It is no secret that Sociology intersects on many different disciplines, such as economics, psychology, and history; but what about art? If sociology is the science that studied humankind, then art is the eager sibling, tugging at coattails. Poetry is also the study of humanity, but through an altogether different lens, a kaleidoscope. It promises to be both critical, and beautiful. To point out the uncomfortable aspects with grace, and commonality. It’s an emotional study of humanity, that brings comfort, as well as scorn. Poetry is a pointing finger, and sociology is the smoking gun. I have studied poetry from a very young age, and have used it to look at humanity under a microscope. That is no joke, it looks at social fact and questions it. Since the origin of sociology, it has led humanity on a journey of self-awareness and told us what to think about, giving us structure for our opinions. Poetry has done the same for us, being told around the ancient fires, telling rhythmic stories about the birth of the sun and the sea, and our birth out of them. In essence, poetry is the social imagination, startlingly and impossibly aware of itself.
Young humanity was brought up on stories of itself: born of the sky and sea, living upon the flesh of fallen gods. We thought the sun was pulled across the sky on Helios’ great chariot, and his golden flying horses. We told these stories in meter and rhyme, as this helped us to remember them. Writing had not yet been invented, so these were oral traditions, this was school for the youth of the ancients. Sociology was made as an attempt to look at ourselves yet closer. Positivism came about around the industrial revolution and aimed to look at how we act as a society. Back then science was the new nobility, cosmology, mechanics, and then sociology. It was not only a time where society reinvented itself but created a formal study of itself. However, poetry had been doing that job since we found ourselves here, cold, and frightened of the vastness. Poetry was not exactly science, as it had no physical proof. We were growing, and we needed that. The poets did not die out then, and that is because the proof arose, and society did not know how to react, how to feel. In my opinion, there are very few disciplines, art or science, that are as well equipped to soothe such a panic in the unknown, as poetry is. I believe the world would not have grown so small so quickly had it not been for poetry, which helped people understand these new discoveries, new issues, and new ways of thinking.
"Young humanity was brought up on stories of itself: born of the sky and sea, living upon the flesh of fallen gods."
Emile Dunkheim wrote about social fact in 1895, he wrote of them pointing to how children are brought up, he says, “...all education consists of a continual effort to impose upon the child, ways of seeing, thinking and acting which he himself would not have arrived on spontaneously.” This spearheads the idea of social fact, the industrial revolution, and sociology at large in saying: we are not animals. We do not act in ways that are entirely natural to us. We are taught to dislike our own smells, to hold in our emotions, to act with decorum and grace. Sociology looks at it neutrally, and poetry looks at it either damningly or favorably, but nonetheless both acknowledge that it exists. I must admit that I don’t know how to act in a lot of circumstances, that I get really uncomfortable when someone is crying, I don’t know how to dance, and sometimes I talk too loud. Most people look at me strangely for any of these qualities, but it used to be much worse. Poetry is what taught me to get out of unhealthy relationships, despite being taught my place as a woman. Poetry taught me that it wasn’t a shameful thing to be interested in academia. And poetry taught me that it was okay to be depressed, and feel trapped sometimes. Sociology told me that these things were normal, but poetry taught me how to feel about them.
Sociological imagination is the ability for one person to look at themselves in the context of all of the history, and all of the other people around them. The sociologist no doubt does this, as this is their job. However the poet also does this, this is his job as well. Arthur Rimbaud who was born in the mid-1800s was a poet who wrote mostly about progress. He was born into a strict catholic family and then taken into literary circles of Paris (Which he was promptly shunned from for his refusal to follow social decorum.). The contrast is absolute. He wrote an essay on his personal context, coming from Celt and Gaul origins, which made him a pagan by heritage. His past was what prevented him from fitting nicely with the present. He wrote that he dreamed of himself once a peasant in 1500, living in Rimes. It is this context that makes the rest of his poetry sensible, he was on the cusp; not traditional, but not quite modern either. It made his poetry concentrated, and universal. To read it today, we are confronted with the very same questions we have always had, “what happens when we die?” and “what is the purpose of this life?” He seeks out the answers, though never finds them, as none of us will. It doesn’t stop us from trying. C. Wright Mills wrote, “The very shaping of history now outpaces the ability of people to orient themselves in accordance with cherished values.” That is what happened to Rimbaud, in his attempts to be “Absolutely Modern.” I got closer to universally human than either modern or outdated. So it still stands when he wrote, “Humanity is putting shoes on the huge child Progress.”
“Humanity is putting shoes on the huge child Progress.
Humanity likes to maintain boundaries, personal space, borders. I believe that these limits make people feel safe, from themselves and others. We don’t think about certain things, because simply put, they scare us. I tend to get scared whenever I think about the vastness of outer space, or being at sea. It is not precisely the vastness that scares me, or I would be frightened of the blank page or canvas. Specifically, it is the possibility of nothing being there that frightens me personally. Sure we can impose our own thoughts into empty spaces, and this is why we project our own feelings onto other people or animals. But it is only an illusion, drawing ourselves onto cave walls, together, and never alone. I equate scientists, sociologists, and artists, to explorers. They are unafraid of the unknown, utterly sure that there is something out there waiting for them. A sociologist betrays the very human idea of boundary, of separation. They go anywhere, and ask any question, no matter if it’s rude. For if someone answers, that is something dear to be gained. A poet is no different, as they challenge our beliefs, they creatively ask us why we are calling a twenty-five-year-old woman a girl. The only difference is that the poet does not need a response. They have already thought long and hard, and the answer does not matter. They have already made up their minds, and it is too late, as the idea once left the nest begins changing. It changes itself and it changes the people it touches. It no longer belongs to the poet, and it is alive, and on its own. A living breathing thing.
To call poetry the same as sociology is a challenge to society who at large might say that art and science are opposing forces. If they are so different, then why do they essentially do the same thing, or ask the same questions? I think art and science are complementary disciplines. For science will yield ideas for as long as questions are asked, and art will help us forever explore these questions we have, and redefine how we think about the world and our place in it. The two have existed beside each other since our own origin story. Today we treat science as though it were religion, and art as though it were mere woman’s work. I don’t believe one could ever be superior over the other. I believe that if the two are barricaded from each other so, that we put our own minds and understanding at a grave disadvantage. That is where the fear will always come from, separation, and ignorance. To truly understand anything, we must think about it, yes, but we must also feel it, and let it become a part of our soul.
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