Question

A. How does the sociological imagination help to examine private acts such as suicide within a larger societal context?

B. What are some examples of social forces influencing youth suicide trends in the United States, suicide trends in India, and suicide trends in the U.S. military?

C. Use the sociological imagination to explain your observations, and how the sociological imagination helps us consider the causes and possible solutions to suicide.

Answer 1

A. The private acts are explained with the views of sociological perspectives. When an individual does any work, it is explained whether the work is according to the social norms or not. It is also seen whether social facts, members and agencies are responsible behind such action.

It is true that individual action can be influenced by society. A person commits suicide. It may be for his personal problem or he may be influenced by the social factors. There are many social norms that force an individual to do an action. In the society there are many types of prejudices that affect individual life. There are class discrimination, color discrimination, religious discrimination etc. For such discriminations individual life may face trouble.

B. In United States the young people take the path of suicide for various reasons:

• Depression and anxiety lead the young people to suicide. They can not control themselves. They are victim of chronic mental disease and this leads them to commit suicide. Environment, wrong parenting, loneliness, frustration etc are the causes of their depression and anxiety.
• Besides, drug addiction is also a major cause that leads the young people to commit suicide.

In India there are lots of reasons behind suicide:

• Frustration and depression.
• Unemployment
• Social discrimination
• Superstitions, customs like dowry, lack of education .
• Emotional disorder.

In the US military there are various reasons for committing suicide like:

• They lead life aloof from the family. They are detached from the family for long time. It causes frustration and they suffer from emotional problem. Such problems lead them to the path of suicide.
• They are also the victim of drug addiction and it causes many types of disorder. Therefore they are victim of suicide.

C. Sociological imagination can be applied to solve the problem.

First, the problems should be detected. It must be noted, whether the problem is rooted from the society, or it is an individual problem. If it is an individual problem, then the case is not so manageable by any social theory. It is a matter of psychology.

But when the problem is the problem of many then the social theories should be applied.

Secondly, the general problems like drug addiction, depression, anxiety are the chronic problems and these problems can be solved with social modification, Government laws and other systems. The awareness programs should be started from the school level. The social groups and community must have important role in changing such attitudes.