Showing papers on "Veblen good published in 1972"

Masters of sociological thought : ideas in historical and social context

Abstract: A history of sociological theory presented through a study of major theorists from the early 20th century to the present. Contains separate chapters on Comte, Marx, Spencer, Durkheim, Simmel, Weber, Veblen, Cooley, Mead, Park, Parento, Mannheim,and Sorokin, a chapter on William I. Thomas and Florian Znaniecki, and a concluding chapter on major American fingures of recent decades.

Veblen's Ideal Political Economy and Its Critics

Abstract: THORSTEIN VEBLEN (1857-1929) has been called by Max Lerner "the most creative mind American social thought has produced." The late C. Wright Mills has referred to him as "the best critic of America that America has produced (1)." He has also been called a peasant, a subversive, and an embittered, unsuccessful, iconoclastic professor with loose morals and a view of capitalism that was both unjust and inaccurate. Although Veblen ranks at the top of the hierarchy of American theorists of his time, it is not our major task here to become involved in the continuing dispute about his merits as theorist and social critic. Instead, we are concerned with clarifying Veblen's vision of the ideal political economy by scrutinizing this misunderstanding which has arisen about his value commitments on the part of other scholars. Before we proceed with our analysis of Veblen's ideal political economy and what we contend are the errors of some of his critics, it is essential to

Veblen and Women’s Lib: A Parallel

Abstract: (1972). Veblen and Women’s Lib: A Parallel. Journal of Economic Issues: Vol. 6, No. 2-3, pp. 75-86.

The Sociology of Sociology: Some Lines of Inquiry in the Study of the Discipline

Abstract: SOCIOLOGISTS HAVE long been aware of the existence of relations between sociocultural variables and the development of types of scientific knowledge. Until relatively recently, the systematic study of the importance of these relations for knowledge in the social sciences has been more or less overlooked. To be sure, there was speculation about the impact of social and cultural factors upon the works of intellectuals in early studies by Veblen (1918), Mannheim (1936), and Weber (translated, 1949), and in later works by Lynd (1939), Znaniecki (1940), Wilson (1942), and Myrdal (1959). Sociologists, however, have appeared especially reluctant to test empirically the relevance of many hypotheses for the development of knowledge in sociology suggested in these works. Studies regarding the function of the social organization of the discipline, climates of opinion, and the social backgrounds and personal values of researchers have tended to be unfashionable. The assumption has been that improvements in research techniques and the rigors of the scientific method rule out significant influences by such factors (Curtis and Petras, 1970a). Some research, however, has begun to evolve in this area, and our purpose in this article is to examine the nature and types of works that have been done. No major American or European scholar has yet specialized in research in the sociology of sociology (but see Waller, 1932; Page, 1963, 1965; Horowitz, 1964, 1967a, 1968; Friedrichs, 1970; Gouldner, 1970; Reynolds and Reynolds, 1970; Tiryakian, 1970), and only occasionally are students introduced, in graduate courses, to some of the scattered findings which suggest that this area would prove a rich one for sociological inquiry. There have, as yet, been no large scale studies of sociology as a research or teaching enterprise. Such studies certainly would be of practical and scientific value in the rapidly developing sociologies of the professions, education, and science. This relative neglect to study the activity of sociologists is, in itself, an interesting problem that requires study from a sociology of sociology perspective. Some changes are taking place. Recently, the number of studies has increased, and further evidence of increasing interest in this area has been reflected in the publications of several symposia which focus on "sociological self-analysis." The essays collected in such works as Sociology on Trial (Vidich and Stein, 1963), Sociologists at Work: Essays on the Craft of Social Research (Hammond, 1964; see also Bates, 1967), Reflections on Community Studies (Vidich, Bensman, and Stein, 1965), Politics, Ethics and Social Research (Sjoberg, 1967), Sociological Inquiry (1969), and The Sociology of Sociology (Reynolds and Reynolds, 1970)

The Measurement of Attributed Image

Abstract: Before the turn of the century, Thorstein Veblen noted that the individual tends to symbolize his status through the purchase and use of socially visible products. It is therefore important to both producer and consumer to know the constituent characteristics of the image of a product. The purpose of this study is to examine one method of image measurement and to present a statistical technique for analysis of image components.