Sociological Theory

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Sociological Theories
Sociological theories are developed to explain or describe a social phenomenon. It is a connection and relationship between a variety of concepts, and it represents the typical functioning of social processes and events. This text will delve into the advantages and disadvantages of some social theories and how they differ from one another.
One of the primary sociological theories is structural functionalism. Its main advantage that it explains how the society reduces conflict through social control and socialization and also shows how the society can adapt to overcome economic and a plethora of changes. However, its main disadvantage is that it hides the conflicts of interest by manipulating ideologies.
The conflict theory has continuously helped us to understand the social machinations linked to competition especially if there is a significant difference in power. For instance, class and race can be explained by this theory. However, its primary disadvantage is that it doesn’t account for the cooperation of people and is therefore contrasted to structural functionalism theory.
The feminism and gender conflict theory has a primary advantage of being able to explain the social injustices that exist between the two primary genders; male and female. However, it is based on a one-sided view and is often harmful because they build an ideology that is against one gender and advocates for another.
Race and conflict theory has a primary purpose of presuming the natural divisions of humans into categories called races.

One of its primary advantages is that it tends to create a link between racism and its source. However, this is flawed as there is no specific gene for a particular race and thus cannot be linked to genetics, nor a natural process.
One of the primary advantages of the symbolic-interaction theory is that the argument in itself has positive aspects that surround its framework. It is therefore non-structured and individual-based that allows people to have freedom of choice. However, its weakness is that it excludes the influence of social structures and socioeconomic groupings (Archibald N.p).
The theory I find most interesting is the symbolic interaction theory. This is because it is the most relatable and logical theories that can be used to explain social activities. This theory forms the basis of freedom of choice that can be used to justify all phenomena and in turn the attitudes and behaviors of each at a personal level. Moreover, it provides a moral responsibility to each instead of being motivated externally by norms. For instance, racism is a choice of a person and not a natural process. Furthermore, people decide by themselves if they want to belong to a social grouping or structure. This theory can thus be used to explain all other theories concisely.
Works Cited
Archibald, Alexandra. “Strengths and Limitations of symbolic interactionism.” prezi.com. N. p., 2018. Web. 27 May 2018. https://prezi.com/zgkxibzcnvzv/strengths-and-limitations-of-symbolic-interactionism/