Question

What is a theory? Discuss the three major theoretical perspectives in sociology.

Answer 1

Theory is an explanation that how a social phenomenon occurs , it relates two facts together

By definition : Theory is a statement that proposes to describe and explain why facts or other social phenomenon are related to each other based on observed patterns.

There are three major theoretical prospectives in sociology

1. Symbolic interactionism: This theoretical prospective says people interact together by various symbols , means spoken words between two persons are predominant symbols. People have plethora of symbols in their daily life , These are birthday cakes,marriage dresses, Church ceremonies, wedding rings etc . All these symbols are the for interaction between individuals .But this has a criticism that it wouldn't discuss serious matters of society. Critics says that it only focuses on micro level problems of the society.

Functionalism:This prospective says each aspect of society are interdependent and contributing to society function as a whole , for example government gave education to children using tax money however,after some time period this children will get job and they will pay tax money to government thus system will go on and enhance society as a whole. This discusses macro level analysis of the society

Conflict theory: This theory implies that unequal people have conflicting values and ideas these lead to compete each other that competition is the basis of ever changing nature of the society.This conflicts include conflict between religion, gender, racial , political and economical. This theory says that these conflicts helps to maintain everchanging nature of society . This is a negative concept theory when comparing to two other theories, however it deals with Macro level analysis of the society