Which of the following statements are 'true' for Sociology?
A. Sociology teaches us how to see the world from many vantage points
B. Sociological analysis requires us to rely on commonsensical observation
C. Sociology helps us to 'unlearn' what we already know about society.
D. Sociology helps us to unravel the connection between individual and society
Choose the correct answer from the options given below:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → A, C, D only
A. Sociology teaches us how to see the world from many vantage points Correct. A vantage point is the place from which one looks. Every viewpoint gives only a partial view, so sociology teaches us to see the world from many vantage points, not just our own but also that of others unlike ourselves, and so get a sense of what the whole looks like.
B. Sociological analysis requires us to rely on commonsensical observation Incorrect. Common sense is learnt from the viewpoint of our own social group, so it is ‘partial’: both incomplete and biased. Sociology asks us to look beyond it, not to rely on it.
C. Sociology helps us to ‘unlearn’ what we already know about society Correct. Everyone already knows something about society. To learn sociology we need to ‘unlearn’ what we already know, and the first stage of learning it consists mainly of such unlearning.
D. Sociology helps us to unravel the connection between individual and society Correct. As C. Wright Mills wrote, sociology helps us map the links between ‘personal troubles’ and ‘social issues’. A worry that feels private to one person is connected to the larger working of society.
Note: The lines saying that sociology teaches us to see the world from many vantage points, in the opening part of the chapter ‘Introducing Indian Society’, were there in the pre-rationalised NCERT, which NTA followed in 2023. This portion has been deleted from the NCERT book (2025-26), though the chapter is still there with its account of unlearning common sense.
NCERT (2025-26): “…This prior knowledge or familiarity with society is both an advantage and a disadvantage for sociology, the discipline that studies society. The advantage is that students are generally not afraid of Sociology – they feel that it can’t be a very hard subject to learn. The disadvantage is that this prior knowledge can be a problem – in order to learn Sociology, we need to ‘unlearn’ what we already know about society. In fact, the initial stage of learning Sociology consists mainly of such unlearning. This is necessary because our prior knowledge about society – our common sense – is acquired from a particular viewpoint. This is the viewpoint of the social group and the social environment that we are socialised into. Our social context shapes our opinions, beliefs and expectations about society and social relations. These beliefs are not necessarily wrong, though they can be. The problem is that they are ‘partial’. The word partial is being used here in two different senses – incomplete (the opposite of whole), and biased (the opposite of impartial). So our ‘unlearnt’ knowledge or common sense usually allows us to see only a part of social reality; moreover, it is liable to be tilted towards the viewpoints and interests of our own social group.” NCERT (Pre-rationalised): “…Sociology does not offer a solution to this problem in the form of a perspective that can show us the whole of reality in a completely unbiased way. Indeed sociologists believe that such an ideal vantage point does not exist. We can only see by standing somewhere; and every ‘somewhere’ offers only a partial view of the world. What sociology offers is to teach us how to see the world from many vantage points – not just our own, but also that of others unlike ourselves. Each vantage point provides only a partial view, but by comparing what the world looks like from the eyes of different kinds of people we get some sense of what the whole might look like, and what is hidden from view in each specific standpoint.” |