What is sociological imagination?

How is
it different from common sense?
Sociology is a discipline which allow us to look beyond
and challenge the common sense. Its approach is not
to accept the given societal facts but rather criticise
them. Like, there are many superstitious belief that if
we sneeze before going out of the house then it is a
bad omen and something bad can happen if we go out.
There are many such superstitions exist in society
which don’t have any logic behind them. So, sociology
is the discipline which allow us to question or challenge
these superstitions, WHY? That is how sociology
challenges the common sense and bring rationality in
our thinking.
Sociology give us this critical lens to see through these
all illogical concepts and criticise them. It brings
criticality in our thinking.
Many thinkers has given their theories and idea. One
such thinker is C. Wright Mills, an American
sociologist, who has given the idea of Sociological
Imagination in his book ‘THE SOCIOLOGICAL
IMAGINATION’ in year 1959.
According to Mills, sociological imagination is a quality
of mind which allows an individual to view themselves
in the larger socio-cultural context. To understand this
idea, let’s take the example of a poor person. A poor
person will think that he/she is the poorest but if
he/she looks at the world, will find many people out
there have the worst condition from him/her. Now this
trouble is not just his/her trouble but becomes the
public issue and also becomes the national or global
issue. Every individual thinks that his/her life is full of
trouble, but it is the sociological imagination which
help us to think that our personal troubles are not the
just our problem only but the public issue in the society
which everyone faces.
People are not able to cope up with their personal
troubles because they do not possess the quality of
mind to grasp the inter-connection between human
beings and society and its history. In this context Mills
argues that “Neither the life of an individual nor the
history of a society can be understood without
understanding both.” (Mills, 1959:3). So what the
people need is the quality of mind to use information
and develop rationality to achieve clear scenario of
what is going in their life and also in the world. This
quality of mind is the sociological imagination. But
what is the need for this imagination? What is the first
fruit of this imagination? What is lesson we get from it?
The need and the first fruit of this imagination is that
the individual can understand his/her own experiences
only by locating himself/herself in that particular
contemporary society and being aware of the all
individuals around him/her. This lesson of becoming
aware of our surroundings is only possible through
sociological imagination.
Every individual lives in a biography / contemporary
world and in a historical sequence. By just living he/she
contributes to society and to the history. What is the
task and the promise of the sociological imagination?
The task and the promise of the sociological
imagination is to enable us to grasp history and
biography and relations between the two within
society. For example, take Madhya Pradesh and
Chhattisgarh. If we want to compare the modernity
and the development of both the states, we need a
historical sequence but if we look at Chhattisgarh
which got separated from MP in the year 2000, so we
need to take in consideration the historical sequence
to know the contemporary situation of both the states.
Sociological imagination is about the relations. It is the
capacity to range from the lack of personal feelings and
remote transformations to the most private and
personal features of human self. It allow us to go
beyond isolation and looking at the larger socio-
cultural context. It thus, makes self-aware and self-
conscious in sense of the larger societal context and
relations.
Sociological imagination works with the distinction
between ‘the personal troubles of milieu’ and ‘the
public issues of social structures’ which is a necessary
tool.
Mills have very elaborately explained about the
personal trouble and public issue.
Troubles are the problems of an individual. They have
to deal with the limited area in which he live, he is
directly and personally aware. People face troubles as
they feel that their cherished values are being
threatened.
Issues are the problems of the public. The matters that
go beyond the individual’s environment and the range
of personal life. They have to deal with the public
institutions of the society. Values that are cherished by
publics is felt to be threatened, that’s why people face
issues.
Consider marriage, every marriage has problem. But if
the divorce rate increases after the first four years of
marriage, then it is the structural issue of marriage
institutions.
What we experience in our daily life is due to the
structural changes. Therefore, we have to look beyond
the personal milieu to understand these structural
changes. For instance, the Covid-19 pandemic brought
about many changes to our day to day life. Nobody had
ever thought of taking classes online through Zoom.
But the pandemic made us aware about the online
learning. To be aware of the social structures and use
them to trace linkages among various milieu. To be
able to do that is to possess the sociological
imagination. Be it seeking explanation or solution, the
sociologist needs to make relations structurally.
People think that sociology is similar to common sense
because it studies about the facts of everyday
experience. But Andre Beteille argues that sociology is
different from common sense in many contexts. Let us
examine how sociology is different from common
sense. For instance, people think that the suicide is
personal act, it is the common sense. But Emile
Durkheim argues that suicide is due alienation from
the society.
Sociology is a recognized academic discipline but
common sense is not. Sociology has a body of
contents, methods and data but common sense
doesn’t have. Sociological knowledge aims to be
general, if not universal. Whereas common sense is
something which is particular and localized. For
instance, beating a remote, so that it will start working,
is common in India but it is not everywhere in the
world. As it is the common sense of Indian people.
Sociological contributions have shown that common
sense is highly variable, subject to constraints of time
and place and other social constraints.
Common sense is not only local and particular to time,
space, class, gender and so on. It is also unreflective
since it does not question its origins and
presuppositions. But sociology does question the
origins of the fact deliberately and methodologically.
People are inclined towards the their way of doing the
things when it comes to the matters such as family, kin,
marriage, worship and they think that it is correct and
reasonable. When these things are done differently, it
strikes them as wrong and contrary to their common
sense. This is because people observe some part of the
other ways of acting not the entire context. It is where
the comparative sociology comes in. The comparative
sociology helps in drawing attention towards the
similarities and differences among the societies with
comparison as well as contrasts.
Common sense easily creates the utopian or imaginary
social arrangements in which there is no inequality, no
oppression, no strife and no constraint on individual
choice. Common sense also fatalistic in its orientation.
For example people think that economic boom will get
them out of the poverty and make them rich. It is the
common sense.
But sociology tends to moderate both utopian and
fatalistic elements. Sociology is anti-utopian. It seeks to
explain the inconsistency between what people
consider right and desirable and their actual practice in
human societies.
Sociology is also anti-fatalist. It does not accept the
constraints taken for granted by the common sense.
For instance, Durkheim argues that economic boom
leads to increase in suicide rate due to alienation.
Sociology tends to distinguish between value
judgements and judgements of reality against the
common sense. The value judgements are based on
the values such as “good or bad” and judgements of
reality are based on facts.
Sociology seeks to explain and challenge the
phenomena through methods or by research unlike
common sense which accepts the phenomena as it is.
Sometimes common sense can misguide us by not
explaining the actual phenomena. For example, if a
black cat crosses our path we consider it as bad omen.
But sociology seeks to challenge this superstition and
explains that it is illogical and this don’t have any
consequences in the human life.
One has to understand the sociology to differentiate it
from the common sense. Emile Durkheim argues that if
one wants to investigate thoroughly about a society
then one should free themselves from the
preconceptions about the society. This preconceptions
are built from the common sense that is limited
experience. These preconceptions are not totally
wrong but these have limited relevance.
Thus sociology give us the critical lens to look at the
phenomena differently beyond from the common
sense.