"Sociology is the study of human social life, groups and societies. It is a dazzling and compelling enterprise, having as its subject matter our own behaviour as social beings.

The scope of sociology is extremely wide, ranging from the analysis of passing encounters between individuals in the street up to the investigation of world-wide social processes".

In the Begining...
The origins of Sociology lie in the 19th century when, the BSA notes: "advances in science and technology encouraged people to believe there could be a rational explanation for everything and that scientific study could lead to the solving of all of the problems faced by human beings".
With this sense of opportunity and optimism "Auguste Comte, who gave the name to sociology, confidently expected it would provide the highest level of scientific explanation in establishing laws of human society itself".
In terms of teaching and academic sociology, modern sociology was "first taught in Britain at the beginning of this century but the expansion here took place much more recently and was at first greatly influenced by US sociology. During the 1960s, especially, it became a major social science subject, taught in universities and colleges, and with the development of the sociology ´A´ level during the 1970s it became a major subject in schools too".
Modern Sociology
The BSA notes: "From its original purpose as the ´science of society´, sociology has moved on...to understand how society works. It seeks to provide insights into the many forms of relationship, both formal and informal, between people. Such relationships are considered to be the ´fabric´ of society.
Smaller scale relationships are connected to larger scale relationships and the totality of this is society itself. Human beings have wants, needs and desires but the form these take is related to attachments to social groupings and participation in social institutions. The latter are patterns of human interaction which become ´instituted´ over time. People therefore recognise them and orientate their actions towards them.
Alternatively, people may react against social institutions. Either way it is the actions of people that serve both to reproduce society and to effect the changes that are a constant feature of the process".

Sociological research (what sociologists do when we're not contemplating the Meaning of Life) broadly proceeds, according to the BSA, in two basic ways:
1. Sociology is conceptual. That is: "Ideas [about society] are devised as ´concepts´ to describe and explain the workings of society. In this way the forms of social organisation and the resulting social institutions which people create and reproduce in the course of everyday life become defined in sociological terms".
2. "Concepts are tested through ´empirical´ research; that is. research involving the investigation of particular aspects of society and the way people interact with each other. This provides a check as to whether sociological concepts actually correspond to the way social life is conducted by real life people".
In other words, sociological research consists of the identification, development and testing of theories.

Sociologists actually do quite a lot - as the BSA puts it:
"Sociology is the one social science which embraces the whole range of human activities and this makes it a very wide field of study. As a result, it offers many opportunities for specialisation and these are reflected in the work of sociologists". These specialisations include the study of:

• Economy, Work and Organisation.
• The Conjunction of Biological and Social Relationships: the Family and Gender.
• Social Identity: Age, Class, Gender and Race.
• Poverty, Welfare and Social Inequality.
• Social Norms, Crime and Deviance.
• Religion and Belief Systems.
• Organisations and Bureaucracy
• Society and the Environment.
• People, Health and the Sociology of the Body

Summary
The BSA suggests, therefore:

• "Human society involves people entering into relationships with each other" and that "such relationships take many forms".
   
• "Patterns of human relationship become institutionalised in the course of their reproduction over time and may therefore be referred to as social institutions".
   
• "To participate in society human beings maintain an understanding of their relationships with others and of the institutions in which they participate".
   
• "The task for sociologists is to capture this understanding in a more systematic way and provide explanations which nevertheless are understandable in terms of everyday life".