College of Behavioral and Health Sciences (OER Hub): SOC 1010: Introduction to Sociology

These skillfully written essays are based on the Georg Simmel Lectures delivered by Neil J. Smelser at Humboldt University in Berlin in the spring of 1995. A distillation of Smelser's reflections after nearly four decades of research, teaching, and thought in the field of sociology, the essays identify, as he says in the first chapter,'... some central problematics—those generic, recurrent, never resolved and never completely resolvable issues—that shape the work of the sociologist.'Each chapter considers a different level of sociological analysis: micro (the person and personal interaction), meso (groups, organizations, movements), macro (societies), and global (multi-societal). Within this framework, Smelser covers a variety of topics, including the place of the rational and the nonrational in social action and in social science theory; the changing character of group attachments in post-industrial society; the eclipse of social class; and the decline of the nation-state as a focus of solidarity.The clarity of Smelser's writing makes this a book that will be welcomed throughout the field of social science as well as by anyone wishing to understand sociology's essential characteristics and problems.

The Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (SKAD) has reoriented research into social forms, structuration and processes of meaning construction and reality formation; doing so by linking social constructivist and pragmatist approaches with post-structuralist thinking in order to study discourses and create epistemological space for analysing processes of world-making in culturally diverse environments. SKAD is anchored in interpretive traditions of inquiry and allows for broadening ¿ and possibly overcoming ¿ of the epistemological biases and restrictions still common in theories and approaches of Western- and Northern-centric social sciences. An innovative volume, this book is exactly attentive to these empirically based, globally diverse further developments of approach, with a clear focus on the methodology and its implementation. Thus, The Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse presents itself as a research program and locates the approach within the context of interpretive social sciences, followed by eleven chapters on different cases from around the world that highlight certain theoretical questions and methodological challenges. Presenting outstanding applications of the Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse across a wide variety of substantive projects and regional contexts, this text will appeal to postgraduate students and researchers interested in fields such as Discourse Studies, Sociology, Cultural Studies and Qualitative Methodology and Methods.

Analytical sociology is a strategy for understanding the social world. It is concerned with explaining important social facts such as network structures, patterns of residential segregation, typical beliefs, cultural tastes, and common ways of acting. It explains such facts not merely by relating them to other social facts, but by detailing in clear and precise ways the mechanisms through which the social facts were brought about. Making sense of the relationship between micro and macro thus is one of the central concerns of analytical sociology. The approach is a contemporary incarnation of Robert K. Merton's notion of middle-range theory and represents a vision of sociological theory as a tool-box of semi-general theories each of which is adequate for explaining certain types of phenomena. The Handbook of Analytical Sociology brings together some of the most prominent sociologists in the world in a concerted effort to move sociology in a more analytical and rigorous direction. Some of the chapters focus on action and interaction as the cogs and wheels of social processes, while others consider the dynamic social processes that these actions and interactions bring about.

Unlike most introductory texts that take a topical approach to studying sociology, this smart, challenging, and accessibly written text looks at the core principles of the discipline, making links to a contemporary context.

"At a time when many are buried in narrow crevices of knowledge, Critical Sociology has the boldness and courage to take on the ‘big questions’. For those who would break out of the straitjacket of the methodological imperative Critical Sociology is a necessary and vital forum for alternative ideas." Stanley Aronowitz, Distinguished Professor of Sociology, Graduate Center, City University of New York, USA

The Journal of Applied Social Science (JASS) is the official, peer-refereed publication of the Association for Applied and Clinical Sociology (AACS). JASS reflects more than 25 years of journal sponsorship by AACS and its predecessor organizations, the Society for Applied Sociology and the Sociological Practice Association. The Journal of Applied Social Science is the direct amalgamated successor of two previously published journals: The Journal of Applied Sociology and Sociological Practice: A Journal of Applied and Clinical Sociology.

The Journal of Historical Sociology was founded in 1988 on the conviction that historical and social studies ultimately have a common subject matter and can only benefit from the interchange of ideas and perspectives. Edited by a distinguished international panel of historians, anthropologists, geographers and sociologists, it is both interdisciplinary in approach and innovative in content. As well as refereed articles, the journal presents reviews essays and commentary in its 'Issues and Agendas' section, and aims to provoke discussion and debate.