Emile Durkheim’s Ideas on Suicide in the Modern World “Suicides, in short, are simply an exaggerated form of common practices,” once said by David Emile Durkheim, a great sociologist, social psychologist, and even philosopher. Emile Durkheim began his work with suicide in 1897 with a warning against “notiones vulgates, together with an insistence that our first task… must be to determine the order of facts to be studied under the name of suicide (Robert Jones)”. Though Emile Durkheim would run into many difficulties right away, he would go on to create a great project, and an even better image for himself. One of the many problems arising for Durkheim would be to find the exact definition of suicide, but he wanted explanation,
…show more content…
Being the first person to ever take the idea of suicide on, and do it scientifically, would already be a challenge, but also the fact of proving everything he found. Durkheim also didn’t want the same ideas to be repeated unless they were being proven, he wanted to also prove his own theory. Durkheim was a very intelligent man, and with this research and the book to come he would prove that to everyone. Though he was stuck in the moment, he would eventually find that “thing” he was looking for and strive. He would be remembered for a long time. Once Durkheim reached most of his research and found the definitions for suicide and all of the things that go along with that, he wanted to know, what causes suicide? Why do people do this? Something we are still asking today. Durkheim being the first to conquer suicide, scientifically, would dig deeper into finding this answer once again. The first answer brought up was to “simply rely on statistical records of the presumptive motive of suicide” but Durkheim would reject this right away, even if it seems like a decent answer. He saw the statistics as opinions, and the credibility did not seem right. Durkheim wanted more though, and to find that he would look more into religious confessions, family, society, and career versus something like statistics. Next Durkheim would ask different religions, such as Christian, Jews, and Catholics to see where they stood with suicide and how
Being the first person to ever take the idea of suicide on, and do it scientifically, would already be a challenge, but also the fact of proving everything he found. Durkheim also didn’t want the same ideas to be repeated unless they were being proven, he wanted to also prove his own theory. Durkheim was a very intelligent man, and with this research and the book to come he would prove that to everyone. Though he was stuck in the moment, he would eventually find that “thing” he was looking for and strive. He would be remembered for a long time. Once Durkheim reached most of his research and found the definitions for suicide and all of the things that go along with that, he wanted to know, what causes suicide? Why do people do this? Something we are still asking today. Durkheim being the first to conquer suicide, scientifically, would dig deeper into finding this answer once again. The first answer brought up was to “simply rely on statistical records of the presumptive motive of suicide” but Durkheim would reject this right away, even if it seems like a decent answer. He saw the statistics as opinions, and the credibility did not seem right. Durkheim wanted more though, and to find that he would look more into religious confessions, family, society, and career versus something like statistics. Next Durkheim would ask different religions, such as Christian, Jews, and Catholics to see where they stood with suicide and how