There’s something about sociology that requires practice—you have to go see what it’s like to actually do sociology. You need those moments of revelation, those “aha!” moments where you understand something, where sociological theory and research help you see familiar realities in a new light. It’s about what we call, in sociology, moments of unveiling, I think—that’s really what allows you to grasp what sociology is. In short, you discover it through practice or through reading sociology.
My name is Madeleine Pastinelli. I’ve been a professor in the Department of Sociology at Université Laval since 2005—so, almost 20 years now. I’m not exactly a sociologist, actually. I sort of became one through circumstance, but I was trained as an ethnologist. As a doctoral student, I was in ethnology, but I had interests and a frame of reference that were heavily rooted in sociology. I’ve always been somewhat straddling the line between the two disciplines. I did my thesis on the relationships that develop online—the connection to others on the Internet—at the end of the 1990s, which was a completely different context from today. It was quite an original subject of study for ethnology, and it led me to work on the literature dealing with the transformation of social bonds, new forms of social ties, the rise of individualism, and the way relationships are shaped in increasingly individualized social contexts. So when I finished my thesis, I was well positioned to apply for jobs in ethnology, sociology, or communication. Sociology was really my first choice—it appealed to me the most because, for me, sociology is, how can I say it, the “mother” discipline of all the social sciences. It’s the discipline from which others draw their conceptual and theoretical references. Even in criminology, international relations, and law, people refer to sociology and its classic works. So for me, going into sociology allowed me to broaden my horizons and explore anything that interested me.
Sociology in Quebec, in itself, is something quite specific or unique—not in the sense that, obviously, people in France or Germany wouldn’t do Quebec sociology. But what’s striking is that in France, they don’t do “French sociology”—they just do sociology. You’ll study the sociology of the family, sociology of religion, sociology of social movements—same in Germany—but they don’t label it “sociology of France,” and one might wonder what that would even mean. In Quebec, however, it’s a given—we do Quebec sociology. That means we reflect on what is unique about Quebec society. We reflect on what “Québécitude” might be. In fact, we are—and have long been—especially concerned with what characterizes or distinguishes Quebec society. And I think that’s not unrelated to the fact that, as researchers and academics, we find ourselves somewhere between American and French sociology. We Quebec sociologists are never numerous enough to develop sociology in Quebec relying only on Quebec authors. So we’re always reading American sociologists, French sociologists, sometimes German or British ones—we borrow from sociologies developed elsewhere. We take our conceptual and theoretical references, our analytical frameworks, from them to think about the context we’re studying. At my university, we have a required course in Quebec sociology that’s been part of the curriculum for all students—I want to say forever, or at least for a very long time. And when hiring colleagues, we always consider Quebec sociology an important field that needs to be covered. We aim to have at least one, if not two or three, colleagues teaching and researching in that area.
At the undergraduate level, sociology training is really broad—it helps develop not just general knowledge, but also, and especially, critical thinking, analytical skills, research ability, and the capacity to reflect and solve problems. As a foundational education, it opens many doors. Our graduates end up working in a wide range of fields. They’re not necessarily hired as sociologists—they might be hired as planning officers, policy analysts in government ministries, project managers—under titles quite different from “sociologist,” but in roles where their sociology training is very important. For students outside of sociology who take a few sociology courses—and we get a lot of them, I think all undergraduate sociology programs do—those courses are often electives or complementary courses. It’s a chance for them to gain an understanding of society, particularly Quebec society, which can be useful in their professional lives, or simply as citizens trying to better understand the world. Often, students’ interest in sociology is linked to their primary field of study. This is true for almost all thematic sociology courses. Even theory and methodology courses in sociology hold value for students across the humanities and social sciences because they provide tools that can be applied in many other areas, not just in sociology. Just like I took courses in ethnology for their theory and methods—and still find them useful and sometimes integrate ethnology, anthropology, or even history and political science literature into my sociology courses when relevant—we always benefit from broadening our horizons.
