Emile Durkheim

Want to read the rest of this paper? Join Essayworld today to view this entire essay and over 50,000 other term papers

he was an outgrowth of a distinguished line of rabbinical scholar (Rothschild; 1999). He graduated from the ‹cole Normale Sup¾rieure in Paris in 1882, then taught law and philosophy. However, in 1887 he began teaching sociology, first at the University of Bordeaux and later at the University of Paris. His knowledge of law and religion helped him to come up with a new theory, which concerned him with the basis of social stability. For example, the common values shared by a society, such as morality and religion. In his view, these values, or the collective conscience, are the major bonds that hold the social order together (Dickey, est. al; 1876; 394). He believed that a breakdown of these values leads to a destruction of social stability and to individual feeling of worry and dissatisfaction (Dickey, est. al; 1876; 394). The notion that sacredness is a value that a given society place on objects, that such object shape and generate the religious feeling of its members, and ...

Get instant access to over 50,000 essays. Write better papers. Get better grades. Already a member? Login

to all the members of the society are greater in number and intensity than those which pertain personally to each member (Rothschild; 1999). It is as much stronger as the excess is more considerable. However, what makes our personality is how much of our own individual qualities we have, what distinguishes us from others. This solidarity can grow only in inverse ratio to personality. There are in each of us, as we have said, two consciences: one which is common to our group in its entirety, which, consequently, is not ourselves, but society living and acting within us; the other, on the contrary, represents that in us which is personal and distinct, that which makes us an ...

Succeed in your coursework without stepping into a library. Get access to a growing library of notes, book reports, and research papers in 2 minutes or less.

CITE THIS PAGE: