Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) a French philosopher who is one of the classical sociological
scholars, he formally established the academic discipline of sociology and is commonly cited as
one of the principle architects of modern social science as much of his works was influenced by
Augoste Comte and Harbert Spencer through the sociological positivism by Comte and
Organism analogy by Spencer. Durkheim had two main themes about sociology, firstly the
priority of the social over individual and secondly the idea that society can be studied
scientifically, by which these themes continue to be controversial that Durkheim is still relevant
today (Ritzer 2011). And he was coined as the father of sociology as he helped to define and
establish the field of sociology as an academic discipline, he distinguished sociology from other
discipline as like philosophy, psychology, economic and other social sciences discipline by
arguing that society was an entity of its own. Durkheim as he came up with the idea that society
is made up of social facts which exceed our intuitive understanding and must be investigated
through observation and measurements, these ideas are so central to sociology that Durkheim
often seen as father of sociology (Gouldner 1958 in Ritzer 2011), to found sociology as
discipline was indeed one of Durkheim's primary goal (Ritzer 2011).
Durkheim believed that sociology as an idea, he wanted to turn this idea into a discipline as well
as defined field of study, he recognized the root of sociology in the ancient philosophers such as
Plato and Aristotle and more proximate sources in franch philosophers such as Montesque and
Condorect (Ritzer 2011). However he view previous philosophers did not go so far enough
becouse they did not try to create an entirely new discipline that had no any field of sociology
per se in late nineteenth century, thus it had few thinkers who where dealing with this idea of
sociology but yet had no disciplinary home of sociology that there was strong opposition from
existing discipline to the founding of such a field, that mostly comes from psychology and
philosophy that they seems already to cover the domain sought by sociology where by for
Durkheimian goals was on how to separate sociology on that to be identifiable as independent
discipline. Therefore for Durkheim sociology to be separated from other discipline should be
oriented toward empirical research (Ritzer 2011).
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Durkheim proposed that the subject matter of sociology should be the study of social facts, that
could distinguished sociology from other disciplines such as philosophy, psychology
that
sociologist should study particular features of collective of individual, those social facts are
features of the group and can not be studied apart from collective nor can they be derived from
the study of individual example religion, urban structures, legal systems and moral values such
as family values. He believed that are features of collective existence, which are not reducible
to features of atoms, individual which make it up (Hadden p.87).
Durkheim defined social facts as the way of acting thinking and feeling that presents the way of
acting, thinking and feeling that present the noteworthy property of existing outside the
individual consciousness. These types of conduct outside the individual only external to the
individual but are endowed with coercive power by virtue of which they impose themselves
upon him, independent of his individual will (Durkheim 1982, chapter 1).
For Durkheim sociology can be separated from other disciplines as philosophy is that the idea of
social facts are to be treated as a things (S. Jones 1996, in Ritzer 2011) and studied empirically,
that means the study of social facts must be studied by obtaining data from outside of our
minds through observation and experimentation (Ritzer 2011). Durkheim as he first insists that
social facts are things and ought to be treated as things, then he outlined two principles for
observation of social facts. First principle all preconceptions must be eradicated, second the
subject matter of every sociological study should comprise a group of phenomena defined in
advanced certain common external features and all phenomena so defined should be included
within this group (Wong 1979).
On showing how Durkheimian root of sociology and his subject matter owes its origin by
treating social facts as a thing, on elaborating the notion of social facts and attempts to treat
them simply as a thing can be considered through the characteristic features of social facts,
Durkheim view sociology is built by the social facts as he referred social facts by Latin term
sugeneris which means unique, on distinguishing sociology from other disciplines as philosophy
that social facts can be empirically studied, are external to the individual, are coercive to the
individual and are explained by other social facts (Ritzer 2011), as summarized below.
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According to Durkheim sociologist without preconceptions and prejudices must study social
facts as a real objective phenomena, this method must at all cost avoid prejudice and subjective
judgement while they may not seen to be observable, social facts ara things and are to be
studied empirically not philosophically (Ritzer 2011, p 78). He uses language to address it due to
it is a social fact, that firstly he described that language is a thing should be studied empirically
in case that language have some rules that can not simply philosophize, it regarding grammars,
pronounciation, spelling however all languages also have important exceptions to logical rules
(Quine 1927, in Ritzer 2011) what follows the rules that can be discovered empirically by
studying actual language use due to language changes according to the context in its use (Ritzer
2011).
Social facts are external to an individual as we can observe that there are social phenomena
that are external to any individual as culture it is external to an individual as it is not defined or
created by the individual, the fact is that individual adapt it for their own use indicate that
culture is first external to an individual that made an individual need it by adapting it so as
individual can have the ability to integrate with others (Ritzer 2011), as like other philosophers
agree with this factlike (Kripke 1982, Wittgenstein 1953) have argued that there can not be
such a thing as a culture of one or a private culture.
The coercive power of social facts to the individual as it comes into force whenever social
demands are violeted for example the means of social controls like law or customs immediately
come into operation in case of such violation, that they impose them selves upon the individual
independent of his own will (Ritzer 2011). Where bythis laws as the system of rules which a
particular country or community recognize as regulating the actions of its memmbers and
which it may enforce by the imposition of penalties example traffic laws they govern an
individual on the way of using the road like don't drive when you drunk, always always wear
seat belt while driving therefore when an individual violate them can be awarded a penalty for
their violation like paying fines.
Social facts they are explained by other social facts as in sociology social facts are values,
cultural norms and social structures that transcend the individual and can exercise social
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control, as Durkheim understood as the empirical study of social facts example as he saws the
changes in language can be explained only by other social facts and never by one individuals
intentions like changeable part of language is slang which almost always originats in marginal
social group, it is the fact of the marginal social group that truly explains the history and
functions of the slang (Ritzer 2011).
In conclusion Durkheim categorized social facts in two categories which are Material and
Nonmaterial social facts. Material social facts this are directly observable things such as style of
architecture, forms of technology, and legal codes due to they are esier to understand.
Nonmaterial social facts this much they found in in the minds of individuals, they are external
and have a coercive power to an individual like norms and values they are external to the actor,
as it was his beliefs that when people begin to interact in complex ways their interactions will
obeys laws all their own (Ritzer 2011).
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REFERENCES
Durkheim, E. (1982). The rules of sociological methods. NewYork:Free press
Hadden, Richard W. Sociological theory "an introduction to classical tradition". Peterborough
Ontario: Broundview Press
Ritzer, G (2011). Sociological theory, 8th ed. New York: McGraw-Hill
Wong, Y. (1979). Social facts and theory construction in sociology. Simon Freser University.
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