Introduction to Sociology #248781

Sociology claims to be the science of society, and the question immediately arises: What is society, or a society, this object which is to be studied? To-day many writers talk freely of society, and mean by it on one page, humanity on the next, a family, or a race; on the next, social intercourse. Those writers who regard society as an organism are perhaps the most careless in this matter, and confuse the reader by including in said organism at one time the world as a whole, and again, without notice of change, some small group of men who have united for a definite purpose.