Abstract
This article makes two points. First, it argues that sociology, like all knowledge, is shaped, though not determined, by its historical-cultural origins. Early sociology arose in 19th-century Europe and its core concepts were shaped by that era—both in what they reveal about society and what they hide. We now realize this, so we sociologists of religion need to examine our inherited concepts to understand those concepts’ limitations. We also need to include an analysis of the way the current historical-cultural situation shapes sociology today. This is the theoretical reflexivity called for in the title. Second, the article argues that expanding sociology’s conceptual canon to include insights from other historical-cultural locations is more than just an ethical matter. It is also epistemological. Sociology does not make progress unless it includes insights from as many standpoints as possible. This does not mean that all insights are equal. It does mean that all have the potential to improve sociological understanding. Whether or not they actually do so is a matter for the scientific process to decide.
Highlights
Theirs was a colonial world and they stood on top of it, imagining that their superior perspective gave them special responsibility for the well-being of the people they were studying
Why do we need to remember where we stand when we survey the social world? Why should we focus on how that standpoint shapes our thinking? What can we gain from building that realization into our theories?
God’s-eye view of the social scenes they were describing, but they no longer do so. They have long acknowledged that their data come from their ability to embed themselves in scenes that are not their own, but they acknowledge the need to make explicit what their own backgrounds prevent them from seeing
Summary
Europe was for them the leading edge of this process They saw science in general and social science in particular as ways of understanding this new world and of bringing it more fully under human control. Theirs was a colonial world and they stood on top of it, imagining that their superior perspective gave them special responsibility for the well-being of the people they were studying Their concepts and theories were shaped by their colonial situation. But we cannot assume that they are better or more useful than the insights gained from people shaped by other social locations: countries, races, ethnicities, classes, genders, sexualities, religions, and so on Sociologists raised in these other locales can often see things that people raised like me cannot. We must embrace theoretical resources from many other standpoints, if we are to improve our understanding of our now-shared world
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