“How do the sociological perspective help to understand my

society”

Section: 001

Date of submission: 20.04.2008

Prepared By: Tasnuva Rubaiyat

ID : 07104056

BBS Department

BRAC University

Submitted to: Kamrul Hasan

Lecturer

ESS Department

BRAC University
Letter of transmittal:

20th April, 2008

To
Kamrul Hasan
Lecturer
ESS Department
BRAC University

Subject: Submission of assignment for Introduction to Sociology (soc-101)

Dear Sir,

It is a great pleasure that I am finally submitting my assignment on “How do the

sociological perspectives help to understand my society”.
The practical exposure while working on this assignment helped me to bridge the
academic work and the practical knowledge. The things that were thought in class while
doing this assignment I was able to apply the theories in real life situation.
I tried my best to furnish this assignment with all the relevant information and facts and
also tried to raise the right questions. But I do acknowledge that many anomalies might
arise, which I was willing to change in light of further in-depth research or information. I
will welcome any clarification and suggestion regarding this report.

Thanking you

Sincerely yours,
Tasnuva Rubaiyat ID: 07104056 …………………………
OBJECTIVE
This assignment has immensely helped us to satisfy some purpose of studying the course
of sociology and left a significant long run effect on us. There are some vital objectives in
support of preparing this assignment. The key objectives are given bellow:

• Identify with perspective and its relationship with society through practical
study.
• Learn the contribution of different perspective to understand the society.
• To be acquainted with the social condition of this country.
• To distinguish between different perspective..
• To recognize the contribution of sociological perspective in order to learn
about the society.
• Gather beneficial and long run effective knowledge through the analysis of
matter-of-fact.
• To acquire an entire sociological impression of our society.
• To spot the weak point of different sociological perspective and the role of
society.
METHODOLOGY
The entire assignment is done on the basis of my understanding about the society using
different sociological perspective.. I have put more emphasis on Bangladesh context
rather than international condition. I have divided the essay by stating the sociological
perspective and giving example of those. To gather information took help from various
referred books. Our class notes have also helped me to a great extent while I was trying to
analyze data. After accumulating the data I have evaluated those delicately. The whole
assignment was based on my understanding and point of view. Though I took help from
book in the assignment my thoughts will reflect most.

LIMITATIONS

Although I didn’t get an adequate amount of fortune to put the last touches on the details
nonetheless I have tried my most excellent to develop and bring to an end of this report
with exact information. While studying and working for this assignment we have faced a
number of problems which I have considered to mention as a prediction of that these
drawbacks will be improved by eligible authority before assigning the students of
upcoming batches for this report. The limitations that I have faced are listed below:

• The most significant one was getting specific information.

• Deficiency of books on sociology at library.
• To complete such a large assignment is bit difficult for only one person.
• The most difficult part it depend on my own point of view so its difficult to know
whether the assignments are correct or not.
Introduction
Sociology is the study about the society. Very simply we can say that the systematic
study of social behavior and human group is called sociology. It focus on social
relationships, how this relationships influence peoples behavior and how societies, the
sum total of theses relationships, development and change.

There are many sociologists who work for the development of sociology. They also gave
some theories which make us able to know our society better. These theories also known
as perspective. Among them four are used most. They are as follows-

• Functionalist Perspective

It was developed by Talcott Parsons, a Harvard University student. He was greatly

influenced by the work of Emile Durkheim, Max Weber and other European sociologists.
More than four decades he dominated USA with his advocacy of functionalism.

The theory said every society is a vast network with a connected parts and each of which
helps to maintain the system as a whole. The functionalist approach holds that if any
aspects of social life does not contribute to a society’s stability or survival- if it does not
serve some identifiably useful function or promote value consensus among members of a
society-it will not be passed from one society to another.

• Conflict Perspective

The conflict perspective assume that the social behavior is best understood in a conflict or
a tension between conflict groups. Such conflicts need not to be violent it can take the
form of labor negotiation to dispute over the federal budget anything.

Throughout most of 1900s the functionalist perspective had the upper hand in sociology
in US. The conflict perspective became increasingly persuasive since 1960.

• Feminist Perspective
Sociologists begin to embracing the feminist perspective in the 1970s. The feminist view
see the inequality in gender as central to all behavior and organization. It has many
similarities with conflict perspective.

How do these perspectives helps to understand my society

Functionalist Perspective

According to functionalist perspective each part of society is very important to maintain

the social balance. Everything is less or more contributing to our society. If we apply this
theory to understand our society we can see that despite of the fact that our society is very
small compare to others there are lot of varieties in our society. And every little thing is
really important and has some contribution.

We can use the example class division in order to show that. There mainly three different
classes in our society known as lower class, middle class and upper class. Often upper
class people ignore or underestimate lower class people. But if we saw from functionalist
perspective we say that this lower class people have a great contribution to the society. If
they were not there the upper class people would not have got the privilege that they are
getting right now.

So like other class people the lower class people are really important in order to make the
balance of the society. They are making a very good effort in our society.

Conflict Perspective

According to the conflict perspective sociological terms best can be observed in conflict
situation. If there is any sort of tension that is the best time to observe the society. We can
apply this theory in terms of our 1971 liberation war.

At the time of liberation people of Bangladesh were desperate to get independence. So in

order to get that they tried their level best. Million of people died at that time. But the
most amazing thing was that all people of our society came together to fight for
independent. There was no high class middle class, other than they all belong to one
common class which was Bangladeshi.

So, we can see that the conflict led them to be together and gave them the courage to
fight.

Interactionist Perspective

This perspective focuses on day to day activities. It analyzes the society at a very macro
level. If we you this perspective we are able to know our society better. It will help you to
create more interaction with people, to know people better.

Feminist Perspective

According to this perspective we can see that gender discrimination is the root of all
source of social inequality. This perspective is very suitable for our country. In our
country there women are always ignored, they are always underestimated. And this led
the society to do in justification with women.

So, if we apply this perspective we will be able to know our society better.

Conclusion

In conclusion we can say that there is no single perspective which we can regard as the
best. Neither can we say that this is the perfect to understand my society. We need
combine all the perspective to judge any society.