CIVILIZATIONAL SOCIOLOGY AND PERSPECTIVES ON THE ATLANTIC

Abstract

This paper calls for an opening of dialogue on the historical character of the Atlantic world between two fields. To date, historical sociologists researching the significance of inter-civilizational encounters have not paid a great deal of attention to the case of the Americas. While historical and comparative sociology has assimilated the lessons of post-colonial critique, the startling histories of transatlantic colonialism have not had the impact on studies of civilizations carried out in this field that they should have. When it comes to the second field, Atlantic Studies, the paper argues that sociologists working in the first field have something to offer in their re-theorization of the character of long term inter-civilizational contacts. A fresh approach to the study of civilizations is sketched out here that reconstructs theoretical conclusions drawn in historical sociology in a way that will be of interest to specialists in Atlantic Studies. The first part of the paper examines the historical sociology of civilizations and sets out a new framework that revolves around a re-conception of radical difference and Otherness. In the second section, I explore how dimensions of the historical experience of transatlantic colonialism—such as mapping, place-naming and early ethnological curiosity—constituted the Americas as a vital zone of the growing sense of civilizational superiority amongst Europeans between the 16th and 18th centuries. In this section, the article argues that civilizational sociology would profit from a systematic examination of this crucial historical zone. The conclusion puts out a call for further detailed inter-disciplinary research that combines the best insights of both the fields of Atlantic Studies and civilizational sociology.