Paper Summary:

The paper discusses "Suicide," a groundbreaking book that was a case study on suicide by the sociologist Emile Durkheim in 1897. The paper explains that suicide was generally considered to be an individual's tragedy, until Durkheim first opened discussion to suicide as a social problem, making connections between the individual and society. The paper also examines "Teenage Wasteland: Suburbia's Dead-End Kids" by Donna Gaines that is similar to Durkheim's study on the groundbreaking connections between the individual and society as causes of suicide. The paper explores the term "sociological imagination" coined by C. Wright Mills that shows how the individual cannot be understood without understanding society and the relationship between them.

From the Paper:

"Durkeim found that Protestants and Catholics have very different rates of suicide. According to him, strong social control in Catholic society lowered suicide rates, while the less social control among Protestants resulted in higher suicide rates. Social integration, the level of attachment people have to their social groups, affects suicide rates. Durkeim found that both high and low levels of social integration can cause people to kill themselves, either because they have no social support, or because they do not want to be a burden on society."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Editor (Text Book)
• Gaines, Donna. (1990) Teenage Wasteland: Suburbia's Dead-End Kids.
• Sociological imagination. (2006, February 2). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved June 3, 2006, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sociological_imagination&oldid=37904121.
• Suicide (book). (2006, May 25). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved June 3, 2006, from http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Suicide_%28book%29&oldid=55020197.

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