In this lucid, stimulating and original book, Zygmunt Bauman and Tim May explore the underlying assumptions and tacit expectations which structure our view of the world. The authors elucidate key concepts in sociology: for example, individualism versus community, and privilege versus deprivation. While charting a course through sociology's main concerns, Bauman and May also examine the applicability of sociology to everyday life. This volume is a completely revised and expanded edition that includes new materials on health and fitness, intimacy, time, space and disorder, risk, globalization, identity, organizations, and new technologies. It was written for the benefit and enjoyment of students, professional sociologists and social scientists, and anyone else interested in the dynamics and issues that structure everyday life. Please visit the accompanying website at http://www.blackwellpublishers.co.uk/ThinkSoc2e/ to view sample material from the new edition, sociology resources for lecturers and students plus information on related titles.

Zygmunt Bauman is a world-renowned sociologist, known for his recent groundbreaking work in social theory. His book Modernity and the Holocaust won the distinguished Amalfi prize for the best sociology book of 1989. He is also the author of Postmodern Ethics (Blackwell, 1993), Life in Fragments: Essays in Postmodern Morality (Blackwell, 1995), Liquid Modernity (Polity, 2000) and Individualized Society (Polity, 2000).

Tim May is Professor of Sociology at the University of Salford. He is the author of Social Research: Issues, Methods, and Process (third edition, 2001); Situating Social Theory (1996) and editor of Qualitative Research in Action (2002); co-author, with Malcolm Williams, of Introduction to the Philosophy of Social Research (1996), with whom he also co-edited Knowing the Social World (1998).