Sociology has been on a downward decline of public relevance and has taken a backseat as such decline has increased. The relationship between sociology and politics have shown a noticeable separation in modern times, for what seems like good reason. Some sociologists were unaware that they were only doing studies based entirely on what is popular which then itemizes the people they would study and leave them forgotten once a new trend of interest came around. Within this separation sociology became more academia based and less public which gave sociologist a bad reputation in that there was a focus on data collection and empirical data but with the exception of sociological journals there was very little exposure of it all.

 As members of society we need the studies done by sociologists to make well informed decisions, however there needs to be a balance of education and activism. Catching the attention of a crowd as well as powerful people requires more than simply self-education and journal publications. Sociologists need to be able to take their knowledge and make it creative and simple for everyone to be able to appreciate and hopefully be able to get on board with. It takes a crowd and coverage to the masses to turn education into a positive change in the society we live in.

That all being said, there needs to be education within activism. A well based platform finds its stability in a research based fact, and builds from there. Especially when it comes to sociology, fact gathered from research and data must be more important than what may be considered professional opinion. Though journals are a primary tool for measuring sociology success, they have become outdated and are to the point where they are reaching irrelevance when it comes to getting data and research out to the public, so we are forced to think outside of the journal. Mainstreaming ideas and rewording our work to make it easier to digest is essential for the survival of public sociology. However, this should not be mistaken for one sided evidence. Especially in politics we see where political toxicity leads to the assumption that factual evidence was collected simply to use in a debate when in reality sociology is not based in proving opinion, it is used to determine trends and facts in society through data and research. The spread of which should be public domain, and therefor should be portrayed in such a way that anyone can understand and learn from it.


Citations:
Anon. 2014. “How Sociologists Made Themselves Irrelevant.” The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved September 11, 2017 (http://www.chronicle.com/article/How-Sociologists-Made/150249/).
Anon. n.d. Everyday Sociology Blog. Retrieved September 11, 2017 (http://www.everydaysociologyblog.com/2013/07/the-promise-and-perils-of-public-sociology.html).
Anon. 2013. “Why activism and academia don’t mix.” orgtheory.net. Retrieved September 11, 2017 (https://orgtheory.wordpress.com/2013/03/31/why-activism-and-academia-dont-mix/).
Pages, The Society. 2012. “How Academics Can Become Relevant.” Cyborgology. Retrieved September 11, 2017 (https://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2012/01/23/how-academics-can-become-relevant/).
Journals.sagepub.com. (2017). Available at: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/1536504213476244 [Accessed 12 Sep. 2017].