Emile Durkheim

Emile Durkheim was a sociologist who helped to define sociology as its own field of study and helped to advance it with his writings and research. Durkheim’s first major writing, The Division of Labor in Society, provides us with many basic concepts of sociology that are used to judge societies today. In The Division of Labor in Society Durkheim provides the idea of two different solidarities or ways that individuals are connected. He says that there is mechanical solidarity; which is how a society is connected through similarities such as work, education, and lifestyle. He then talks about organic solidarity where individuals are connected through a need for each other and each other’s skills. This idea is important because it shows us how different societies can be built and gives an answer to why a society is created in the first place.

In his next work The Rules of the Sociological Method helps to define Sociology as its own branch of science. Durkheim provides rules for how sociology should be studied. Durkheim believes that you must apply the same principles in the scientific method to the study of sociology. These rules helped to form how future sociologists would study sociology and also helped to differ sociology from other similar fields of study. In this work Durkheim also defined social facts. A social fact is the manner in which an individual in a society acts, thinks, and feels based on the society they are part of. Durkheim defines two types of facts constraints and social currents. Constraints are actions that are controlled by the society’s laws and morals that prevent a person from acting in a certain manner. Social currents are actions that are carried out because of how the society as a whole is acting in the moment. The definition of a social fact gives us some language to explain certain social phenomenon and the discovery of the two different types of facts shows how a society effects an individual.

Emile Durkheim is known as one of the fathers of sociology. His writings helped to mold how we learn and teach sociology today. His discoveries provide a large amount of the structure of sociology as we see it today.

Sources:

(Jones, 1986)

(Rules of Sociological Method., n.d.)

(Crossman, n.d.)