Historical Sociology - The Use of History in Sociology

The Use of History in Sociology

A common phrase regarding this subject is "Sociology is history with the hard work left out; history is sociology with the brains left out". As time has passed, History and Sociology have historically developed into two different specific academic disciplines. Historical data was used and is used today in mainly these three ways. There are many other ways and Sociologists can add different theories to it. The first one is: Examining a theory through a Parallel investigation. To correspond with the natural-science conceptions of laws, and to look at, or apply various historical material where you gather your resources in order to prove the theory that is applied. Or on the other hand sociologists for the parallel investigation theory could apply the theory to certain cases of investigation but in a different modalities of a more widely used process.The second theory that Sociologists mainly use: applying and contrasting certain events or policies. Analyzed by their specific, or what makes them in unique quality of a composition, certain events used by the Sociologist for comparative data can be contrasted and compared. For interpretive Sociologists it is very common for them to use the 'Verstehen' tradition. And lastly, the third way sociologists typically relate is by taking a look at the causalities from a macro point of view. This is Mill's method: " a) principle of difference: a case with effect and cause present is contrasted with a case with effect and cause absent; and b) principle of agreement: cases with same effects are compared in terms of their (ideally identical) causes. There is an important debate on the usefulness of Mill’s method for sociological research, which relates to the fact that historical research is often based on only few cases and that many sociological theories are probabilistic, not deterministic. Today, historical sociology is measured by a conjunction of questions that are rich in detail