

We don’t in other words, need sociologists to tell us…

2. We also tend to have a reasonable idea about why we
behave as we do.

But that’s not always necessarily the case and there’s a role
for sociologists in trying to understand and explain the
choices people make. Why, for example, some people
choose crime or why some people leave education at the
earliest opportunity.

3. It’s the third part of the statement - the idea people don’t really understand how the choices they
make or the things they do impact on others - that’s arguably the major focus of sociology.

The role of the sociologist, in this respect, is to explain how the consequences of individual
choices and behaviours impact on the behaviour of others - and vice versa.

Sociology, in other words, is all about understanding and explaining how individual behaviours
are actually the outcome of group decisions.

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