Hi guys!
I think I’ve read more academic books that weren’t directly on my reading list through my courses this year than before. I do it in the hope of getting better grades, but sometimes they are boring or snooze-like in their content.
The field of sociology changes with society, which is natural, but it is also an all-time kind of field. It involves basically anything from history to biology in order to understand the society around us, and this is the aspect I find most interesting about it. It is not my main field of study, but since I’ve chosen classes in the Sociology Department this year I’ve become more acquainted with it. It is nice to dig into other fields, but I think I prefer my psychology path. I could, however, relate my psychology education to some parts of this book and it is interesting to see how Mills make these connections. The Times Literary Supplement London says this about the book; «A challenge, a stimulus, and incitement to students everywhere to look at sociology with a fresh and clearer vision.» I can agree that it is a challenge, but I think this depends on how familiar you are with sociology. I’m not too familiar with it and I don’t catch all the references made, but I think I caught on to the main points made. I would not personally call it a stimulus or an incitement, but I can agree on the fact that it gives you a fresh and clearer vision of sociology. It is always fun when you realize that you grasp something you weren’t sure about. I had this experience a few times while reading the book.
Mills was a known sociologist in his day. He died three years after he wrote this book and the version I’ve read is the Fortieth Anniversary Edition. This means that this book isn’t very up to date, which you can tell in some of the chapters (like when he refers to the USSR/Soviet Union which today doesn’t exist). The main topics and information are still very relatable to today’s society, but one has to keep in mind when it was originally written. I believe that as new editions have been released the interior of the book has been altered if needed. Somewhere it was pointed out if something had been changed on a later occasion.
If you study sociology on a regular basis and has more knowledge than I do I believe this book will suit you better than me. Since its short, it doesn’t take too long to finish and if you find it more interesting than I did, then I suppose you’ll finish faster and more enlightened as well, haha.
Published: 2000
Genre: Academica
Theme: Sociology, social structures
– The Book Reader
TheBookReader 