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Journal ArticleDOI

Outline of a Theory of Practice.

01 Mar 1980-Contemporary Sociology-Vol. 9, Iss: 2, pp 256
About: This article is published in Contemporary Sociology.The article was published on 1980-03-01. It has received 14683 citations till now. The article focuses on the topics: Practice theory.
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TL;DR: In this article, it is argued that many other societies do not distinguish ritual from secular action and that what anthropologists identify as ritual is generally considered practical and effective action by its practitioners.
Abstract: This paper argues that the conception of ritual employed in both archaeology and anthropology is a product of post-Enlightenment rationalism. Because it does not meet modern western criteria for practical action, ritual is frequently described as non-functional and irrational; furthermore, this designation is employed as the primary way of identifying ritual archaeologically. However, this evaluation of ritual action must be questioned. Contemporary modes of categorizing human practice are not untainted by socio-political interest but enable the reproduction of certain forms of power. It is argued that many other societies do not distinguish ritual from secular action. In fact, what anthropologists identify as ritual is generally considered practical and effective action by its practitioners. This is because different conceptions of instrumentality and causation inform such activities. For archaeologists, use of the concept of ritual has resulted in a serious misapprehension of prehistoric rationa...

313 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
Anssi Paasi1
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors analyse the meaning of region and identity, and the links between them, and suggest that an analytical distinction between the identity of a region and the regional identity of its inhabitants, i.e. regional consciousness, is useful for problematising these links.
Abstract: Regional identity has become an important category in the ‘Europe of regions’, and one that is often taken as self-evident in the relations between a group of people and a bounded region. The movement of people, capital and information across spatial boundaries that takes place in the contemporary world challenges the supposed harmonious link between regions and people on all spatial scales. This paper analyses the meanings of region and identity, and the links between them. Regions are understood as historically contingent structures whose institutionalisation is based on their territorial, symbolic and institutional shaping. Regional identity is understood as an abstraction that can be used to analyse the links between social actors and the institutionalisation process. This paper suggests that an analytical distinction between the identity of a region and the regional identity of its inhabitants, i.e. regional consciousness, is useful for problematising these links. The conceptual arguments will be illustrated with analyses of identity discourses related to Finnish regions and of the mobility of the Finns between regions.

312 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This paper found that teachers perceive substantial racial-ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender differences in children's literacy skills, and that half of these disparities are explained by actual between-group differences, while the remaining perceptual inaccuracies flow more from classroom characteristics than from teachers' professional or personal backgrounds.
Abstract: Teachers’ subjective understandings of their students’ cognitive abilities have important implications for classroom interactions, children’s access to resources and opportunities, and educational equity more broadly. Using nationally representative data and three-level hierarchical linear models, this study explored the links between teacher perceptions and children’s sociodemographic backgrounds. The authors find that teachers perceive substantial racial-ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender differences in children’s literacy skills. Roughly half of these disparities are explained by actual between-group differences. The remaining perceptual inaccuracies flow more from classroom characteristics than from teachers’ professional or personal backgrounds (e.g., their own race or ethnicity). Specifically, holding students’ social and academic backgrounds constant, the authors find that teachers in lower-socioeconomic-status and lower-achieving contexts more often underestimate their students’ abilities. These re...

311 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: A special issue on entrepreneurial narrative that provides theoretical and empirical links between scholarship in narrative and entrepreneurship as well as demonstrates how theories and methods in narrative may be applied to the study of entrepreneurship as a phenomenon is presented in this paper.

311 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the emerging practice-theory approach in the social sciences is proposed as an appropriate frame of reference for entrepreneurship, which is ontologically/epistemologically qualified by presenting phronesis as the relevant guiding intellectual virtue in the knowledge creating process.
Abstract: Adopting a process perspective on entrepreneurship, captured by the notion of “entrepreneuring,” the emerging practice-theory approach in the social sciences is proposed as an appropriate frame of reference. Entrepreneuring as a practice is ontologically/epistemologically qualified by presenting phronesis as the relevant guiding intellectual virtue in the knowledge-creating process. A constructionist view invites different modes of coping with an ambiguous environment, including the use of analogizing and bricolage when enacting entrepreneuring by way of improvisation and personal networking. The notion of “organizing context” is introduced to grasp how collective support for entrepreneuring may be mobilized. Enactive research as an interactive way for doing field research is outlined and illustrated in order to complete the paradigmatic and theoretical arguments for a practice-theory approach to entrepreneuring with an adequate methodology.

310 citations