Sociological Analysis

Upon signing up for this class I was a little unaware of what I was getting myself into. I needed to fulfill my last general education requirement in order to graduate and receive my diploma. As you can see from waiting till the final day to submit my work I did not take it very seriously. I thought to myself this will be easy! A 100 level sociology class, what a joke. However, after reading through the lectures and the book the past few nights I found it to be extremely eye opening. I feel as if I have never been so aware of my surroundings in the world. What makes people do the things they do and why do they do it? That is what I got most out of this class. Although I admit I did not put as much time into it as I should have this past week has been one filled with enlightenment both on a micro level and personal level. What is the sociological perspective? It is a tough question to answer and humans have been trying to figure that out for many years. I believe it is the human existence trying to connect to one another on a personal and global level. There are three schools of thought when it comes to defining the sociological perspective; Conflict Theory, the Functionalist Perspective, and Symbolic Interactionist Perspective. Not all of these are all right and not all of these are all wrong. Symbolic Interactionist appears to focus more on the micro perspective of sociology. Symbolic Interaction states that people attach meaning to symbols. How they react and treat these symbols defies how they live their lives. People interpret these symbols in different way. Society as a whole also plays a major role in how symbols are interpreted. Take for example the symbol of a medium sized house, a white picket fence, and kids playing in the backyard. This is a symbol of “the American dream”. We as young adults, according to society, are supposed to achieve this symbol of the “American dream”. However, each individual may interpret the symbol of this dream