This is the third edition of a text that has proved to be highly successful and popular with a wide range of students. The authors provide a critical introduction to sociology, and to the ways in which sociologists are trained to think and work. The subject is presented as a sequence of different perspectives on the social world, all of them interrelated, sometimes in conflict with one another, and all contributing important and necessary insights. The discussion is backed up by extensive reference to empirical studies. This edition has been revised with a new chapter on critical theory and considerable rewriting throughout, to ensure continued clarity and to respond to the comments of users of the previous edition.