Table of Contents

Introduction: The Sociological Perspective​

1. Sociology as the Science of Social Life – W.E.B. Du Bois

2. The Promise of Sociology – C. Wright Mills

3. Sociology as the Study of Figurations: Beyond Individual and Society? – Norbert Elias

4. Decolonizing Sociology – Raewyn Connell

5. Understanding Ourselves and Others – Zygmunt Bauman & Tim May

Further Reading

 

PART 1 Thinking Sociologically

6. The Capitalist Revolution – Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels

7. Tastes, Distinctions and Social Structure – Pierre Bourdieu

8. Learning from the Outsiders Within – Patricia Hill Collins

9. The Consequences of Modernity – Anthony Giddens

10. Sociology after the Postcolonial Turn – Gurminder K. Bhambra

Further Reading

 

​PART 2 Doing Sociology

11. Treat Social Facts as Things – Émile Durkheim

12. Sociology's Historical Imagination – Philip Abrams

13. Mixing Methods in Empirical Research – Emma Pullen, Daniel Jackson & Michael Silk

14. Digital Sociology: Opportunities and Dangers – Noortje Marres

15. What is Feminist Research? – Patricia Leavy & Anne Harris

Further Reading

 

PART 3 Environment and Urbanism

16. The Metropolis and Mental Life – Georg Simmel

17. A Sociology of Climate Change – John Urry

18. Navigating the 'White Space' – Elijah Anderson

19. Urban Transitions in the Global South – AbdouMaliq Simone & Edgar Pieterse

20. Entering an Anthropocene Era? – Rolf Lidskog & Claire Waterton

Further Reading

 

PART 4 Structures of Society

21. Religion and the Origins of Capitalism – Max Weber

22. The Feminization of Work – Teri L. Caraway

23. Families and Personal Life – Deborah Chambers & Pablo Gracia

24. Schools: Challenging or Reproducing Social Inequalities? – Christy Kulz

25. Capitalism and the Digital Revolution – Shoshana Zuboff

Further Reading

 

PART 5 Social Inequalities

26. Intersectionality: Structural and Political – Kimberlé Crenshaw

27. Producing Disability and Abledness – Fiona Kumari Campbell

28. Wealth Concentration and Inequality – Thomas Piketty

29. Racial Distinctions and Social Structures – Michael Banton

30. 'Doing Gender' via Domestic Labour – Clare Lyonette & Rosemary Crompton

Further Reading

 

PART 6 Relationships and the Life Course

31. I, Me and the Social Self – George Herbert Mead

32. Towards a Sociology of Personal Life – Carol Smart

33. Love as a Sociological Problem – Eva Illouz

34. From the Life Cycle to the Life Course – Stephen J. Hunt

35. The Significance of Generational Experience – Lorraine Green

Further Reading

 

PART 7 Interaction and Communication

36. Self Presentation and Impression Management – Erving Goffman

37. Violence in Sociological Perspective – Randall Collins

38. Misogyny, Beauty and Body Modification – Sheila Jeffreys

39. Constructing and Negotiating Social Identity – Susie Scott

40. Knowledge Production in a Post-Truth World – Dominic Malcolm

Further Reading

 

PART 8 Health, Illness and the Body

41. The Medical Re-definition of Social Life – Peter Conrad

42. Does Inequality Cause Poor Health Outcomes? – Richard Wilkinson & Kate Pickett

43. Challenging the Dominance of Biomedicine – Sarah Nettleton

44. Health and Illness in Sociological Perspective – William C. Cockerham

45. The Exceptional and the Normal After COVID-19 – Jens O. Zinn

Further Reading

 

PART 9 Crime and Social Control

46. The Social Construction of Outsiders – Howard S. Becker

47. The Shifting Politics of Punishment – David Garland

48. Race, Blackness and Exclusion in the USA – Loïc Wacquant

49. The Digital Transformation of Criminality – David S. Wall

50. Back to the Future: The Return of Banishment – Katherine Beckett & Steve Herbert

Further Reading

 

PART 10 Political Sociology

51. Conceptualizing Power in Sociological Theory – Steven Lukes

52. Ethnic Cleansing and the Dark Side of Democracy – Michael Mann

53. Populist Politics and Mobilization – Bart Bonikowski

54. Representations of British Muslims During the Covid-19 Pandemic – Elizabeth Poole & Milly Williamson

55. Social Media Use in Black Lives Matter Activism – Marcia Mundt, Karen Ross & Charla M. Burnett

Further Reading

About the Author

Anthony Giddens is the former Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science and is now a member of the UK House of Lords.
Philip W. Sutton is an independent researcher, formerly of the University of Leeds and Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen.