ABSTRACT
The object of study also seemed too large and interlocked with other kinds of action. Society was, i t appeared, made up of giant building blocks called institutions, but nei ther observationally nor abstractly could these be separated or set apart for individual study. These segments were too concrete for scientific analysis. That is, each institu tion was defined as being made up of a physi cal location, the particular people who manned i t or participated in it, the ideology or values i t upheld, and the social patterns of its members. "Religion" had to include the doctrines, the clergymen and parishion ers, the church buildings and possessions, and all the appropriate modes of religious behavior. Obviously, such a concrete object of study overlapped with many other sub systems of the society-economic patterns, socialization processes, stratification, prop erty and legal systems, social control, and so on. Studying an institution as a single unit seemed difficult, for i t related con cretely with all the rest of the society. Where was the line between one institution and another? When a family head took his family to church, was this part of the in stitution of the family or of the church?
