Invitation to Sociology Critical Discussion of Text

Invitation to Sociology
Critical Discussion of text The term “Culture Shock” is used by anthropologists to describe the way people react and their response to a new culture. Peter L. Berger the author of the article uses an example of a person’s first encounter with polygamy, puberty rites, or the way a car is driven to explain the kind of reaction and shock they may have. It’s a good method because it shows that anthropology has a lot of new things to learn and it is not as basic as it may seem. Sociology is about going the extra mile into what is accepted in the culture and learning that everything has different meanings. Berger states that an sociologist’s perspective can be interpret as, “seeing through” or “looking behind”. I for one think this is a great way to explain the fundamentals of sociology because it shows that they are always looking further into straight forward subjects. Berger also uses love as an example that he looks deeper into. Berger says “It is assumed that men and women marry because they are in love”(pg.8), but as a sociologist he looked behind that and became aware that most people fall in love are usually in the same class, make the same amount of money have the same education and religious background. This is a good example because it explains that once you investigate much further into the behavior of love, you as the reader notice that love doesn’t create the relationship, it is achieved after the relationship has been fully planned out thoroughly. Sociologist can be described as using “debunking” techniques. They look further into what is accepted into society. This technique helps people understand the social systems they are dealing with and for one it defiantly gave me a better understand of culture shock too.