The Oxford Handbook of Cognitive Sociology

Abstract

Abstract This book explores cognitive sociology as an area of inquiry focused on culture, cognition, and the social dimensions of human thought. Highlighting differing traditions, from cultural sociological perspectives focused on emphasizing group differences in categorical knowledge to neuropsychology-influenced integrative perspectives analyzing the mechanisms by which cultural processes enter into individual minds, this volume brings together prominent scholars from sociology and other disciplines to feature the key tensions, debates, and directions in the field. The volume is organized into seven parts. The first three parts are organized around general theoretical, interdisciplinary, and methodological contributions. Part I addresses theoretical foundations that forge cognitive sociology and its relationships to cultural sociology and to cognitive science. Part II emphasizes perspectives from other fields that inform an interdisciplinary cognitive social science. Part III highlights methodological developments in cognitive sociological analysis. The next four parts focus on employing cognitive sociology to examine the sociocultural organization of specific cognitive processes. Part IV analyzes the sociology of perception and attention. Part V explores the sociocultural framing of meaning through oppositions, language, analogies, and metaphor. Part VI looks at the social construction of categories, boundaries, and identities. Part VII examines collective experiences of time and memory.