Book Review Essay: The Unmasking Style in Social Theory

Abstract

Peter Baehr's new book examines unmasking in the history of social theory, politics and contemporary media. In this review, I focus on the assessment of styles of theorizing in social theory and sociology in particular. Baehr shows that through its inheritance of an Enlightenment commitment to a critique of power and domination, mainstream sociology (including the discipline's conservative critics) have absorbed an “unmasking” model of critique where instead of “scientific refutation” or “principled disagreement” what is practiced is the removal of a “disguise”. I consider the book's rich history of masking and unmasking in social thought, as well as the claim that “dramaturgical” and Anglophone sociologies are more favorably disposed towards the “masking” trope; although, I also observe the book's historical depth is not matched by contemporary breadth (for e.g. it doesn't consider the migration of social theory into new domains). I conclude by asking whether reflection on styles of thought in social theory can be separated from a sociology of sociology; and also ask whether the masking and unmasking dialectic is yet another chapter in the long history of what the Greeks called theoria.