Sociology Now: The Essentialsreflects the discipline today and explores the big questions about multiculturalism and globalization that sociologists ask.

Sociology has always offered a way to make sense of the complex and sometimes contradictory forces that shape our social lives in any era. As Sociology Now explains sociology as both a body of knowledge and a "way of seeing," it shows how two such forces in particular have come to preoccupy sociologists and influence the way they look at the events and experiences of the early twenty first century:

The first is globalization--the economic, political, cultural, and social interconnections among people and institutions all over the world.

The second is multiculturalism--the recognition that race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, religion, and other statuses are sources of social inequality, but also the foundations of our identities.

Michael Kimmel, a leading sociologist and gender researcher, and co-author Amy Aronson, a journalist and media scholar, address these questions head-on as they make a compelling case for the importance of sociology in the contemporary world.