a research paper about sociological imagination

Cultivating the sociological imagination: fostering inclusive and democratic classrooms

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Experience and sociological imagination

Transforming the researcher's learner identity.

Two research projects undertaken ten years ago explored the experiences of mature students’ access, progression and drop-out in higher education, relying on Habermas and Honneth for sensitizing concepts. This paper explores the implications of undertaking this research today adopting a different set of sensitizing concepts and in the process transforming the identity of the researcher. To this end, this paper moves beyond Habermas and Honneth to the critical theory of Negt and Kluge as a source of new sensitizing concepts informing a reimagined researcher and research project. Their work on experience, its dialectic nature, imploitation, obstinacy – as an alternative to resilience – and a sociological imagination are explored in order to identify possible new sensitizing concepts for researching adults returning to higher education. Implications for transformative adult education will be identified.

Author Biography

Ted fleming, teachers college columbia university, new york.

Adjunct Associate Professor of Adult Education

Department of organization and leadership

Teachers College Columbia University, New York

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Towards a sociology of imagination

• Published: 08 September 2020
• Volume 50 , pages 357–380, ( 2021 )

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• Todd Nicholas Fuist   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0375-3238 1  

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Cultural sociologists have devised numerous theoretical tools for analyzing meaning making among individuals and groups. Yet, the cognitive processes which underpin these theories of meaning making are often bracketed out. Drawing on three different qualitative research projects, respectively on activists, religious communities, and gamers, this article synthesizes work in sociology, psychology, and philosophy, to develop a sociology of imagination. Current work highlights that (1) imagination is a higher order mental function, (2) powerful in its effects, which (3) facilitates intersubjectivity, and (4) is socially constructive. However, sociology can additionally contribute to scholarly understandings of imagination, which have often focused on individualistic mental imaging, by highlighting the degree to which (a) imagination allows individuals and groups to coordinate identities, actions, and futures, (b) imagination relies on widely shared cultural elements, and (c) imagination is often undertaken collectively, in groups. The article concludes with suggestions for future sociological work on imagination.

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Expanding the definitional criteria for imaginative play: Contributions of sociocultural perspectives

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The names of groups in study #2 with an asterisk are pseudonyms. I acquired permission to use the real names of the other groups. The names of all participants in any group are pseudonyms.

All participants in study #3 have been given pseudonyms.

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Acknowledgments

Thank you to Courtney Ann Irby, Meghan Burke, and Jack Delehanty, as well as the reviewers and editors at Theory and Society, for useful comments on this work.

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Appendix: Names and description of groups in studies one and two

Study 1: A “moderate” liberal group called College Liberals, two “radical” groups called Urban Anarchists and Radical Media Alliance, and a community group called Neighborhood Organizers. All names of groups are pseudonyms,

Study 2: The congregations were (1) Dignity/Chicago, an LGBT-identified Catholic church; (2) Emerald City Metropolitan Community Church, a nondenominational LGBT-identified congregation; (3) Mind Body Soul Church*, an African Methodist Episcopal congregation, (4) Neighborhood Church*, a nondenominational, multiracial congregation; and (5) Welcome and Shalom Synagogue*; an LGBT-identified Jewish Temple. The communes were (1) Jesus People USA and (2) Reba Place Fellowship. The nonprofit organizations were (1) Cornerstone Community Outreach, a homeless shelter and (2) Sharing Love and Faith*, a shelter and community organization. Groups with asterisks are pseudonyms.

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Fuist, T.N. Towards a sociology of imagination. Theor Soc 50 , 357–380 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11186-020-09416-y

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Associate Editor for Simply Psychology

BSc (Hons) Psychology, MSc Psychology of Education

Olivia Guy-Evans is a writer and associate editor for Simply Psychology. She has previously worked in healthcare and educational sectors.

• The term sociological imagination describes the type of insight offered by sociology; connecting the problems of individuals to that of broader society.
• C. Wright Mills, the originator of the term, contended that both sociologists and non-academics can develop a deep understanding of how the events of their own lives (their biography) relate to the history of their society. He outlined a list of methods through which both groups could do so.
• Mills believed that American society suffered from the fundamental problems of alienation, moral insensibility, threats to democracy, threats to human freedom, and conflict between bureaucratic rationality and human reason, and that the development of the sociological imagination could counter these.

What is Sociological Imagination?

Sociological imagination, an idea that first emerged in C. Wright Mills’ book of the same name, is the ability to connect one’s personal challenges to larger social issues.

The sociological imagination is the ability to link the experience of individuals to the social processes and structures of the wider world.

It is this ability to examine the ways that individuals construct the social world and how the social world and how the social world impinges on the lives of individuals, which is the heart of the sociological enterprise.

This ability can be thought of as a framework for understanding social reality, and describes how sociology is relevant not just to sociologists, but to those seeking to understand and build empathy for the conditions of daily life.

When the sociological imagination is underdeveloped or absent in large groups of individuals for any number of reasons, Mills believed that fundamental social issues resulted.

Sociological Imagination Theory

C. Wright Mills established the concept of sociological imagination in the 20th century.

Mills believed that: “Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both” the daily lives of society’s members and the history of a society and its issues.

He referred to the problems that occur in everyday life, or biography, as troubles and the problems that occur in society, or history, as issues.

Mills ultimately created a framework intended to help individuals realize the relationship between personal experiences and greater society (Elwell, 2002).

Before Mill, sociologists tended to focus on understanding how sociological systems worked, rather than exploring individual issues. Mills, however, pointed out that these sociologists, functionalists chief among them, ignored the role of the individual within these systems.

In essence, Mills claimed in his book, The Sociological Imagination , that research had come to be guided more by the requirements of administrative concerns than by intellectual ones.

He critiqued sociology for focusing on accumulating facts that only served to facilitate the administrative decisions of, for example, governments.

Mills believed that, to truly fulfill the promise of social science, sociologists and laypeople alike had to focus on substantial, society-wide problems, and relate those problems to the structural and historical features of the society and culture that they navigated (Elwell, 2002).

Mills’ Guidelines for Social Scientists

In the appendix of The Sociological Imagination, Mills set forth several guidelines that would lead to “intellectual craftsmanship.” These are, paraphrased (Mills, 2000; Ellwell, 2002):

Scholars should not split work from life, because both work and life are in unity.

Scholars should keep a file, or a collection, of their own personal, professional, and intellectual experiences.

Scholars should engage in a continual review of their thoughts and experiences.

Scholars may find a truly bad sociological book to be as intellectually stimulating and conducive to thinking as a good one.

Scholars must have an attitude of playfulness toward phrases, words, and ideas, as well as a fierce drive to make sense of the world.

The sociological imagination is stimulated when someone assumes a willingness to view the world from the perspective of others.

Sociological investigators should not be afraid, in the preliminary and speculative stages of their research, to think in terms of imaginative extremes, and,

Scholars should not hesitate to express ideas in language that is as simple and direct as possible. Ideas are affected by how they are expressed. When sociological perspectives are expressed in deadening language, they create a deadened sociological imagination.

Mills’ Original Social Problems

Mills identified five main social problems in American society: alienation , moral insensibility, threats to democracy, threats to human freedom, and the conflict between bureaucratic rationality and human reason (Elwell, 2015).

1. Threats to Democracy and Freedom

The end result of these problems of alienation, political indifference, and the economic and political concentration of power, according to Mills, is a serious threat to democracy and freedom.

He believed that, as bureaucratic organizations became large and more centralized, more and more power would be placed into the hands of a small elite (Elwell, 2006).

2. Alienation

Mills believed that alienation is deeply rooted in how work itself works in society; however, unlike Marx, C. Wright Mills does not attribute alienation solely to the means of production, but to the modern division of labor .

Mills observed that, on the whole, jobs are broken up into simple, functional tasks with strict standards. Machines or unskilled workers take over the most tedious tasks (Elwell, 2002).

As the office was automated, Mills argued, authority and job autonomy became the attributes of only those highest in the work hierarchy. Most workers are discouraged from using their own judgment, and their decision-making forces them to comply with the strict rules handed down by others.

In this loss of autonomy, the average worker becomes alienated from their intellectual capacities and work becomes an enforced chore (Elwell, 2015).

3. Moral Insensibility

The second major problem that C. Wright Mills identified in modern American society was that of moral insensibility. He pointed out that, as people had lost faith in their leaders in government, religion, and the workplace, they became apathetic.

He considered this apathy a “spiritual condition” that underlined many problems — namely, moral insensibility. As a result of moral insensibility, people within society accept atrocities, such as genocide, committed by their leaders.

Mills considered the source of cruelty to be moral insensibility and, ultimately, the underdevelopment of the sociological imagination (Elwell, 2002).

4. Personal Troubles

Personal troubles are the issues that people experience within their own character, and in their immediate relationships with others. Mills believed that people function in their personal lives as actors and actresses who make choices about friends, family, groups, work, school, and other issues within their control.

As a result, people have some issue on the outcomes of events on a personal level. For example, an individual employee who spends most of his work time browsing social media or online shopping may lose their job. This is a personal problem.

However, hundreds of thousands of employees being laid-off en masse constitutes a larger social issue (Mills, 2000).

5. Social and Public Issues

Social and public issues, meanwhile, are beyond one”s personal control. These issues pertain to the organization and processes of society, rather than individuals. For example, universities may, as a whole, overcharge students for their education.

This may be the result of decades of competition and investment into each school”s administration and facilities, as well as the narrowing opportunities for those without a college degree.

In this situation, it becomes impossible for large segments of the population to get a tertiary education without accruing large and often debilitating amounts of debt (Mills, 2000).

The sociological imagination allows sociologists to distinguish between the personal and sociological aspects of problems in the lives of everyone.

Most personal problems are not exclusively personal issues; instead, they are influenced and affected by a variety of social norms, habits, and expectations. Indeed, there is often confusion as to what differentiates personal problems and social issues (Hironimus-Wendt & Wallace, 2009).

For example, a heroin addiction may be blamed on the reckless and impulsive choices of an addict. However, this approach fails to account for the societal factors and history that led to high rates of heroin addiction, such as the over-prescribing of opiate painkillers by doctors and the dysregulation of pharmaceutical companies in the United States.

Sociological imagination is useful for both sociologists and those encountering problems in their everyday lives. When people lack in sociological imagination, they become vulnerable to apathy: considering the beliefs, actions, and traditions around them to be natural and unavoidable.

This can cause moral insensitivity and ultimately the commitment of cruel and unjust acts by those guided not by their own consciousness, but the commands of an external body (Hironimus-Wendt & Wallace, 2009).

Fast Fashion

Say that someone is buying themselves a new shirt. Usually, the person buying the shirt would be concerned about their need for new clothing and factors such as the price, fabric, color, and cut of the shirt.

At a deeper level, the personal problem of buying a shirt may provoke someone to ask themselves what they are buying the shirt for, where they would wear it, and why they would participate in an activity where they would wear the shirt over instead of some other activity.

People answer these questions on a personal level through considering a number of different factors. For example, someone may think about how much they make, and how much they can budget for clothing, the stores available in the community, and the styles popular in one”s area (Joy et al., 2012).

On a larger level, however, the questions and answers to the question of what shirt to buy — or even if to buy a shirt at all — would differ if someone were provided a different context and circumstances.

For example, if someone had come into a sudden sum of wealth, they may choose to buy an expensive designer shirt or quit the job that required them to buy the shirt altogether. If someone had lived in a community with many consignment shops, they may be less likely to buy a new shirt and more likely to buy one that was pre-owned.

If there were a cultural dictate that required people to, say, cover their shoulders or breasts — or the opposite, someone may buy a more or less revealing shirt.

On an even higher level, buying a shirt also represents an opportunity to connect the consumption habits of individuals and groups to larger issues.

The lack of proximity of communities to used-clothing stores on a massive scale may encourage excessive consumption, leading to environmental waste in pollution. The competition between retailers to provide the cheapest and most fashionable shirts possible results in, as many have explored, the exploitation of garment workers in exporting countries and large amounts of co2 output due to shipping.

Although an individual can be blamed or not blamed for buying a shirt made more or less sustainably or ethically, a discussion of why an individual bought a certain shirt cannot be complete without a consideration of the larger factors that influence their buying patterns (Joy et al., 2012).

The “Global Economic Crisis”

Dinerstein, Schwartz, and Taylor (2014)  used the 2008 economic crisis as a case study of the concept of sociological imagination, and how sociology and other social sciences had failed to adequately understand the crisis.

The 2008 global economic crisis led to millions of people around the world losing their jobs. On the smallest level, individuals were unable to sustain their lifestyles.

Someone who was laid off due to the economic downturn may have become unable to make their mortgage or car payments, leading to a bank foreclosing their house or repossessing their car.

This person may also be unable to afford groceries, need to turn to a food bank, or have credit card debt to feed themselves and their families. As a result, this person may damage their credit score, restricting them from, say, taking out a home ownership loan in the future.

The sociological imagination also examines issues like the great recession at a level beyond these personal problems. For example, a sociologist may look at how the crisis resulted from the accessibility of and increasing pressure to buy large and normally unaffordable homes in the United States.

Some sociologists, Dinerstein, Schwartz, and Taylor among them, even looked at the economic crisis as unveiling the social issue of how academics do sociology. For example, Dinerstein, Schwatz, and Taylor point out that the lived experience of the global economic crisis operated under gendered and racialized dynamics.

Many female immigrant domestic laborers, for example, lost their jobs in Europe and North America as a result of the crisis.

While the things that sociologists had been studying about these populations up until that point — migration and return — are significant, the crisis brought a renewed focus in sociology into investigating how the negative effects of neoliberal globalization and the multiple crises already impacting residents of the global South compound during recessions (Spitzer & Piper, 2014).

Bhambra, G. (2007).  Rethinking modernity: Postcolonialism and the sociological imagination . Springer.

Dinerstein, A. C., Schwartz, G., & Taylor, G. (2014). Sociological imagination as social critique: Interrogating the ‘global economic crisis’. Sociology, 48 (5), 859-868.

Elwell, F. W. (2002). The Sociology of C. Wright Mills .

Elwell, F. W. (2015). Macrosociology: four modern theorists . Routledge.

Hironimus-Wendt, R. J., & Wallace, L. E. (2009). The sociological imagination and social responsibility. Teaching Sociology, 37 (1), 76-88.

Joy, A., Sherry Jr, J. F., Venkatesh, A., Wang, J., & Chan, R. (2012). Fast fashion, sustainability, and the ethical appeal of luxury brands. Fashion theory, 16 (3), 273-295.

Mills, C. W. (2000). The sociological imagination . Oxford University Press.

Spitzer, D. L., & Piper, N. (2014). Retrenched and returned: Filipino migrant workers during times of crisis. Sociology, 48 (5), 1007-1023.

Module 1: Foundations of Sociology

The sociological imagination, learning outcomes.

• Define the sociological imagination
• Apply the sociological imagination

Figure 1.  The sociological imagination enables you to look at your life and your own personal issues and relate them to other people, history, or societal structures.

Many people believe they understand the world and the events taking place within it, even though they have not actually engaged in a systematic attempt to understanding the social world, as sociologists do. In this section, you’ll learn to think like a sociologist.

The sociological imagination , a concept established by C. Wright Mills (1916-1962) provides a framework for understanding our social world that far surpasses any common sense notion we might derive from our limited social experiences. Mills was a contemporary sociologist who brought tremendous insight into the daily lives of society’s members. Mills stated: “Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both” [1] .  The sociological imagination is making the connection between personal challenges and larger social issues. Mills identified “troubles” (personal challenges) and “issues” (larger social challenges), also known as biography, and history, respectively. Mills’ sociological imagination allows individuals to see the relationships between events in their personal lives (biography), and events in their society (history). In other words, this mindset provides the ability for individuals to realize the relationship between their personal experiences and the larger society in which they live their lives.

Personal troubles are private problems experienced within the character of the individual and the range of their immediate relation to others. Mills identified that we function in our personal lives as actors and actresses who make choices about our friends, family, groups, work, school, and other issues within our control. We have a degree of influence on the outcome of matters within this personal level. A college student who parties 4 nights out of 7, who rarely attends class, and who never does his homework has a personal trouble that interferes with his odds of success in college. However, when 50% of all college students in the United States never graduate, we label it as a larger social issue.

Larger social or public issues are those that lie beyond one’s personal control and the range of one’s inner life. These pertain to broader matters of organization and process, which are rooted in society rather than in the individual. Nationwide, students come to college as freshmen who are often ill-prepared to understand the rigors of college life. They haven’t often been challenged enough in high school to make the necessary adjustments required to succeed in college. Nationwide, the average teenager text messages, surfs the Net, plays video games, watches TV, spends hours each day with friends, and works at least part-time. Where and when would he or she get experience focusing attention on college studies and the rigorous self-discipline required to transition into college?

The real power of the sociological imagination is found in how we learn to distinguish between the personal and social levels in our own lives. This includes economic challenges. For example, many students do not purchase required textbooks for college classes at both 2-year colleges and 4-year colleges and universities. Many students simply do not have the money to purchase textbooks, and while this can seem like a “choice,” some of the related social issues include rising tuition rates, decreasing financial aid, increasing costs of living and decreasing wages. The Open Educational Resource (OER) movement has sought to address this  personal trouble  as a  public issue  by partnering with institutional consortia and encouraging large city and state institutions to adopt OER materials. A student who does not purchase the assigned textbook might see this as a private problem, but this student is part of a growing number of college students who are forced to make financial decisions based on structural circumstances.

A majority of personal problems are not experienced as exclusively personal issues, but are influenced and affected by social norms, habits, and expectations. Consider issues like homelessness, crime, divorce, and access to healthcare. Are these all caused by personal choices, or by societal problems? Using the sociological imagination, we can view these issues as interconnected personal and public concerns.

For example, homelessness may be blamed on the individuals who are living on the streets. Perhaps their personal choices influenced their position; some would say they are lazy, unmotivated, or uneducated. This approach of blaming the victim fails to account for the societal factors that also lead to homelessness—what types of social obstacles and social failings might push someone towards homelessness? Bad schools, high unemployment, high housing costs, and little family support are all social issues that could contribute to homelessness. C. Wright Mills, who originated the concept of the sociological imagination, explained it this way: “the very structure of opportunities has collapsed. Both the correct statement of the problem and the range of possible solutions require us to consider the economic and political institutions of the society, and not merely the personal situation and character of a scatter of individuals.”

Watch the following video to see an example of how the sociological imagination is used to understand the issue of obesity.

• Mills, C. W.: 1959, The Sociological Imagination, Oxford University Press, London. ↵
• Modification, adaptation, and original content. Authored by : Sarah Hoiland for Lumen Learning. Provided by : Lumen Learning. License : CC BY: Attribution
• The Sociological Imagination. Provided by : College of the Canyons. Located at : https://www.canyons.edu/Offices/DistanceLearning/OER/Documents/Open%20Textbooks%20At%20COC/Sociology/SOCI%20101/The%20Sociological%20Imagination.pdf . Project : Sociology 101. License : CC BY: Attribution
• People graphic. Authored by : Peggy_Marco. Provided by : pixabay. Located at : https://pixabay.com/en/network-society-social-community-1019778/ . License : CC0: No Rights Reserved

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The Sociological Imagination

Learning outcomes.

• Define the sociological imagination
• Apply the sociological imagination

Many people believe they understand the world and the events taking place within it, even though they have not actually engaged in a systematic attempt to understanding the social world, as sociologists do. In this section, you’ll learn to think like a sociologist.

The sociological imagination , a concept established by C. Wright Mills (1916-1962) provides a framework for understanding our social world that far surpasses any common sense notion we might derive from our limited social experiences. Mills was a contemporary sociologist who brought tremendous insight into the daily lives of society’s members. Mills stated: “Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both” [1] .  The sociological imagination is making the connection between personal challenges and larger social issues. Mills identified “troubles” (personal challenges) and “issues” (larger social challenges), also known as biography, and history, respectively. Mills’ sociological imagination allows individuals to see the relationships between events in their personal lives (biography), and events in their society (history). In other words, this mindset provides the ability for individuals to realize the relationship between their personal experiences and the larger society in which they live their lives.

Personal troubles are private problems experienced within the character of the individual and the range of their immediate relation to others. Mills identified that we function in our personal lives as actors and actresses who make choices about our friends, family, groups, work, school, and other issues within our control. We have a degree of influence on the outcome of matters within this personal level. A college student who parties 4 nights out of 7, who rarely attends class, and who never does his homework has a personal trouble that interferes with his odds of success in college. However, when 50% of all college students in the United States never graduate, we label it as a larger social issue.

Larger social or public issues are those that lie beyond one’s personal control and the range of one’s inner life. These pertain to broader matters of organization and process, which are rooted in society rather than in the individual. Nationwide, students come to college as freshmen who are often ill-prepared to understand the rigors of college life. They haven’t often been challenged enough in high school to make the necessary adjustments required to succeed in college. Nationwide, the average teenager text messages, surfs the Net, plays video games, watches TV, spends hours each day with friends, and works at least part-time. Where and when would he or she get experience focusing attention on college studies and the rigorous self-discipline required to transition into college?

The real power of the sociological imagination is found in how we learn to distinguish between the personal and social levels in our own lives. This includes economic challenges. For example, many students do not purchase required textbooks for college classes at both 2-year colleges and 4-year colleges and universities. Many students simply do not have the money to purchase textbooks, and while this can seem like a “choice,” some of the related social issues include rising tuition rates, decreasing financial aid, increasing costs of living and decreasing wages. The Open Educational Resource (OER) movement has sought to address this  personal trouble  as a  public issue  by partnering with institutional consortia and encouraging large city and state institutions to adopt OER materials. A student who does not purchase the assigned textbook might see this as a private problem, but this student is part of a growing number of college students who are forced to make financial decisions based on structural circumstances.

A majority of personal problems are not experienced as exclusively personal issues, but are influenced and affected by social norms, habits, and expectations. Consider issues like homelessness, crime, divorce, and access to healthcare. Are these all caused by personal choices, or by societal problems? Using the sociological imagination, we can view these issues as interconnected personal and public concerns.

For example, homelessness may be blamed on the individuals who are living on the streets. Perhaps their personal choices influenced their position; some would say they are lazy, unmotivated, or uneducated. This approach of blaming the victim fails to account for the societal factors that also lead to homelessness—what types of social obstacles and social failings might push someone towards homelessness? Bad schools, high unemployment, high housing costs, and little family support are all social issues that could contribute to homelessness. C. Wright Mills, who originated the concept of the sociological imagination, explained it this way: “the very structure of opportunities has collapsed. Both the correct statement of the problem and the range of possible solutions require us to consider the economic and political institutions of the society, and not merely the personal situation and character of a scatter of individuals.”

Watch the following video to see an example of how the sociological imagination is used to understand the issue of obesity.

<a style="margin-left: 16px;" target="_blank" href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vy-T6DtTF-BbMfpVEI7VP_R7w2A4anzYZLXR8Pk4Fu4"

• Mills, C. W.: 1959, The Sociological Imagination, Oxford University Press, London. ↵

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