Holistically, culture includes everything made by man.

Our identity and unique differences reflect the

kind of culture in our society. In this lesson, you will have a glance on the understanding of culture,
society, and politics. You will begin to realize that you are connected to the social realities and
phenomena based from your actions, behavior, attitude within a society. This is to prove Aristotle’s
notion that we are indeed a social animal. Different political, social, and cultural issues do not stand
alone inside the classroom hence, they surface beyond that they need thorough analysis and
interpretation.

“A person may escape society for a while, but he can never escape culture.” - Joseph H. Fichter.”

The study of culture, society, and politics are parts and parcel of a larger body of knowledge with the
integration of systematic processes and scientific method called, Social Science. Nisbet (1974) stated
that “it is a branch of discipline or branch of science that deals with human behavior in its social and
cultural aspects” (para.1). It includes anthropology, sociology, political science, economics, psychology,
and geography as its branches. It also the field of human knowledge that deals with all aspects of the
group of life of human beings therefore, it is subject to change with the changes of the human behavior.
Social scientists use empirical research methods to investigate all sorts of interpersonal and
intrapersonal behaviors.

Social Science goes side by side with Natural Science as both branches of Science. It is a branch of
science that deals with the natural world: its processes, elements, and composition. However, social
science is a branch of science primarily focusses in human society and social relationships.
Consequently, the main difference between natural science and social science is that natural science
studies natural events whereas social science studies the human society.

Sociology is one of the disciplines that tends to answer the social and political issues in the Modern
Period. Etymologically, Sociology came from the Latin word socius – means companion and Greek word
logos – means to study. It is a systematic study of human relationship along with human society and
interaction.

Sociology delve into social problems that affect behavior of an individual and a group. It addresses
solutions to mitigate the phenomenon which cannot be explained by mere physical experiments and
investigations. This may be the starting point of grasping the discipline, sociology is full of complexities
that it uses different methods and strategies to study a wide range of discipline with its application to
the real world. (OpenStax College, 2013, p.10)

From the ancient times, the complexities of human relationship and their societies fascinated few
people to put this into understanding. These thinkers gave rise to a deeper understanding of sociological
concepts and theories deeply motivated by their desire to describe an ideal society.

Through the series of powerful and complex economic and social forces, it gave rise to the birth of the
discipline. The Industrial Revolution introduced great changes in the field of technology most especially
in the work and living pattern of the people. Factory system pulled people away from their homes,
change the routine schedule and weakened the connection of families. These events sparked Auguste
Comte (1798- 1857) to study these phenomena and eventually coined the term sociology in 1838. He
focused on the idea of improving the development of the society and how it operates.
He also introduced the term Positivism through his book entitled Course on Positive Philosophy (1830–
1842) and System of Positive Polity (1851-1854). He said that the use of scientific methods to present
the laws in which societies and individuals interact would propel in a new “positivist” age of history. It
allowed sociologists to study society scientifically through evidences, experiments, and statistics to
clearly see the operations of the society. (OpenStax College, 2013, p.14).

Karl Marx (1818–1883), a German philosopher and economist. He made Communist Manifesto
(1848) with Friedrich Engels (1820–1895). This book presents Marx's theory of society, which different
from the point of view Comte. He disagreed with Comte's positivism and believed that societies
developed and progressed because of the struggles of different social classes over the means of
production. Through the efforts of Emile Durkheim (1858-1917), the professionalization of sociology
made it through in the University of Bordeaux in 1985. He defended sociology as a separate and
independent field from psychology. His notable works are The Division of Labor in Society (1893) which
tackles the transformation of a society from a primitive state into a capitalist, industrial society. He also
published a work titled Suicide (1897). He searched different police districts to study suicide statistics
that would reveal differences from the communities of Catholics and Protestants. The differences
observed were linked to socioreligious forces rather than psychological causes of each person.

Max Weber (1864-1920) is another pioneer in the field of sociology. He emphasized the role of
rationalization in the development of society. It refers essentially to the disenchantment of the world.
As the world progressed, people began to justify and adopt scientific and rational attitude towards
understanding the workings of the world. With this view, modern people became so rigid on science.

With prevalence of the scientific processes, he introduced bureaucracy as an application of scientific

way of life. As bureaucracy efficiency possesses supreme value, other values such as personal
relationship and intimacies are gradually rejected.

Generally, sociology is the study of society. Society is where social interactions occur. Their members
interact with one another and cooperate to achieve objectives collectively that they could not achieve as
individuals. (Gordon, 1991, p.3)

Areas of Sociology

It can be said that social science disciplines are interrelated to one another because of the nature and
the core of its focus. Thus, the following are the scope that is encompassed by sociology.

1. Social Organization ; 2. Social Psychology ; 3. Human Ecology ; 4. Applied Sociology ; 5.

Population Studies ; 6. Social Change ; 7. Sociological Theory and Research

Anthropology

Another pioneering Social Science discipline, anthropology helps us to understand our holistic identity. It
came from a Latin word anthropos – means man and Greek word logos – means to study. Anthropology
is a branch of Social Science that deals with all aspects of human beings including their biological
evolution and social and cultural features that definitively distinguish humans from other animal species.
With the scope of the discipline, it encompasses a group of more specific and specialized fields. Physical
anthropology focuses on the biological and evolutionary framework of humanity. It focuses on greater
information and details about human evolution. Other branches that deal with social and cultural
interactions of human groups are categorically belong to social anthropology, cultural anthropology,
psychological anthropology, and linguistic anthropology. Archaeology which investigates of prehistoric
cultures as its primary focus, has been an essential part of anthropology since it became a separate and
distinct discipline in the end of the 19th century. The material remains or artifacts helped social
scientists to validate, describe, and analyze the kind of culture and society humans made through the
course of history. (Kuper et al., 2007)

The discipline of anthropology is the fruity of scientific developments in the Western World through the
groundbreaking work of the Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species” (1859), it boosted the passion
of the all scientists in different fields. His idea not only opened the new avenues of disciplines under
Natural Science but also accelerated the pace of Socio-Cultural studies. He inspired a group of enthusiast
and intellectuals namely Spencer, Morgan, Tylor who concluded that evolution did not limit itself in the
biological aspect of human but can also be seen extending to cultural life. (History of Anthropology,
n.d.). Bronislaw Malinowski (1884-1942) introduced participant observation as a method of studying
culture. Howell (2018, p. 4) defined it as “open-ended inductive long-term living with and among the
people to be studied, the sole purpose of which is to achieve an understanding of local knowledge,
values, and practices from the native’s point of view”. This method also allows the researcher to obtain
a close familiarity within a group of people and their practices by means of a rigorous involvement to
them and to their environment over a long period of time. Franz Boas (1858-1942) is considered the
Father of American Anthropology. His works focused on rejecting the biological basis of racism or racial
discrimination. He also rejected the Western idea of social evolution thus, he favored historical
particularism.