Sociology Books by Ashish Kumar ( ALL India Topper in Sociology in CSE-2016)
Whether you join a coaching institute or not, you need to build a conceptual understanding of important topics in Sociology to score 300+ marks in Sociology. This makes reading some BASIC BOOKS extremely important. In addition to these basic books, you may go for HIGHLY SELECTIVE reading of some reference books.
1. Read the minimum possible number of books, but it should be revised regularly.
2. Use diagrams, maps, flowcharts & innovative illustrations in your answers. Diagrams give better expression of an idea, improve presentation, which is either difficult or lengthy to express in words.
3. Try to identify places that appeared in the news for some reason and practice drawing of diagrams to increase speed & save time.
4. Practice Mock tests.
5. Cover ‘’contemporary issues’’ with GS/current/national issues.
Basic Books for UPSC Sociology
1. Oxford Sociology Dictionary–For conceptual clarity of common terms like FAMILY, SOCIETY, MARRIAGE etc
2. Haralambos & Holborn Sociology : Themes and Perspectives (Blue book- Paper-1)– Backbone of Sociological Concepts, easy-to-understand, have many examples, case studies etc. to elaborate a topic. Only selective reading of key terms, concepts, case studies, definitions, theories etc
3. Indian Sociological Thought by B K Nagla (Paper-II): Only selective reading– Read concepts like Indology, Structural functionalism and Marxist Sociology and respective theorists G S Ghurye, M N Srinivas, A R Desai.
4. Modernization of Indian tradition by Yogendra Singh :- Best book for Topics like “ Modernisation, Sanskritisation,” “Westernisation, and its impact on Indian Social Structure” etc.
5. Social Change in Modern India by M N Srinivas :–
6. Sociology NCERT Books- Must for basic understanding of Sociology
(iii) Indian Society
(iv) Social Change and development in India