When students leave a course introducing them to the field of sociology, they should be able to answer the following question: What does sociology add to our knowledge and understanding of the world around us? Many different scientific fields study health, alcoholism, occupations, family life and education. What is it that sociologist contribute to our understanding these and other areas that disciplines such as psychology, medicine and anthropology do not? A central aim of this edition was to address thus key question. A book of readings in general sociology cannot hope to provide a comprehensive coverage of all the literature of the discipline and maintain a defined perspective. A major shortcoming of many of the readers in introductory sociology id the shotgun approach which seems to characterize the selection of articles for the volumes. In short they lack well defined perspectives.