Social Theory and Social History PDF Download

Author: Donald MacRaild
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350317497
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
The expansion of social history that took place in the twentieth century has produced some of the most exciting works in the field of historical studies. As the range of the social historian's concerns has grown, so has the range of methodologies and theoretical approaches they employ. Historians have made greater use of the theoretical insights of social scientists, and boundaries between the disciplines have become blurred as a consequence. Social Theory and Social History: - Covers the major developments within social history - Offers an introduction to the most important social theorists - Discusses the relationship between history and the social sciences - Considers the use of theory in the writing of history - Examines current debates within historiography In this concise introductory guide, Donald M. MacRaild and Avram Taylor explore the complex relationship between social theory and social history, arguing that an awareness of the relation between the two is the key to a deeper understanding of the process of historical change.

Author: Peter Burke
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745634079
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
Taking into account new developments since this book was first published, 'History and Social Theory' discusses topics including globalization, postcolonialism and social capital.

Author: William H. Sewell Jr.
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226749193
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 425

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Book Description
While social scientists and historians have been exchanging ideas for a long time, they have never developed a proper dialogue about social theory. William H. Sewell Jr. observes that on questions of theory the communication has been mostly one way: from social science to history. Logics of History argues that both history and the social sciences have something crucial to offer each other. While historians do not think of themselves as theorists, they know something social scientists do not: how to think about the temporalities of social life. On the other hand, while social scientists’ treatments of temporality are usually clumsy, their theoretical sophistication and penchant for structural accounts of social life could offer much to historians. Renowned for his work at the crossroads of history, sociology, political science, and anthropology, Sewell argues that only by combining a more sophisticated understanding of historical time with a concern for larger theoretical questions can a satisfying social theory emerge. In Logics of History, he reveals the shape such an engagement could take, some of the topics it could illuminate, and how it might affect both sides of the disciplinary divide.

Author: Daniel W. Rossides
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9781882289509
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 422

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Book Description
Social Theory: Its Origins, History, and Contemporary Relevance analyzes the tradition of social theory in terms of its origins and changes in kind of societies. Rossides provides a full discussion of the sociohistorical environments that generated Western social theory with a focus on the contemporary modern world. While employing a sociology of knowledge approach that identifies theories as aristocratic versus democratic, liberal versus socialist and also liberal feminist versus radical feminist; it attempts to construct a scientific, unified social theory in the West. Additionally, it also features African American theory, American culture studies, political and legal philosophy, and environmental theory.

Author: Alex Callinicos
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9047404769
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 343

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Book Description
This republication gives a new generation of readers access to an important intervention in Marxism and social theory. Making History is about the question of how human agents draw their powers from the social structures they are involved in.

Author: Nicholas B. Dirks
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691228000
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 635

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Book Description
The intellectual radicalism of the 1960s spawned a new set of questions about the role and nature of "the political" in social life, questions that have since revolutionized nearly every field of thought, from literary criticism through anthropology to the philosophy of science. Michel Foucault in particular made us aware that whatever our functionally defined "roles" in society, we are constantly negotiating questions of authority and the control of the definitions of reality. Such insights have led theorists to challenge concepts that have long formed the very underpinnings of their disciplines. By exploring some of the most debated of these concepts--"culture," "power," and "history"--this reader offers an enriching perspective on social theory in the contemporary moment. Organized around these three concepts, Culture/ Power/History brings together both classic and new essays that address Foucault's "new economy of power relations" in a number of different, contestatory directions. Representing innovative work from various disciplines and sites of study, from taxidermy to Madonna, the book seeks to affirm the creative possibilities available in a time marked by growing uncertainty about established disciplinary forms of knowledge and by the increasing fluidity of the boundaries between them. The book is introduced by a major synthetic essay by the editors, which calls attention to the most significant issues enlivening theoretical discourse today. The editors seek not only to encourage scholars to reflect anew on the course of social theory, but also to orient newcomers to this area of inquiry. The essays are contributed by Linda Alcoff ("Cultural Feminism versus Post-Structuralism"), Sally Alexander ("Women, Class, and Sexual Differences in the 1830s and 1840s"), Tony Bennett ("The Exhibitionary Complex"), Pierre Bourdieu ("Structures, Habitus, Power"), Nicholas B. Dirks ("Ritual and Resistance"), Geoff Eley ("Nations, Publics, and Political Cultures"), Michel Foucault (Two Lectures), Henry Louis Gates, Jr. ("Authority, [White] Power and the [Black] Critic"), Stephen Greenblatt ("The Circulation of Social Energy"), Ranajit Guha ("The Prose of Counter-Insurgency"), Stuart Hall ("Cultural Studies: Two Paradigms"), Susan Harding ("The Born-Again Telescandals"), Donna Haraway ("Teddy Bear Patriarchy"), Dick Hebdige ("After the Masses"), Susan McClary ("Living to Tell: Madonna's Resurrection of the Fleshly"), Sherry B. Ortner ("Theory in Anthropology since the Sixties"), Marshall Sahlins ("Cosmologies of Capitalism"), Elizabeth G. Traube ("Secrets of Success in Postmodern Society"), Raymond Williams (selections from Marxism and Literature), and Judith Williamson ("Family, Education, Photography").

Author: Peter Wagner
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1446264513
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description
Divided into two parts, this book examines the train of social theory from the 19th century, through to the ′organization of modernity′, in relation to ideas of social planning, and as contributors to the ′rationalistic revolution′ of the ′golden age′ of capitalism in the 1950s and 60s. Part two examines key concepts in the social sciences. It begins with some of the broadest concepts used by social scientists: choice, decision, action and institution and moves on to examine the ′collectivist alternative′: the concepts of society, culture and polity, which are often dismissed as untenable by postmodernists today. This is a major contribution to contemporary social theory and provides a host of essential insights into the task of social science today.

Author: Craig Calhoun
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
ISBN: 9781557862884
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
In this outstanding reinterpretation - and extension - of the Critical Theory tradition, Craig Calhoun surveys the origins, fortunes and prospects of this most influential of theoretical approaches. Moving with ease from the early Frankfurt School to Habermas, to contemporary debates over postmodernism, feminism and nationalism, Calhoun breathes new life into Critical Social Theory, showing how it can learn from the past and contribute to the future.

Author: Edward Granter
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317157028
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
Critical Social Theory and the End of Work examines the development and sociological significance of the idea that work is being eliminated through the use of advanced production technology. Granter’s engagement with the work of key American and European figures such as Marx, Marcuse, Gorz, Habermas and Negri, focuses his arguments for the abolition of labour as a response to the current socio-historical changes affecting our work ethic and consumer ideology. By combining history of ideas with social theory, this book considers how the 'end of work' thesis has developed and has been critically implemented in the analysis of modern society. This book will appeal to scholars of sociology, history of ideas, social and cultural theory as well as those working in the fields of critical management and sociology of work.

Author: Carsten Bagge Laustsen
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317329716
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description
This textbook offers a new approach to understanding social theory. Framed around paired theoretical perspectives on a series of sociological problems, the book shows how distinctive viewpoints shed light on different facets of social phenomena. The book includes sociology’s "founding fathers", major 20th-century thinkers and recent voices such as Butler and Zizek. Philosophically grounded and focused on interpretation and analysis, the book provides a clear understanding of theory’s scope while developing students’ skills in evaluating, applying and comparing theories.