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A Sociology Exhibit

Organizing Relationships

The Fertility of the Unfit (by Chapple, W. A)
The Sexual Question : A Scientific, Psyc... (by Auguste Forel)
The Social System (by Parsons, Talcott)
William the Conqueror (by Edward A. Freeman)
Wanted, A Young Woman to Do Housework, B... (by Barker, Clara Helene)
Five Lectures on Blindness (by Kate M. Foley)
Siouan Sociology: a Posthumous Paper Volume: 15th 1893-1894
Quaker Hill; A Sociological Study (by Wilson, Warren Hugh)
The History and Meaning of the Term Soci... (by Shields, Leo William)
Essays in Sociological Theory (by Parsons, Talcott)
The Principles of Sociology : Volume 3 (by Spencer, Herbert)
The Fundamental Principles of Old and Ne... (by Zelia Nuttall)
Eugenics Marriage and Birth Control Prac... (by William Josephus Robinson)
The Threefold State, The True Aspect of ... (by Steiner, Rudolf)
Six Thousand Country Churches (by Gill, Charles Otis)

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

The Fertility of the Unfit (by Chapple, W. A)
The Sexual Question : A Scientific, Psyc... (by Auguste Forel)
The Social System (by Parsons, Talcott)
William the Conqueror (by Edward A. Freeman)
Wanted, A Young Woman to Do Housework, B... (by Barker, Clara Helene)
Five Lectures on Blindness (by Kate M. Foley)
Siouan Sociology: a Posthumous Paper Volume: 15th 1893-1894
Quaker Hill; A Sociological Study (by Wilson, Warren Hugh)
The History and Meaning of the Term Soci... (by Shields, Leo William)
Essays in Sociological Theory (by Parsons, Talcott)
The Principles of Sociology : Volume 3 (by Spencer, Herbert)
The Fundamental Principles of Old and Ne... (by Zelia Nuttall)
Eugenics Marriage and Birth Control Prac... (by William Josephus Robinson)
The Threefold State, The True Aspect of ... (by Steiner, Rudolf)
Six Thousand Country Churches (by Gill, Charles Otis)

Top 100 books on Psychology

Analyzing Character, The New Science of ... (by Blackford, Katherine Melvina Huntsinger)
Psychopathology of Everyday Life (by Freud, Sigmund)
Dora an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria (by Sigmund Freud)
Crime and Punishment (by Dostoevsky, Fyodor)
The Intermediate Sex; A Study of Some Tr... (by Carpenter, Edward)
The Foundations of Personality (by Myerson, Abraham)
Behavior an Introduction to Comparative ... (by John B. Watson)
Psychology from the Standpoint of a Beha... (by Watson, John B. (John Broadus))
The Nervous Housewife (by Myerson, Abraham)
The Science of Human Nature; A Psycholog... (by Pyle, William Henry)
Practical Lessons in Psychology (by William Otterbein Krohn)
Essays in Radical Empiricism (by James, William)
Three Thousand Years of Mental Healing (by Cutten, George Barton)
The Misuse of Mind (by Stephen, Karin)
The Expression of Emotion in Man and Ani... (by Darwin, Charles)

Top 100 books on Economics

A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foun... (by Rousseau, Jean Jacques)
The Theory of Business Enterprise (by Veblen, Thorstein)
On Liberty (by John Stuart Mill)
The Collapse of Capitalism (by Cahn, Herman)
The Cry for Justice; An Anthology of the... (by Sinclair, Upton, Ed)
Animal Farm (by Orwell, George)
Wage Labour and Capital (by Marx, Karl)
Mutual Aid (by Kropotkin, P.)
The Jungle (by Sinclair, Upton)
Looking Backward from 2000 to 1887 (by Bellamy, Edward)
Nature and Progress of Rent (by Malthus, Thomas)
The origin of the family, private proper... (by Engels, Friedrich)
Prince, The (Version 2) (by Machiavelli, Niccolo)
The State and Revolution (by Lenin, V. I.)
Conquest of bread, The (by Kropotkin, Peter)

Top 100 books on Government

Assize of Arms
The Union of Utrecht (by Lucy Maynard Salmon)
An Introduction to the Principles of Mor... (by Bentham, Jeremy)
A Plea for Religious Liberty and the Rig... (by George Ticknor Curtis)
Discourse on Inequality (by Rousseau, Jean Jacques)
The Constitutional Documents of the Puri... (by Gardiner, Samuel Rawson)
The Origin and Growth of the Common Law ... (by Hamilton, Peter Joseph)
Discourses on the First (by Niccolò Machiavelli)
Introduction to the Principles of Morals... (by Bentham, Jeremy)
The English Constitution (by Sir Frederick Pollock)
Deposition of Air Pollutants to the Grea... (by Allan, Mary Ann)
Of the Law of Nature and Nations : Eight... (by Pufendorf, Samuel, Freiherr Von)
Leviathan (by Hobbes, Thomas)
Laws (by Plato)
Between Past and Future : Six Exercises ... (by Hannah Arendt)

Top 100 books on Law

Codex Hammurabi (by Hammurabi, King of Balonia)
Bartleby the Scrivener, A Story of Wall ... (by Melville, Herman)
Terrorism, The Future, And U.S. Foreign ... (by Lee, Rensselaer)
Draft Mandates for Mesopotamia and Pales... (by League of Nations. Council)
Americans in Eastern Asia; A Critical St... (by Dennett, Tyler)
Constitution of the New-England Anti-Sla... (by Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society)
League of Nations : Vol. 1 Volume Vol. 1
A Law Dictionary : Adapted to the Consti... (by Bouvier, John)
On Liberty (by Mill, John Stuart)
Your Right to Federal Records Questions ...
The Magna Carta (by Hutchinson, Joshua)
The Critique of Practical Reason (by Kant, Immanuel)
Institutes of the Laws of England : Or a... Volume Vol. 6 (by Coke, Edward, Sir)
Codification, Annotation, And Revision o... (by United States. Congress. House. Committee On Revis...)
Crime and Punishment (by Dostoyevsky, Fyodor)

Top 100 books on Politics

Socialism, Utopian and Scientific (by Engels, Friedrich)
The Trial and Death of Socrates (by Plato)
The History of the Russian Revolution Vo... (by Leon Trotsky)
Art of War, The (version 2) (by Sun Tzu)
The Politics of Obedience : The Discours... (by De La Boetie, Étienne)
The Subjection of Women (by Mill, John Stuart)
Reflections on the Revolution in France (by Burke, Edmund)
Walden (by Thoreau, Henry David)
Introduction to the Principles of Morals... (by Bentham, Jeremy)
The Origin of the Family, Private Proper... (by Engels, Friedrich)
Common Sense (by Paine, Thomas)
On War (by Von Clausewitz, Carl)
Discourse Upon the Origin and the Founda... (by Rousseau, Jean-Jacques)
Political Ideals (by Russell, Bertrand)
Capital : A Critique of Political Econom... (by Marx, Karl)

Top 100 books on Anthropology

The Anthropological Treatises of Johann ... (by Blumenbach, Johann Friedrich)
American Anthropologist : Vol. 06 Part 0... Volume Vol. 06 Part 01-02 (by American Anthropological Association)
Current Anthropological Literature Volume 1 (by American Anthropological Association)
Pedagogical Anthropology (by Montessori, Maria)
Systematic Theology (by Hodge, Charles)
Boas Anniversary Volume; Anthropological... (by Laufer, Berthold)
The American Beaver and His Works (by Lewis Henry Morgan)
Sex and Repression in Savage Society (by Malinowski, Bronislaw)
Criminal Man, According to the Classific... (by Lombroso-Ferrero, Gina)
The Living World : Containing Descriptio... Volume v 1 (by Arnold, Augustus C. L.)
The Andaman Islanders; a Study in Social... (by Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. (Alfred Reginald), 1881-195...)
The History of Mankind Volume: v.3 (by Ratzel, Friedrich, 1844-1904)
Anthropology and a Lifetime of Observati... (by Colson, Elizabeth)
On the Functions of the Brain and of Eac... (by Gall, F. J., Franz Joséf)
Systematic Theology : Index Volume index (by Hodge, Charles)

Top 100 books on Mathematics

A Treatise on Probability (by Keynes, John Maynard)
Ptolemy's Cataloque of Stars; A Revision... (by Ptolemy)
Traité des Substitutions et des Équation... (by Jordan, Camille)
Logic, Deductive and Inductive (by Carveth Read)
Histoire des Nombres et de la Numération... (by Jacomy-Régnier)
Symbolic Logic and Its Applications (by John Venn)
Theory of the Motion of the Heavenly Bod... (by Gauss, Karl Friedrich)
A Treatise of Celestial Mechanics : Pt. ... Volume Pt. 1-2 (by Laplace, Pierre Simon, Marquis De)
Vorlesungen über Zahlentheorie (by Lejeune-Dirichlet, Peter Gustav)
The Construction of the Wonderful Canon ... (by Napier, John)
Mathematical Geography (by Johnson, Willis Ernest)
The Elements of the Theory of Algebraic ... (by Reid, Legh Wilber)
Symbolic Logic: Part I, Elementary (by Lewis Carroll)
Projective Geometry (by Mathews, George Ballard)
Calcul des Probabilités. Lecons Professé... (by Poincaré, Henri)

Top 100 books on Economics

A Discourse Upon the Origin and the Foun... (by Rousseau, Jean Jacques)
The Theory of Business Enterprise (by Veblen, Thorstein)
On Liberty (by John Stuart Mill)
The Collapse of Capitalism (by Cahn, Herman)
The Cry for Justice; An Anthology of the... (by Sinclair, Upton, Ed)
Animal Farm (by Orwell, George)
Wage Labour and Capital (by Marx, Karl)
Mutual Aid (by Kropotkin, P.)
The Jungle (by Sinclair, Upton)
Looking Backward from 2000 to 1887 (by Bellamy, Edward)
Nature and Progress of Rent (by Malthus, Thomas)
The origin of the family, private proper... (by Engels, Friedrich)
Prince, The (Version 2) (by Machiavelli, Niccolo)
The State and Revolution (by Lenin, V. I.)
Conquest of bread, The (by Kropotkin, Peter)