I'm sorry I guess I am just ignorant, but....?

Question

what is the difference between anthropology and sociology?

Answer 1

Please don't be sorry for not knowing one thing, don't say to you  you're ignorant. It's ok to not know one thing, it's also ok to ignore one thing. If you separate the words, logy is the study of ... and both are pretty much the same.

Take care.

Answer 2

Not much difference.

Anthropology  is the scientific study of the origin, the behavior, and the physical, social, and cultural development of humans.

Sociology is the study of human social behavior, especially the study of the origins, organization, institutions, and development of human society.

Answer 3

Anthropology textbook definition:

the study of humankind in all its aspects, especially human culture or human development.

It differs from sociology in taking a more historical and comparative approach.

Sociology textbook definition:

the study of the origin, development, and structure of human societies and the behavior of individual people and groups in society

Answer 4

anthropology: the study of human variation over time and space; tends to study cultures outside the mainstream/generally ignored/misunderstood. tends to use more firsthand accounts.

sociology: the study of society and it's effect on the individual; tends to employ more statistical methods and study the culture that the sociologist is actually living in

Answer 5

I remember a professor saying "Sociology is just anthropology about OUR own culture."

They have a lot in common, in terms of subject-matter -- how the groups we are part of influence us.

But their methods, and some of the exact stuff they deal with differs.

One thing you might do is go to a really good bookstore (especially if you're in or near a college -- used book stores near colleges are best), and simply browse those two sections. Pick up a few books and read their blurbage, introductions, suss out the Contents, and such.

Another thing to do would be to go to university web sites, and read the basic blurbages for those two departments.

Answer 6

I'd say that these fields have distinct approaches to understanding cultures and people.  Although anthropology does tend to be more active in lesser known cultures, it is certainly not restricted to those.  In fact, one of the last ethnographic studies I read was about shopping in London in the mid 90's.

Anthropology tends to look at individuals, small groups, isolated events, etc. to get a better understanding of a larger idea.  For example, you could examine the role of a specific person or group of people to understand a caste system, that culture's organization of power, and maybe even try to construct an understanding of the distribution of wealth.  

Sociology, on the other hand, would look at things on a larger scale to compile statistics to make more general conclusions about a culture.  Sociology is far more likely to deal with large-scale surveys to collect data in a way that facilitates observing trends (like a graph or table).  From these large trends, sociology makes more conclusions about smaller groups.  You can think about the way stats are being used in the current American presidential elections.  Any random woman, for example, is more likely to support Clinton over Obama because nation-wide statistics show a national trend of supporting Clinton.  The same could be said about any random Hispanic supporting Democratic party over the Republican party.

So, long answer short....anthropology uses small groups to extract data about a larger group/idea.  sociology uses large-scale trends to conclude certain characteristics of smaller groups.  

Just as a side note, you might want to think of anthropology as a middle ground between psychology and sociology.  psychology tends to deal with the individual and how he/she interacts with the outside world to better understand the individual.  anthropology understands the individual to understand the larger group.  sociology understands the larger group to understand a smaller group.

hope that wasn't too confusing.  it was a little difficult to put into words.

Answer 7

anthropology: studies culture (most of them indigenous)

sociology: levels of society in civilized culture.