Dissertation•
Disciplined reasoning: Styles of reasoning and the mainstream-heterodoxy divide in Swedish economics
01 Sep 2018-
TL;DR: The authors argue that the mainstream-heterodoxy divide is fruitfully understood in terms of the institutionalised stabilisation of a disciplinary style of reasoning, and show how economists understand their scientific approach and its merits.
Abstract: Economics is one of the most influential social science disciplines, with a high level of internal consent around a common theoretical and methodological approach to economic analysis. However, marginalised schools of thought have increasingly unified under the term “heterodox” economics, with their critical stance towards the “neoclassical mainstream” as common denominator. This has spawned debates among scholars about how to understand the nature of the mainstream-heterodoxy divide in economics.This thesis sets out to explain how such a common approach to science is generalised and stabilised in modern economics, and how this process is related to heterodoxy. Grounded in the sociology of science, it aims first to provide an empirical account of the mainstream-heterodoxy dynamics in Swedish economics, and second, to contribute to theory development. Drawing on the literature on distinct styles of reasoning in the history of science, I develop a theoretical framework of relational disciplinary styles of reasoning, which is used to analyse two bodies of empirical material from Swedish economics. The first is an in-depth interview study with researchers in economics, and the second is a document study of expert evaluation reports from the hiring of professors of economics at four of the top Swedish universities during 25 years. Through the two empirical studies, the fine-grained qualitative material provides an insight into the ways economists understand their discipline and the character of proper knowledge production.I argue that the mainstream-heterodoxy divide is fruitfully understood in terms of the institutionalised stabilisation of a disciplinary style of reasoning, and show how economists understand their scientific approach and its merits. The maintenance of the style of reasoning is the achievement of the thought collective of economists, where boundaries are constructed in relation to contesting heterodox economics and to other scientific disciplines. I show how the disciplinary style with its conception of good science and the notion of a core of the discipline is linked to the reproduction of disciplinary boundaries. I trace how this plays out through shifting quality evaluation practices, and show how top journal rankings have become a powerful judgement device which links the hierarchical ranking of top journals to the notion of a disciplinary core, and effectively functions as a mechanism of disciplinary stabilisation. In conclusion, I argue that these processes form a self-stabilising system in which the disciplinary style of reasoning and its boundaries is reproduced, with potential implications for how we understand intellectual dynamics and pluralism. (Less)
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TL;DR: To study the operational behaviour of λ-terms, this work will use the denotational (mathematical) approach to choose a space of semantics values, or denotations, where terms are to be interpreted.
Abstract: To study the operational behaviour of λ-terms, we will use the denotational (mathematical) approach. A denotational semantics for a language is based on the choice of a space of semantics values, or denotations, where terms are to be interpreted. Choosing a space with nice mathematical properties can help in proving the semantic properties of terms, since to this aim standard mathematical techniques can be used.
880 citations
TL;DR: Information is provided on how to identify the wood of several species common to the Northern Hemisphere using a hand-magnifying lens, as well as some techniques used in the study of Japan.
Abstract: Section (CRN) Meets in: Instructor: Office Ofc Hrs. STSH1110-01(60478) Carnegie 102 Jeanette Simmonds (simmoj@rpi.edu) Sage 5706 TBA STSS1110-01 (60138) Carnegie 205 Selma Sabanovic (sabans@rpi.edu) Sage 5703 Tue 4-5p IHSS1963-01 (62348) Sage 2701 Atsushi Akera (akeraa@rpi.edu) (see above) IHSS1963-02 (62349) DCC 236 Meredith Wells (wellsm@rpi.edu) TBA TBA IHSS1963-03 (62350) Sage 4203 Camar Diaz (diaztc@rpi.edu) Sage 5710 Tue./Fri. 4-5p IHSS1963-04 (62351) Carnegie 208 Lorna Ronald (ronall@rpi.edu) Sage 5706 TBA IHSS1963-05 (62352) Sage 2112 Jeffrey Hannigan (hannij@rpi.edu) Sage 5202 TBA *office hours also by appointment.
225 citations
Journal Article•
190 citations
01 Jan 2016
TL;DR: The handbook of science and technology studies is universally compatible with any devices to read and is available in the authors' digital library an online access to it is set as public so you can get it instantly.
Abstract: Thank you for reading handbook of science and technology studies. As you may know, people have look numerous times for their chosen books like this handbook of science and technology studies, but end up in infectious downloads. Rather than reading a good book with a cup of coffee in the afternoon, instead they juggled with some infectious virus inside their desktop computer. handbook of science and technology studies is available in our digital library an online access to it is set as public so you can get it instantly. Our book servers hosts in multiple countries, allowing you to get the most less latency time to download any of our books like this one. Kindly say, the handbook of science and technology studies is universally compatible with any devices to read.
166 citations
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Dissertation•
01 Jan 2004
TL;DR: In this article, a group of parents of deaf and hearing-impaired children and representatives of a special school in the south of Sweden began to hold formally arranged meetings in order to start a "dialogue" and the transcriptions of those meetings form the basis for the analysis.
Abstract: In the spring of 1997 a group of parents of deaf and hearing-impaired children and representatives of a special school in the south of Sweden began to hold formally arranged meetings in order to start a “dialogue”. This particular form of collaboration became the focus of this study. The meetings lasted two to three hours and I attended seventeen of them. The transcriptions of those meetings form the basis for the analysis.
In many arenas of contemporary western society there is a strong belief in dialogue; this is seen as a way to constructive and edifying ends. People do communicate with intentions to understand and help each other and to create commonly adhered to values and goals, but also to manipulate and control each other.
I have analysed empirical material from a constructivist perspective. More specifically, I examine how problems are produced, dissembled and fought over as they are constructed in the world of deaf education.
Different kinds of dialogical aspects of talk, such as the climate of conversation and the speed of talk are identified. Turns of talk are analysed in an attempt to discover how a specific conversation develops. The study shows how both parties tried to find different ways to avoid talking about responsibility and guilt. In many cases this lead to an evasive speech, which in its own way makes agreement possible. Vagueness is analysed as a conversational tool. The study points out a way of talking, a kind of repeated pattern that constantly seemed to circulate around “a minimum of consensus”.
The dissertation focuses on how identities and categories are created and shaped in these specific speech situations. For example how the construction of a particular problem involves malleable and constantly ongoing identity creation. It is mainly in the formulation of the pupils’ capacity and competence that different attributions are made.
Finally, the study argues that conversation is both a governed and intended action and an action with unforeseen elements and it is here that social order constantly is sought to be established.
6 citations
01 Jan 2002
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a rapport for ekonomiska transaktioner via Internet skapas, vidmakthalles och forandras, samt hur dessa kan sattas i samband med den massmediala diskursen i amnet.
Abstract: Denna rapport ar ett forsok att skissera en bild av hur manniskors uppfattningar och forestallningar om ekonomiska transaktioner via Internet skapas, vidmakthalles och forandras, samt hur dessa kan sattas i samband med den massmediala diskursen i amnet. Rapporten ar i forsta hand en litteraturstudie. Men den innehaller ocksa exempel och tolkningar fran tre parintervjuer dar paren har skiftande erfarenheter av Internet och e-handel. I genomgangen av litteraturen riktas uppmarksamheten framst mot tre omraden: risk och riskbedomningar, massmediernas betydelse for manniskors upplevelser av risk samt dimensionerna av fortroende och skepsis. Kortfattat ges aven en bakgrundsbild av informationssamhallet och Internethandeln.
6 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 1999
TL;DR: In this article, the authors focus on how households with different demographic and socio-economic characteristics and transport needs, confronted with different restrictions and possibilities in the surrounding structures, choose to travel in their everyday life.
Abstract: Starting from the assumption that travelling has negative consequences for the ecological environment, this study deals with travel behaviour in Malmo. The study focuses on how households with different demographic and socio-economic characteristics and transport needs, confronted with different restrictions and possibilities in the surrounding structures, choose to travel in their everyday life. The approach is based on theories of urbanism as a form of life and of the distribution and segregation of the population in urban areas. From this basis analyses of the physical and social structures of Malmo have been made, followed by in-depth interviews with 25 households in two residential areas of Malmo. The analysis indicates the significance of different physical and social conditions for the chosen ways of travelling, such as the local commercial services in the areas and the structure of the public transport system. The most common argument for choosing the car is time, that is the time it takes to travel a certain distance and the perception of time as a limiting factor in everyday life. This points to the constant spread of society where different functions become separated demanding increased mobility and fast ways of travelling. This study finds that local commercial services which do not live up to the demands of local consumers and public transport systems which are deemed too slow compared to the privately owned car play a more important role in choosing environmentally unfriendly ways of travelling than what often has been labelled "lack of environmental consciousness".
6 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 2015
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine the social interaction in inter-ethnic collegial relationships as it spontaneously arises and develops in the interethnic colleagues' relationships in everyday working life, where humour, play and pleasure are continually on line in the collegial interaction and this contributes to a range of humour-based and sexualized forms of social interaction.
Abstract: How can we understand the multi-ethnic workplace as a social meeting place? And what happens if we do not 'frame' in advance the social meeting in the widespread anti-racist frame of understanding? These are the questions that are central to this thesis. Starting from a phenomenological methodology, it is the ambition of the thesis to challenge our usual preconceptions and not pre-define how inter-ethnic relations are to be understood, which is why the thesis - expressed in Goffman's terms - asks: ”What is it that’s going on here?” (Goffman 1974), as a way of finding which framework of understanding should be applied. Based on the part of the lifeworld that unfolds in a multi-ethnic workplace, the thesis examines the social interaction in inter-ethnic collegial relationships as it spontaneously arises and develops in the inter-ethnic collegial relationships in everyday working life. The thesis is based on fieldwork (consisting of participant observation and interviews) at the Food Factory ("Madfabrikken"), a multi-ethnic workplace in the hospitality sector in Denmark. With an auto-ethnographic point of departure, the researcher brings herself into play in the relationships under study, and makes herself an object of observation, reflection and study. In addition to the life at the Food Factory, the thesis is also concerned with the research process, and experiments with different methods of grasping and conveying the life lived in the Food Factory in all its complexity and ambiguity. The thesis explores empirical observations of social interactions, where humour, play and pleasure are on the line. As much as the interplay in the collegial relationships at the Food Factory can be pleasurable and fun, it does, however, bring the risk of danger. It is this duality that is illuminated in this thesis. In the first instance, the humour, play and pleasure are continually on line in the collegial interaction and this contributes to a range of humour-based and sexualized forms of social interaction, where "ethnicity" is defused and enjoyed as an aesthetic and sexualised surface. Secondly, it is true in the sense that humour, play and pleasure risk being on the line or jeopardized, if the rules for the interaction are not mastered or respected. What was previously 'framed' as being pleasurable, sexualized play and teasing at work, or what was set in a humorous frame, is suddenly in danger of being replaced or overtaken by a new 'framing' of the situation as sexual harassment or racism. The thesis does not end up with definitive answers as to how social interaction in a multi-ethnic workplace should be understood and how we can understand it as a social meeting place, but contributes with the knowledge that social interaction in inter-ethnic collegial relationships is vulnerable, ambiguous, fragile, undecidable, manipulable and redefinable. With an object-sensitive eye, the thesis contributes to other, more nuanced narratives about the social meeting of the inter-ethnic relationships - namely the narratives about the life lived and its forms. (Less)
6 citations
01 Jan 1996
TL;DR: The authors discuss the epistemological underpinnings of one distinctly French sociological enterprise, that of Pierre Bourdieu and his collaborators, and demonstrate its intimate connections to the so-called historical epistemology represented by Gaston Bachelard, Georges Canguilhem, Jean Cavaillès and others.
Abstract: My talk is announced under a vast heading. Today’s French sociology is most diversified. From a foreigners point of view much of it appears more American than French, which means that it is closely related to dominating sociological schools in the Scandinavian countries. I am, though, going to discuss the epistemological underpinnings of one distinctly French sociological enterprise, that of Pierre Bourdieu and his collaborators. My aim is to demonstrate its intimate connections to the so called historical epistemology, i.e. the tradition in French philosophy of science represented by Gaston Bachelard, Georges Canguilhem, Jean Cavaillès and others. I will also make a few remarks on the reception of Bourdieu’s work in the Anglo-Saxon sphere of influence.
6 citations