"Social" is synonymous with "public". Therefore, any definition that includes at least one of these two terms implies the existence of a connected set of people, that is, society. It is assumed that all social phenomena are the result of joint labor. Interestingly, this does not oblige more than one person to participate in the reproduction of anything. That is, "joint" does not mean a direct relationship to the result of labor. Moreover, in sociology it is obviously considered that any work is social in one way or another.
Terminogy
Social phenomena are a product of people's vital activity. All phenomena, in principle, can be divided into man-made (man-made) and natural (natural). The first ones are just considered social (public).
What is included in the concept of public? This word has the same root as "general". Between people there is always something that unites them: gender, age, placeresidence, interests or goals. If there are more than two such people, they are said to form a society.
What are social phenomena?
Examples of social phenomena - any result of the development and work of society. It can be the Internet, knowledge, education, fashion, culture and more.
The simplest example that arose as a result of the development of the economic system of commodity-market relations is money. Therefore, almost everything can be represented as a social phenomenon. Anything that has to do with society in one way or another. For example, culture is considered as a social phenomenon or the same society. These two aspects will be described in more detail below.
Why is even the work of one person a social phenomenon?
A little higher it was indicated that the work of one person can be defined as the term in question. Why is this happening? Doesn't the concept of "social phenomenon" include a society that should consist of more than two people?
Here's the thing. Any activity of a person is influenced by his environment: directly or indirectly. Relatives, acquaintances or even strangers shape his activity or, more precisely, correct it. Relationships with other people and human actions are correlated with each other by a complex system of relationships: causes and effects. Even creating something alone, a person cannot unequivocally say that this is only his merit. I immediately remember the presentation of awards to media persons who say thank you to their friends and relatives: thisphenomena have a sociological background.
What, then, has nothing to do with the term in question? For example, we can take the characteristics of a person like height and weight, sex and age, which are given to him by nature, his relations with people do not affect them in any way, and therefore they do not fit the definition of "social phenomena".
Classification
Due to the diversity of social phenomena, it is customary to distinguish them by type of activity. It is problematic to give a complete classification: there are as many categories as there are areas of their application. Suffice it to say that there are socio-cultural, as well as socio-political, socio-religious, socio-economic and other social phenomena. Examples of each of them constantly surround a person, regardless of his activity. This happens because a socialized person is a part of society, although the relationship of each individual person with society may be different. Even anti-social personalities interact with him - in a negative way. And antisocial behavior can manifest itself as a result of an unsuccessful collision with society. A person never creates himself, all this is the result of long-term and fruitful cooperation with society.
Two sides
Social phenomena and processes have two sides. The first of them is internal-psychic, and it expresses the subjectivity of mental experiences and feelings reflected in the phenomenon. The second is outwardly symbolic,objectifies subjectivity, materializes it. Thanks to this, the social value of phenomena and processes is formed.
They themselves are closely linked by cause-and-effect logic: a process is the creation of a phenomenon, and a phenomenon is created by a process.
Defining culture
The concept of culture comes from the concept of society. The first is a way of realizing the goals and interests of the second. The main task of culture is to be a link between people, to support existing societies and to promote the creation of new ones. A few more stand out from this function.
Culture functions
These include:
- adaptation to the environment;
- epistemological (from "gnoseo" - knowledge);
- informative, responsible for the transfer of knowledge and experience;
- communicative, going inextricably with the previous one;
- regulatory-normative, which regulates the system of norms and morals of society;
- evaluative, due to which the concepts of "good" and "evil" are distinguished, is closely related to the previous one;
- delimitation and integration of societies;
- socialization, the most humane function that is designed to create a socialized person.
Personality and culture
Culture as a social phenomenon is seen as a long-term, continuous reproduction of benefits by society. But she also has her own characteristics. Unlike other social phenomena, examples of culture and art are created by individuals and creators.
Interaction between man and culture takes on severalforms. There are four main such incarnations.
- The first one represents the personality as the result of culture, a product created from its system of norms and values.
- The second one says that a person is also a consumer of culture - other products of this activity.
- The third form of interaction is when the individual contributes to cultural development.
- The fourth implies that a person is able to perform the informative function of culture himself.
Society is a unique social phenomenon
Society as a social phenomenon has a number of features that no other example of this term characterizes. Thus, the very definition of a social phenomenon includes this concept. It is said, as has already been pointed out earlier, that one is the product of the other, the result of joint labor.
Hence society is notable for reproducing itself. It creates social phenomena, being, in fact, the same. Culture, for example, which is very important to remember, is not capable of this.
It is also important (it is a logical conclusion from the definition given in this article more than once) that society is the key to any social phenomenon. Without it, neither culture, nor politics, nor power, nor religion is possible, which makes it the basis. From this point of view, it can be seen that its reproduction of itself is an example of a self-preservation function.
Importance of society and social phenomena
The emergence of society has become an important step forprogress in human development. Actually, it is he who is responsible for the fact that individual individuals began to be perceived as one whole, interconnected. The emergence of various social phenomena of different levels at different times testified and continues to testify to the progress of mankind. They help control and predict development, are the subject of study of many social sciences, from sociology to history.
