The Subfields and Interdiciplinary Fields of Sociology by Rogelio G. Dela Cruz, Ph. D (August, 2006)

Sociology was long identified primarily with broad evolutionary reconstructions of historical change in Western societies, as well as with the exploration of relationships and interdependencies among their more specialized institutions and aspects of social life, such as the economy, the state, the family, and religion. Sociology was thought of as a synthesizing field that attempted to integrate the findings acquired from other social sciences. Although such concepts concerning the scope and task of sociology are still prevalent, they now tend to be regarded as the province of sociological theory, which is only a part of the entire discipline.

Sociological theory also includes the discussion and analysis of basic concepts that are common to all the different spheres of social life studied by sociologists. An emphasis on empirical investigations carried out by standardized and often statistical research methods directed the attention of sociologists away from the abstract visions of 19th-century scholars toward more focused and concrete areas of social reality. These areas became the subfields and specialties of sociology that are today the subjects of college courses, textbooks, and specialized journals. Much of the scholarly and scientific work of sociologists falls clearly within one of the many subfields into which the discipline is divided.

The oldest subfields in the discipline are those that concentrate on social phenomena that have not previously been adopted as objects of study by other social science disciplines. These include marriage and the family, social inequality and social stratification, ethnic relations, deviant behavior, urban communities, and complex or formal organizations. Subfields of more recent origin examine the social aspects of gerontology and the sociology of sex and gender roles.

Because nearly all human activities involve social relations, another major source of specialization within sociology is the study of the social structure of areas of human activity. These areas of teaching and research include sociologies of politics, law, religion, education, the military, occupations and professions, governmental bureaucracies, industry, the arts, science, language, medicine, mass communications, and sports. These subfields differ widely in the extent to which they have accumulated a substantial body of research and attracted large numbers of practitioners. Certain subfields have achieved brief popularity, only to be later incorporated into a more comprehensive area. Industrial sociology, for example, was a flourishing field in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s, but later it was largely absorbed into the study of complex organizations; in Britain, however, industrial sociology has remained a separate area of research. A more common sociological phenomenon is the splitting of a recognized subfield into narrower subdivisions; the sociology of knowledge, for instance, has increasingly been divided into individual sociologies of science, art, literature, popular culture, and language. At least two subfields, demography and criminology, were distinct areas of study long before the formal field of sociology existed. In the past, they were associated primarily with other disciplines.

The oldest and most important interdisciplinary subfield of sociology is social psychology. It has often been considered virtually a separate discipline, drawing practitioners from both sociology and psychology. Sociologists primarily concern themselves with social norms, roles, institutions, and the structure of groups, while social psychologists concentrate on the impact of these various areas on individual personality. Social psychologists trained in sociology have pioneered studies of interaction in small informal groups; the distribution of beliefs and attitudes in a population; the formation of character and outlook under the influence of the family, the school, the peer group, and other socializing agencies. Psychoanalytic ideas derived from the work of Sigmund Freud and later psychoanalysts have been particularly important in this last area of social psychology.

Comparative historical sociology, often strongly influenced by the ideas of both Marx and Weber, has shown much growth in recent years. Many historians have been guided by concepts borrowed from sociology; at the same time, some sociologists have carried out large-scale historical-comparative studies. The once firm barriers between history and sociology have crumbled, especially in such areas as social history, demographic change, economic and political development, and the sociology of revolutions and protest movements.