The 20th century was marked by the brilliant works of C. Wright Mills who invented Sociological Imagination. In this paper, I will be addressing the need for Sociological Imagination and its importance in our daily lives. Secondly, I will be discussing how people can use it so that they don't feel trapped in their own lives. Furthermore, I will also be describing Mills work in shaping Sociological Imagination. Having a Sociological Imagination is like "thinking out of the box" (Isaksen, 2013). It allows an individual to not only look into and interpret their own lives but also get a greater sense of the lives of others. Doing this allows the person to get a better understanding of history and society as a whole (Witt & Hermiston, 2013). From this understanding a person is then able to analyze society and figure out how to go about fixing key issues (Mills, 1959). .
People often feel trapped in their own lives and circumstances, thinking that their troubles are not escapable thus making them extremely depressed and unhappy in their lives. If we can only look at our own troubles we will have nothing to go upon to help fix them (Mills, 1959). Therefore, in order to understand our own troubles we need to understand a greater issue and a deeper reasoning behind the issue (Mills, 1959). In this way we can look at our own problems from a more knowledgeable perspective and then go about fixing it (Fuller, 2007). In order for people to escape the traps they have created for themselves, they have to understand the larger history (Mills, 1959). For example, an individual hurts his back causing him an incredible pain. He does not know what to do because he is isolated and has no sense of others experiences (Mills, 1959). Now, if he was in touch with his sociological imagination and other people he could have figured out that the real cause (Fuller, 2007) of his back pain was some sort of muscle tear and he should visit a Chiropractor or a Physiotherapist for treatment.
