After having read these articles, I realized how people (myself included)
develop or create our own social theories to understand or make sense of social
experiences we come across. We also make these theories as we go along in order
to understand that which we cannot explain ourselves. In Mills’ The
Promise of Sociology, he discusses social imagination as something people
practice on a daily basis; individuals relate their own experiences with the
social world around them and vice versa. Social imagination enables individuals
to understand their problems and the relation the world and or circumstances
around them have to their problems or situation.
As I mentioned above, Mills in his article The
Promise of Sociology talks about social imagination, this means that people
begin to think of their lives and particular situation and what relationship
that has with society or the world around them. Going back to the marriage
example, which describes the personal trouble as opposed to the public issue;
personal trouble in this case would mean the particular couple going through a
divorce as a result of certain fault(s) by one or both parties. This same topic
when looked at from a public issue perspective would look at the divorce rates
of a large number of marriages over a significant period of time. In the
individual case, the divorce may not be as significant to society; however, once
the rate in a city or country is taken into account, there may be certain
factors that can then be observed that may help explain why this is occurring
more frequently. The individual might then see how both the outside world and
his or her own personal situation are connected and affect one another. This can
also be very useful when attempting to address issues such as the high
incarceration rates in a particular country. Is the responsibility really on the
individual? My question is not meant to say for instance a thief is not really
guilty of their crime or should not be punished but rather do the conditions set
forth by society through laws, economic inequalities, and such influence crime
rates?
One thing I thought about when writing this was the case of one of my
former volunteers. He is nineteen years old, undocumented and from Mexico. When
he was eighteen, after having had some minor problems, he obtained his GED. He
later applied to Northwestern University and was with a full ride, however, when
they learned he did not have a social security number, they basically told him
he was on his own. I am not justifying his actions after this, but now he is in
jail possibly facing over sixty years. When I learned about this and went to
visit him, he only said that he tried to do what he knew how to help his
family, he took the opportunity that was offered to him, in this case by people
who do not exactly engage in legal business instead of having been offered
opportunities by other people or individuals such as schools. The first thing I
thought of and told him was that there were other options out there for him, to
which he responded that he did not know about them. When reading these articles
I remembered this because although just because resources were there for this
young man, it was almost as if they did not exist to him in this case because
he was in a way disconnected to people or institutions that could connect him
with them.