What is this site about?

What if sociologists ran the world?

Okay, that’s probably not going to happen any time soon, but what if they commented on everything from politics, religion, race, and inequality to pop culture on a colorful, fun, website?

That’s more like it.

Welcome to Everydaysociologyblog.com, a brand-new site that features interesting, informative, and most of all entertaining commentary from sociologists around the United States. Come to this site regularly to get a sociological take on what is happening in the news (and on what should be in the news).

Although this site was created primarily for people taking or teaching classes in sociology, we are all really students of sociology, aren’t we? Whether we know it or not, we all generate ideas about social groups, about why things happen and about what should be done to address some of the challenges our society faces (like terrorism, health care and education). Issues like war and peace, gay rights, and why Paris Hilton is always on the news are things that many people try and make sense of.

We are trying to figure this stuff out too, and the many tools that sociology offers will help us to do so. These tools are not magic wands or secret codes—in fact, we want to share them with you to so we can all have a deeper and richer understanding of the world around us.

So here’s what you can expect from this site:

1.  We promise to stay on top of current events and be as relevant as people over 25 with Ph.D.s possibly can be.
2. We will avoid using jargon and terms that you actually need a Ph.D. to understand (although personally I think even people with Ph.D.s sometimes just pretend to understand).
3. And most of all, we will keep things interesting—all of the posts on this site will pass the “so what?” test that some academic research frankly does not.

Sociology is a very diverse field, and our contributors have a wide variety of interests. You will see discussions of immigration, mental health, race, religion, gender, and other topics from a wide variety of perspectives. To bring in fresh ideas, we will also periodically have guest contributors.

And we will do more than lecture you. Even though most of us are professors who teach regularly, this site will be more of a conversation than a class. Okay, there might be some charts and graphs occasionally, but we promise there won’t be a test. We are going to do our best to help these ideas come to life through pictures and occasionally even streaming video. We also might write a little about our lives to bring some of the basics of sociology to life, but we promise—no endless blog rambling about what we had for dinner or random thoughts about why the cat hates the guy who lives next door.

You might be wondering—where do you fit in with all this? What about what you think? This site will present a variety of ideas and viewpoints, and you may not agree with some of them. That’s okay. In fact, sometimes we might purposefully play devil’s advocate.

For now we will just be posting our contributors’ columns, but eventually we will have a letter to the editor feature, which will allow you to respond to us with your thoughts, and we will also open select posts to reader comments. Remember, the point of this site is to learn more about how sociology helps us understand everyday life, not to vent! Quality control is really important to us, so you can be sure when you visit you won’t have to sift through a lot of junk.

So, welcome! We invite you to visit regularly and (eventually) to tell us what you think. But for now, sit back, relax, and enjoy the sociological conversation.

Karen Sternheimer

Editor

Comments

[tasha]

Hello
I am writing a speech on infidelity. I was wondering if you can answer some quesions for me?
Do you think technology helps with commiting an affair?

Why do you think infidelity happens?

There was this survey that says that infidelity has gone up. What do you think that caused it?

[lisa hendrickson]

i've been following this blog for a little over a month now and so far am loving it. i do social work in mental health (which is basically psychology & sociology put together). thanks!

[Allen Salzman]

Hi. Great site. Norton does respectable work. Mitch Duneir is outstanding. But my question is this: is this site in any way related to the textbook (a rather poor one in our opinion) by the same name?

[Karen Sternheimer]

No, our site is not affiliated with the text Everyday Sociology. Glad you are enjoying the blog!

[Johan]

I've been following this blog now since the 11th of september 2007 and is just overwhelmed when looking back at all the posts (over 250!). The range of subjects taken up and the quality of each of the posts are just amazing! So I just want to take a moment and thank all the contributors to the blog, you're doing something unique and I think very valuble to the field of sociology (i.e. presenting highly readable connections between everyday life and sociology). THANK YOU!

[Ken]

Hi! I really enjoy this blog, but I also have a suggestion. On two different occasions, I spent some time posting comments reflecting on two of the blog entries. After posting the comments, they showed up at the bottom of the page -- and then they were gone when I looked back a while later. If your policy is not to allow comments on most of the posts (which I didn't realize until I found this early blog entry), you should probably find a way to disable the "Post a comment" box at the bottom of them. It was no fun to post and then lose everything I'd typed on both occasions. It's not what people expect to happen when they see a blog entry with a box for comments at the end! Thanks for considering.

[wwnorton]

Ken, Sorry your comments disappeared! We allow comments on all posts and are not sure what happened to your comments, but will look into why they might have gone away.

[Heather]

Hi,

My name is Heather Jones and I am the assistant editor of Epsychologist.org. I am contacting you today in hopes of developing a relationship with your website; we have seen your site and think your content is great. Epsychologist.org offer a free informational resource to both the general and professional public on several issues.

I hope you show some interest in building relationship, please contact me at [email protected].

[comment system]

Thanks for the post, I really enjoyed the site, I hope someday the world will be ruled by this ideology as it is intelligent and more humane.

[Camilla]

hello!
I'm a student who will be writing a paper about online information, and i'll be using your site as a great example and reference for people to find honorable interesting and accountable information. thanks for posting, i've really enjoyed reading the content :)

[boxing machine]

I think your blog is wonderful and creative and you take a realy different approach about life and how they should be. thanks.

[AKASH GOGOI]

I excited to explore your site on sociology

[bubble shooter]

sociologists ran the world? are your kidding? They don't have enough abilities to do that. Because the work need logical brains and in my opinion, I think sociologists just can give opinion in their views and sometimes some advice. But can advice work? It still needs to considered more.