Showing papers in "History of the Human Sciences in 2007"
TL;DR: In the elaborated conditions of contemporary capitalist societies, we can ask: Is art still being made? as mentioned in this paper examine this question and contrast what Bauman has called ''thinking sociologically' with a proposition that art thinks aesthetically.
Abstract: This article takes as its provocation Marx's intriguing statement about the disjunction between the flowering of Greek art and the underdeveloped stage of social and economic development made as an epilogue to the Introduction to the Grundrisse in order to ask what are the relations between that which has been considered art and what Marx calls `production as such'. In the elaborated conditions of contemporary capitalist societies, we can ask: Is art still being made? To examine this question I juxtapose what Bauman has called `thinking sociologically' with a proposition that art thinks aesthetically. So how can art historians deal with that challenge of thinking aesthetic practices both socially and historically? I track a genealogy of art historians (Clark, Antal, Shapiro) who have attempted to think socially about artistic practices. This leads into a section about the necessity for both sociological and aesthetic education if we are to avoid totalitarianism or free-market individualism (Bahro). Finall...
167 citations
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TL;DR: In this article, a variety of theories and models of hope are discussed, including those offered by Marcel, Dauenhauer, Bloch, Moltmann, Bovens, Pettit, Snyder, Rorty and Gutierrez.
Abstract: It is widely acknowledged that hoping is an integral part of what it is to be human. The present article strives to make sense of the myriad competing conceptions of hope that have emerged over the past half-century. Two problems with the literature are highlighted. First, discussions of hope tend to take place within rather than between disciplines. Second, hope is often taken to be an undifferentiated experience. In order to address the first problem, the article takes an interdisciplinary approach, drawing on research from the fields of philosophy, anthropology, psychology, theology and politics. In order to address the second problem, the article proposes that hope be regarded as a human universal that can be experienced in different modes. A variety of theories and models of hope are discussed, including those offered by Marcel, Dauenhauer, Bloch, Moltmann, Bovens, Pettit, Snyder, Rorty and Gutierrez. While many of these claim to have identified the characteristics of hope, it is argued that each cap...
107 citations
TL;DR: This paper explored the idea of spaces of speech by underscoring the connections between location and locution, and developed a case study of how Darwinian evolution was talked about in different sites using examples from Ireland and the American South during the latter part of the 19th century.
Abstract: An awareness of the significance of location in the production and dissemination of scientific knowledge has brought a new dimension to recent work on the sociology of science. But the importance of speech in scientific enterprises has been less well developed. This article explores the idea of `spaces of speech' by underscoring the connections between location and locution. It develops a case study of how Darwinian evolution was talked about in different sites using examples from Ireland and the American South during the latter part of the 19th century. These reveal how sites enable and constrain what may be said, and heard, about particular scientific claims, and how they are crucial to understanding the circulation of scientific claims in public arenas.
69 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors reveal the intellectual indebtedness of Hans J. Morgenthau's realist theory of international power politics to Freudian meta-and group psychology, and examine an unpublished Morgentha...
Abstract: The article unveils the intellectual indebtedness of Hans J. Morgenthau's realist theory of international power politics to Freudian meta- and group psychology. It examines an unpublished Morgentha...
38 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that evolutionary thinking has much more to offer the social sciences than most people have assumed, and they offer examples of both of these approaches, as well as the broader question of the macro-social scale.
Abstract: When the social sciences parted company from evolutionary biology almost exactly a century ago, they did so at a time when evolutionary biology was still very much in its infancy and many key issues were unresolved. As a result, the social sciences took away with them an understanding of evolution that was in fact based on 18th- rather than 19th-century biology. I argue that contemporary evolutionary thinking has much more to offer the social sciences than most people have assumed. Contemporary evolutionary research on human behaviour focuses on two main issues at the micro-social scale: understanding the trade-offs in individual decision-making and understanding the cognitive constraints that limit flexibility of decisions. I offer examples of both of these approaches. Finally, I consider the broader question of the macro-social scale.
35 citations
TL;DR: This article explored the relationship between theology and sociology on two levels: the first is in terms of the general disciplinary closure that has marked much of their coexistence, despite the many topics on which they potentially meet.
Abstract: This article explores the relationship between theology and sociology on two levels. The first is in terms of the general disciplinary closure that has marked much of their coexistence, despite the many topics on which they potentially meet. The second level is more specific and concerns the tension in Britain between religious sociology, in which sociology is put to serve faith, and the secular sociology of religion, where religion is studied scientifically. This tension has been addressed before with respect to the history of sociology in France and the United States, but the British case, hitherto relatively unknown, illustrates the potential there was for a more fruitful relationship between sociology and theology in Britain that went undeveloped as the secular sociology of religion eventually replaced early religious sociology. The existence of religious sociology has been written out of the history of the discipline in Britain, such that when theology and sociology began a more serious engagement in the 1970s in Britain and elsewhere, particularly as biblical studies discovered sociology and as theologians and sociologists first met jointly, this earlier dialogue was entirely overlooked.
30 citations
TL;DR: Herbert Spencer as discussed by the authors was one of the most important contributors to the Victorian discourse on social evolution and his theory of evolution in nature and society has been the subject of countless scholarly studies.
Abstract: Herbert Spencer was one of the most important contributors to the Victorian discourse on social evolution. His theory of evolution in nature and society has been the subject of countless scholarly ...
28 citations
TL;DR: The authors argues that the similarities between the two disciplines are actually based on a number of shared epistemological assumptions, a priori ways of thinking that in fact are very much open to question.
Abstract: Of all sociology's `strange others', cultural studies is perhaps the least unfamiliar to many sociologists. Yet cultural studies exists in one of the most ambiguous relationships with sociology of any academic discipline. In this article, it is argued that the complicated nature of the relationship is compelled by the very closeness of the two participants in it. What often seems to be an ongoing state of ritualized antagonism between them flows not from their ostensible differences but in fact from their striking underlying similarities. Their symbiotic bond both compels, and is hidden by, the rhetorical displays of selfhood in which they both often engage. The article reviews and assesses this state of affairs, and argues that the similarities between the two disciplines are actually based on a number of shared epistemological assumptions, a priori ways of thinking that in fact are very much open to question. A critique of these assumptions is outlined, and it is suggested that by recognizing their shar...
26 citations
TL;DR: The importance of employment exchanges in the governance of mass unemployment in the 1930s presented social researchers with a rich site for the investigation of the meaning of unemployment from a governmental perspective, or more precisely, how that meaning is encoded into social spaces as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: The importance of employment exchanges in the governance of mass unemployment in the 1930s presented social researchers with a rich site for the investigation of the meaning of unemployment from a governmental perspective, or more precisely, of how that meaning is encoded into social spaces. Comparing writing from the 1930s and earlier with my own contemporary research in Jobcentres, Benefits Agencies and Jobcentre Plus offices facilitates an understanding of how that meaning, and its literally concrete means of deployment, has shifted. Observation conducted in these institutional spaces adds an empirical dimension to extant discursive analyses of the governance of unemployment. Broadly, there has been a move from an overt, gendered stigmatization of being without paid work as a moral failing deserving of penance in the 1930s employment exchange, to an attempt to discursively rearticulate unemployment with a mainstream nexus of work-consumerism in Jobcentre Plus. These changes are also indicative of broad...
21 citations
TL;DR: For instance, this article treated the account of the state of nature which Locke presents in his Second Treatise as neither an hypothesis nor a description but rather as a fiction, and thus treated it as a provable hypothesis.
Abstract: Scholarly discussion has treated the account of the state of nature which Locke presents in his Second Treatise as neither an hypothesis nor a description but rather as a fiction. John Dunn, for ex...
18 citations
TL;DR: This paper argued that the modern world is not only produced by, and is promoting, processes of rationalization and disenchantment, but is also the site of enchanting influences that are genuinely ''charming'' or ''magical''.
Abstract: This article argues that the modern world is not only produced by, and is promoting, processes of rationalization and disenchantment, but is also the site of `enchanting' influences that are genuinely `charming' or `magical'. Such modes of influencing rely increasingly on the power of images, and on theatre-like performances of words or discourses. The impact takes place under conditions that, following Victor Turner's work, could be called `liminal', and which can be turned through `imagemagic' into a state of `permanent liminality'. A path-breaking analysis of such influences can be found in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, written at a highly liminal moment in European history, the end of the Renaissance and the unfolding of the Reformation. It is argued that the central problem of the play is the source of the power that motivates, from the inside, human beings. Shakespeare attributes this power to images through which human beings can be incited to act, in particular to fall in love, and assi...
TL;DR: In this article, the connections between Parsons' and Smelser's economic sociology and that of contemporary authors including Granovetter, Callon and White are explored, with the focus on markets with boundaries and interstices.
Abstract: Economic sociologists have developed and applied theories and concepts in close connection with broadly economic phenomena, including, recently, embeddedness and actor network theory. Key to these theories is understandings of action given uncertainty in which actors develop calculative capabilities, and an emphasis on markets with boundaries and interstices as essential properties. This article reflects upon the connections between Parsons' and Smelser's economic sociology and that of contemporary authors including Granovetter, Callon and White. As a strange other to economics and to sociology, economic sociology can develop research questions in considering arbitrage generally, rather than only restricted to financial markets.
TL;DR: This paper examined the respective interpretations of the Arrernte tribe of central Australian Aborigines adopted by the English biologist Baldwin Spencer and the German missionary Carl Strehlow in relation to the broader theoretical debates in the theory of myth that took place in England and Germany in the latter half of the 19th century.
Abstract: This article examines the respective interpretations of the Arrernte tribe of central Australian Aborigines adopted by the English biologist Baldwin Spencer and the German missionary Carl Strehlow. These interpretations are explored in relation to the broader theoretical debates in the theory of myth that took place in England and Germany in the latter half of the 19th century. In Britain, these debates were initially shaped by the comparative philology of F. Max Muller, before being transformed by the evolutionism of Edward Burnett Tylor and James George Frazer. The article shows how the research of Spencer and Strehlow was both influenced by and exerted an influence upon these theoretical debates, before assessing their research findings in relation to the philosophical hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer and the theories of myth offered by Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer and Hans Blumenberg.
TL;DR: In this paper, the Foucauldian technique of self-critique is used to explain the subjective crisis that prompts critique, which is then elaborated by comparison to Girard's work on imitation and sacrifice.
Abstract: This article considers `critique' as performative, being on the one hand a reiterative performance, that enacts the `critic' through the act of critique, and on the other hand reflecting the constitution of the subject. While this approach takes on the conceptual framework of Judith Butler's work, it differs by refusing critique — or its correlates; parody, subversion or similar — any special status. Like any other performance critique is taken here as a cultural practice, as a Foucauldian `technique of self', though the complex genealogy of such a technique lies outside the scope of this article. In order to illustrate this argument I interpret a number of Butler's prefaces, interviews and digressions which diverge from her own theoretical framework, and argue that these `fictions' arise from critical `disavowals': that is, a `self-transformative' turn against power. The subjective `crisis' that prompts critique is then elaborated by comparison to Girard's work on imitation and sacrifice.
TL;DR: The relationship between sociology and law has been a close partner to sociology from its very beginning, and the partnership often has proven to be extremely prolific for sociology as discussed by the authors, and sociologists can be counted among its offspring Both disciplines share the common ground of socio-legal studies, which has developed into a nearly independent interdisciplinary enterprise where legal scholars and social scientists happily meander between the normative and the analytical from the vast array of topics in the field of sociolegal studies.
Abstract: Law has been a close partner to sociology from its very beginning, and the partnership often has proven to be extremely prolific for sociology Grand theories as well as vital conceptual tools can be counted among its offspring Both disciplines share the common ground of socio-legal studies, which has developed into a nearly independent interdisciplinary enterprise where legal scholars and sociologists happily meander between the normative and the analytical From the vast array of topics in the field of socio-legal studies I select the sociology of criminal justice and punishment in order to demonstrate the characteristics of this relationship The partnership between sociology and law emerged as part of the modernization project in the 19th and 20th centuries, and the sociology of punishment was part of this endeavour Rooted in a strong tradition of old (Durkheim) and new (Elias, Foucault) classics, recent developments in this field are leaving the idea of an `unproblematically modern punishment' (Whitman, 2005a) behind, and new fields of inquiry for comparative lawyers and sociologists are opening up
TL;DR: The 19th-century story of Phineas Gage is much quoted in neuroscientific literature as the first recorded case in which personality change (from polite and sociable to psychopathic) occurred after...
Abstract: The 19th-century story of Phineas Gage is much quoted in neuroscientific literature as the first recorded case in which personality change (from polite and sociable to psychopathic) occurred after ...
TL;DR: The authors examines the impact of ''exile'' on how human experience is theorized, and examines the relationship between 'exile' and 'thought' as an individual or collective experience.
Abstract: This article examines the impact of `exile' — as an individual or collective experience — on how human experience is theorized. The relationship between `exile' and thought is initially approached ...
TL;DR: Astrid Lange-Kirchheim, a German literary scholar, published an article announcing an astonishing discovery: credible evidence exists to suggest that Kafka's famous disturbing short story, ''In the Penal Colony', published in 1919 but first written in 1914, echoes and reworks, in several of its key images and turns of phrase, elements of an essay published in 1910 in the German literary magazine, Die neue Rundschau, bearing the title ''Der Beamte' (`The Civil Servant', or ''The Official' or 'The Functionary') by
Abstract: In 1977 a German literary scholar, Astrid Lange-Kirchheim, published an article announcing an astonishing discovery: credible evidence exists to suggest that Kafka's famous disturbing short story, `In the Penal Colony', published in 1919 but first written in 1914, echoes and reworks, in several of its key images and turns of phrase, elements of an essay published in 1910 in the German literary magazine, Die neue Rundschau, bearing the title `Der Beamte' (`The Civil Servant', or `The Official' or `The Functionary') by Alfred Weber, younger brother of Max Weber. Most Kafka scholars today accept Lange-Kirchheim's findings and recognize the importance of `Der Beamte' as at least one crucial reference point for Kafka's writing. Yet little wider awareness of the connection seems to exist among historians of sociology and other scholars of the history of the human sciences. This article comprises a summary of Lange-Kirchheim's analysis together with a complete annotated translation of `Der Beamte' by Alfred Webe...
TL;DR: In this article, an original, intellectual portrait of G. H. Mead's thinking is presented, in methodological terms, upon a historically minded yet theoretically oriented strategy, based on a historical reconstruction in order to grasp the evolution of his ideas over time, and to a thematic reconstruction organized around three major research areas or pillars: science, social psychology and politics.
Abstract: This article offers an original, intellectual portrait of G. H. Mead. My reassessment of Mead’s thinking is founded, in methodological terms, upon a historically minded yet theoretically oriented strategy. Mead’s system of thought is submitted to a historical reconstruction in order to grasp the evolution of his ideas over time, and to a thematic reconstruction organized around three major research areas or pillars: science, social psychology and politics. If one re-examines the entirety of Mead’s published and unpublished writings from the point of view of contemporary social and political theory, one can see that his contributions transcend the field of social psychology. Mead’s innovative insights on the communicative aspects of social life and individual conscience are yet to be fully explored by current social and political theorists. This is partly due to the fact that his was a system in a state of flux, ever escaping the final written form.
TL;DR: The authors examines the anti-fascist rhetoric of the self-proclaimed ''revolutionary liberal'' Piero Gobetti in Italy in the early 1920s and concludes that "Gobetti is interesting from a rhetorical perspective for...
Abstract: This article examines the anti-fascist rhetoric of the self-proclaimed `revolutionary liberal', Piero Gobetti, in Italy in the early 1920s. Gobetti is interesting from a rhetorical perspective for ...
TL;DR: The authors examines the inter-implication between Foucault's and Derrida's representations of one another's work in the debate over Histoire de la folie and discovers a chiasmic structure between them, an inverted mirroring of each in the other, in which philosophy and history alternately encompass and exceed one another.
Abstract: The article examines the inter-implication between Foucault's and Derrida's representations of one another's work in the debate over Histoire de la folie and discovers a chiasmic structure between them, an inverted mirroring of each in the other, in which philosophy and historicity alternately encompass and exceed one another. At the heart of this is a problem of language (and the reason that accompanies it), which defines the limitations of the historian's work.
TL;DR: In this article, the relevance of the concepts of truth and truthfulness in culturalistic, psychoanalytical and neuro-biological theories of trauma from a philosophical point of view is investigated.
Abstract: The article investigates the relevance of the concepts of truth and truthfulness in culturalistic, psychoanalytical and neuro-biological theories of trauma from a philosophical point of view. The b...
TL;DR: The history of the human sciences can be found at: History of the Human Sciences Additional services and information for http://hhs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/refs/20/2/1 SAGE Journals Online and HighWire Press platforms as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: can be found at: History of the Human Sciences Additional services and information for http://hhs.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts Email Alerts: http://hhs.sagepub.com/subscriptions Subscriptions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav Permissions: http://hhs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/refs/20/2/1 SAGE Journals Online and HighWire Press platforms): (this article cites 5 articles hosted on the Citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present a collection of essays on psychological subjects covering the period from 1900 to the 1970s, covering economic life, healthcare, the Second World War, and the permissive society.
Abstract: I would like to thank all three reviewers for their generous and perceptive reflections on Psychological Subjects. As they recognize, this has been a challenging project, not just in terms of scope – it covers the period from 1900 to the 1970s, ranges from academic psychology to popular psychology, and contains chapters on economic life, healthcare, the Second World War, and the permissive society – but also conceptually. The result is not without its flaws and limitations; some of them highlighted by the reviewers. But the fact that the book has impressed them as opening up the subject in new ways does I hope go some way in compensation. In this response, I shall attempt to address the main issues raised in the three reviews.
TL;DR: In the 18th century Adam Smith argued that in a commercial society based on the division of labour, a rising standard of living for all was possible and desirable as discussed by the authors, but regretted that a preoccupation with material goods and social status had displaced a more expansive notion of human nature.
Abstract: In the 18th century Adam Smith argued that in a commercial society based on the division of labour, a rising standard of living for all was possible and desirable. At the same time Smith regretted that a preoccupation with material goods and social status had displaced a more expansive notion of human nature. This tension is a recurrent theme in European social thought. It underlies the social vision of the architects of postwar reconstruction and the welfare state in Australia after the Second World War as it is presented in the writings of Herbert Cole Coombs. Coombs worked to achieve a rising standard of living for ordinary Australians but believed that both living standards and human development could best be achieved through publicly funded services rather than private consumption. Unlike Smith, whose moral philosophy sees human nature as a reflection of God’s nature, Coombs’s social vision was thoroughly secular. This study explores how, in the absence of a religious justification, Coombs formulated...
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TL;DR: Mark Bonta and John Protevi, Deleuze and Geophilosophy: A Guide and Glossary, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005.
Abstract: Mark Bonta and John Protevi, Deleuze and Geophilosophy: A Guide and Glossary. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005. ISBN 0 7486 1838 4, 160 pp. £17.99 pbk. Ian Buchanan and Gregg Lambert (eds), Deleuze and Space. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005. ISBN 0 7486 1892 9, 256 pp. £55.00 hbk. ISBN 0 7486 1874 0, 256 pp. £18.99 pbk. Todd May, Gilles Deleuze: an introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. ISBN 0 5218 4309 X, 196 pp. £40.00 hbk. ISBN 0 5216 0384 6, 196 pp. £15.99 pbk. Adrian Parr (ed.), The Deleuze Dictionary. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005. ISBN 0 7486 1899 6, 320 pp. £60.00 hbk. ISBN 0 7486 1898 8, 320 pp. £18.99 pbk.
TL;DR: Kathe Truhel's 1934 doctoral dissertation, prepared under the supervision of Karl Mannheim, repays detailed examination for a number of reasons. as mentioned in this paper provides an interesting and subtle analysis of the emerging bargaining structure for negotiations between bureaucrats and social workers in the context of late Weimar, understood as a site of the crisis of modernity.
Abstract: Kathe Truhel’s 1934 doctoral dissertation, prepared under the supervision of Karl Mannheim, repays detailed examination for a number of reasons. First, it serves as an important counter-example to commonplace generalities about the alleged incapacity of women social workers of Truhel’s generation, supposedly enmeshed in ideological myths about ‘motherliness’, to reflect on their power relations to a male-dominated society and state. Second, it offers an intrinsically interesting and subtle analysis of the emerging bargaining structure for negotiations between bureaucrats and social workers in the context of late Weimar, understood as a site of the crisis of modernity. Third, it illustrates the quality and range of empirical work fostered by Mannheim during his brief tenure in Frankfurt.
TL;DR: In this paper, Adorno argues that the thought which, for the sake of the relation to its object, forgoes the full transparency of its logical genesis, will always incur a certain guilt.
Abstract: . . . unfailingly boil down to mere repetition, whether of what was there beforehand or of categorical forms, then the thought which, for the sake of the relation to its object, forgoes the full transparency of its logical genesis, will always incur a certain guilt. It breaks the promise presupposed by the very form of judgement. This inadequacy resembles that of life, which describes a wavering, deviating line, disappointing by comparison with its premises, and yet which only in this actual course, always less than it should be, is able, under given conditions of existence, to represent an unregimented one. If a life fulfilled its vocation directly, it would miss it. (Adorno, 2005: 81)
TL;DR: In this article, Weber and Ernst Toller are regarded as political opposites with the former viewed as a responsible realist and the latter as an ethical idealist, and they argue that this contrast between the two is not as great as is customarily thought.
Abstract: Max Weber and Ernst Toller are regarded as political opposites with the former viewed as the responsible realist and the latter as an ethical idealist. I argue that this contrast between the two is not as great as is customarily thought.