Among the many things which distinguish man from the lower animals and perhaps in a more spectacular but less extensive way distinguish man at an advanced level of culture from primitive man is the capacity to use the recorded experience of the past. This can help determine his actions in the present and thus determine in part what kind of future the world will see. The codification of knowledge of the past and its interpretation constitute the material of history. Doctrines and beliefs, various schools, and ideological sets about history determine each period's interpretation of what has gone on in the past. For instance, how may one reconcile the doctrinal myth of progress with the fix that the world is in now? In the light of contemporary ideas about causation, determinism, accident, objectivity, and the function and role, if any, of the individual person in history, ideas thin out. Professor

What is History

The International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences.

Symbolic interactionism has changed over the past two decades, both in the issues that practitioners examine and in its position within the discipline. Once considered adherents of a marginal oppositional perspective, confronting the dominant positivist, quantitative approach of mainstream sociology, symbolic interactionists find now that many of their core concepts have been accepted. Simultaneously their core as an intellectual community has been weakened by the diversity of interests of those who self-identify with the perspective. I examine here four processes that led to these changes: fragmentation, expansion, incorporation, and adoption. I then describe the role of symbolic interactionism in three major debates confronting the discipline: the micro/macro debate, the structure/agency debate, and the social realist/interpretivist debate. I discuss six empirical arenas in which interactionists have made major research contributions: social coordination theory, the sociology of emotions, social constru...

The Sad Demise, Mysterious Disappearance, and Glorious Triumph of Symbolic Interactionism

SUMMARY

This paper considers the activities of senior managers as isomorphic with the activities of actors. It takes performing as not a matter of metaphor, but a matter of form; life at the top of an organization is intrinsically theatrical; each of us is blessed or cursed with histrionic sensibility. Proceeding by way of a comparison of Edmund Kean and Lee lacocca it touches upon matters of text and interpretation, rehearsal and performance and the importance of individuation. The argument – such as it is – is that both Kean and lacocca perform themselves, the former's Richard III, the latter's Chrysler being the fullest realizations of that which was, hitherto, inchoate and emergent. The final part of the paper is concerned with the implications of this perspective for education, training and development; current management education appears geared to reduce rather than to promote individuality. Techniques are imposed and answers are provided and the entire educational performance revolves around teachers as performers rather than managers as performers. The way to become a management star, it is suggested, is to do managing, not simply to be audience for academic stars.

Managing as a Performing Art

This article argues that clicktivism is a legitimate political act. It emphasizes that such acts, through a recurrent negative discourse, have been marginalized. As a result, new modes of participation that draw upon the simplification of social connectivity have largely been ignored in the mainstream Political Science literature. In addressing this issue, the article develops a heuristic that identifies seven dimensions (or characteristics) of clicktivism. This new heuristic will allow for the analysis of clicktivism as a form of civic engagement separate from digital activism more broadly. Subsequently, the article applies the heuristic to several popular forms of clicktivism, including social buttons and the creation of memes, demonstrating both its utility and flexibility.

Clicktivism: A Systematic Heuristic

The Dual Vision: Alfred Schutz and the Myth of Phenomenological Social Science.By Robert A. Gorman. Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1977. 234 pp. $8.75

A Poetic for Sociology: Toward a Logic of Discovery for the Human Sciences.By Richard H. Brown. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1977. 302 pp. $19.95

Michael A. Overington

Papers

The Dual Vision: Alfred Schutz and the Myth of Phenomenological Social Science.By Robert A. Gorman. Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1977. 234 pp. $8.75

A Poetic for Sociology: Toward a Logic of Discovery for the Human Sciences.By Richard H. Brown. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1977. 302 pp. $19.95