Sociological Interest Research Articles

Contributors

Previous articleNext article FreeContributorsPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreAbigail Ocobock is assistant professor of sociology at the University of Notre Dame. Her research combines family sociology, institutional sociology, and gender and sexualities studies, with a particular focus on the institutional character of marriage.Natasha Warikoo is professor of sociology at Tufts University and the author of The Diversity Bargain: And Other Dilemmas of Race, Admissions, and Meritocracy at Elite Universities (University of Chicago Press, 2016).Siwei Cheng is assistant professor of sociology at New York University. Her research focuses on social inequality, work and occupations, and quantitative methodology. Her current project employs new analytic approaches to examine the structure of the occupational system.Barum Park is assistant professor of sociology at Cornell University, where he is an affiliate of the Center for the Study of Inequality and the Cornell Population Center. His research interests are in social networks, political sociology, social mobility, and quantitative methods. His current research focuses on political polarization and network segregation in the United States.Hongwei Xu is associate professor of sociology at Queens College, the City University of New York. His research interests include spatial analysis of human behavior and society, social stratification, and disparities in health and health care.Geng Tian is assistant professor of sociology at Peking University. He is a University of Chicago PhD (2015) and is interested in historical sociology of state and empire, social theory, bureaucracy, and sociology of knowledge. He is currently finishing a book on the emergence of social survey of customs and mores in China during the first half of the 20th century.Robert Faris is professor of sociology at the University of California, Davis. He uses social network analysis to investigate how violence, bullying, and related forms of aggression shape social hierarchies.Diane Felmlee is professor of sociology and demography at Pennsylvania State University, with research interests in social networks, social psychology, mathematical sociology, and gender. Her research concerns the interconnections of friendship, peer aggression, online harassment, and close relationships.Cassie McMillan is assistant professor of sociology, criminology, and criminal justice at Northeastern University. Her research applies a social networks perspective to processes related to inequality, adolescent delinquency, and immigration. Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Sociology Volume 126, Number 3November 2020 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/713514 © 2020 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

A proposal for theoretical and empirical extension of the sociology of anti-doping

The purpose of the paper is to highlight the interest of using diverse sociological approaches and models for studying anti-doping (developed outside the epistemic community of researchers working on doping) and to point out the sociological interest of the doping issue for social sciences.First, we will present a model developed by pragmatic sociologists for describing social issues in society that could assist researchers in describing the complex reality of the anti-doping issue. The model proposes to examine the ways in which axiology, devices and realities are articulated in anti-doping related criticism and the existing circulation between the six social logics described in it. Its use could allow researchers to apprehend local and global transformations in the system and the articulations between these two levels. Second, we will resume the most relevant results of a research that analysed the prevention activity using an approach of work sociologists. A part of this research sought to identify the meaning that people working in prevention gave to their activity. The received answers were manifold; five ways of “doing prevention” were identified, to which institutions were committed differently. The described panorama showed a dispute where the debate as such was not tabled and nobody seemed able to definitively close the dispute, not even the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Finally, an ongoing research will be presented. It focuses on the procedures-based management implemented by WADA and aims to compare its development with the implementation of similar management systems by other institutions. The research could allow us identifying possible related risks, for example, the loss of the pleasure of working, the emergence of fear or the increasing work pressure. We hope the paper will encourage other social researchers to renew the usual theoretical approaches.

Social Distancing, Safe Spaces and the Demand for Quarantine

Social distance has been a topic of interest in sociology for more than a century before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Whereas in the past it referred to the distance between groups in more recent times it signifies the space between individuals. The aspiration for safe space and personal boundaries in recent years indicated that social distancing has acquired an increasingly individuated and privatised form. This article suggests that the demand for safe space can be interpreted as a demand for a quarantine from psychic threats. This pre-existing demand for a quarantine from criticism and pressure has seamlessly meshed with the imperative of social distancing in the COVID-19 era.

On the Other Side of Values

The concept of values is currently enjoying renewed interest in sociology; indeed, many claim that it must be treated as central to any theory of action. As introduced to American sociology from Eu...

Harmony of the Seas?: Work, faith, and religious difference among multinational migrant workers on board cargo ships

ABSTRACT This paper advances a long-standing sociological interest in the relationship between religion and work. As protections for freedom of religious expression have played a more central role in the US and Europe, questions have been raised about the implications for people who are associated with heterogeneous workplaces. In this context, we consider the work-based practices of multinational groups of migrant workers who self-affiliate to a variety of religions and none. Our research employed non-participant observation and semi-structured interviews with multinational groups of seafarers working on cargo vessels, as well as participant observation with seafarers and chaplains in ports. The findings indicate that religious beliefs offer solace and support to seafarers. However, they also highlight workers’ desire for religion to be kept private on board in order to avoid interpersonal conflict. The findings have broader application in a variety of diverse environments where migrant and indigenous workers are employed.

Effects of stigma and stress on mental health and quality of life

Sociological interest in stigma gained attention following the publication of the article Stigma: Notes on Managing Spoiled Identity (Goffman, 1963). Social stigmatization is, to a large extent, a spontaneous process, but its development is carried out within the framework of certain well-established laws of a sociocultural nature. Knowledge of these laws makes it possible to predict possible consequences of this phenomenon, to prevent their onset, and to neutralize the negative effect of the phenomenon on social actors. However, experimental data are insufficient to support explanations for this social phenomenon and the effect of stigma on the quality of life.

Explaining the rise of ‘nonreligion studies’: Subfield formation and institutionalization within the sociology of religion

As recently as 2008, a major reference work in the sociology of religion could (correctly) describe the study of atheism, secularity, and nonreligion as ‘meager, fragmentary, and unappreciated’. Only a decade later, this situation has been radically transformed. Not only is there a substantial, ever-growing, and constantly diversifying (methodologically, theoretically, geographically) research literature, but ‘nonreligion studies’ now possesses a full ‘academic architecture’ of conferences, journals, monograph series, professional communities, and grant successes. Over this period, the study of nonreligion has become increasingly institutionalized as an established subfield of the sociology of religion. This has not simply come about by magic. On the contrary, there are very good sociological reasons i) why, for over a century, nonreligion failed to take off (outside of certain, telling milieux) as an area of sustained sociological interest; and ii) why and how this has – seemingly so rapidly – changed.

Monitoring the 'diabetes epidemic': A framing analysis of United Kingdom print news 1993-2013.

The view that we are in the midst of a global diabetes epidemic has gained considerable ground in recent years and is often linked to the prior 'obesity epidemic'. This research explored how the diabetes epidemic was represented in United Kingdom (UK) news over the same time period that the obesity epidemic was widely reported. The research was motivated by a sociological interest in how postmodern 'epidemics' synergise with each other amidst broader political, economic, moral and sociocultural discourses. We analysed three time-bound samples of UK news articles about diabetes: 1993 (n = 19), 2001 (n = 119) and 2013 (n = 324). Until now, UK media has had the least attention regarding portrayal of diabetes. We adopted an empathically neutral approach and used a dual method approach of inductive thematic analysis and deductive framing analysis. The two methods were triangulated to produce the findings. Framing of diabetes moved from medical in 1993 to behavioural in 2001, then societal in 2013. By 2001 obesity was conceptualised as causal to diabetes, rather than a risk factor. Between 2001 and 2013 portrayals of the modifiable risk factors for diabetes (i.e. diet, exercise and weight) became increasingly technical. Other risk factors like age, family history and genetics faded during 2001 and 2013, while race, ethnicity and culture were positioned as states of 'high risk' for diabetes. The notion of an 'epidemic' of diabetes 'powered up' these concerns from an individual problem to a societal threat in the context of obesity as a well-known health risk. Portraying diabetes and the diabetes epidemic as anticipated consequences of obesity enlivens the heightened awareness to future risks in everyday life brought about during the obesity epidemic. The freeform adoption of the 'epidemic' term in contemporary health discourse appears to foster individual and societal dependence on biomedicine, giving it political, economic and divisive utility.

The life and work Raoul Charles van Caenegem (1927-2018)

Summary This article deals with the life and work of the Belgian legal historian R.C. van Caenegem. It shows how van Caenegem’s work was influenced by his teachers, first of all François-Louis Ganshof, but also many others like Theodore Plucknett. Van Caenegem’s research was very diverse and addressed different groups of readers, so that most of them only know a fragment of his work. Van Caenegem learned from Ganshof’s mistakes. Unlike his master, van Caenegem took an interest in sociology and he did not hesitate to publish the grand overviews of history which Ganshof had stopped writing in the second half of his career. Many of van Caenegem’s books on English, medieval and legal history were a product of his teaching. Whereas the books for the students in Ghent, where van Caenegem was burdened by a heavy teaching load, presented a complete survey, the books for select groups of foreign students cherry-picked from legal history and took part in discussions on larger debates. Van Caenegem’s many articles offer a better insight into his personal evolution from a scholar who started out as a jurist, but very soon lost interest in dogmatic legal history and preferred to investigate the lawmakers instead of the law itself. As a historian, van Caenegem put the middle ages first, because in his opinion the middle ages laid the foundations for the modern rule of law. However, these ‘modern’ middle ages only started in the twelfth century. Although he claimed that the future of legal historical research lays in teamwork, van Caenegem himself remained an indvidualistic scholar.

Should we fund research randomly? An epistemological criticism of the lottery model as an alternative to peer review for the funding of science

Abstract The way research is, and should be, funded by the public sphere is the subject of renewed interest for sociology, economics, management sciences, and more recently, for the philosophy of science. In this contribution, I propose a qualitative, epistemological criticism of the funding by lottery model, which is advocated by a growing number of scholars as an alternative to peer review. This lottery scheme draws on the lack of efficiency and of robustness of the peer-review-based evaluation to argue that the majority of public resources for basic science should be allocated randomly. I first differentiate between two distinct arguments used to defend this alternative funding scheme based on considerations about the logic of scientific research. To assess their epistemological limits, I then present and develop a conceptual frame, grounded on the notion of ‘system of practice’, which can be used to understand what precisely it means, for a research project, to be interesting or significant. I use this epistemological analysis to show that the lottery model is not theoretically optimal, since it underestimates the integration of all scientific projects in densely interconnected systems of conceptual, experimental, or technical practices which confer their proper interest to them. I also apply these arguments in order to criticize the classical peer-review process. I finally suggest, as a discussion, that some recently proposed models that bring to the fore a principle of decentralization of the evaluation and selection process may constitute a better alternative, if the practical conditions of their implementation are adequately settled.

Creative placemaking and the cultural projectariat: Artistic work in the wake of Hull City of Culture 2017

Cultural work attracts much sociological interest and is often seen as typifying ‘precarity’. However, this scholarship rarely examines how ‘placemaking’ policy interventions affect the concrete conditions of cultural work. We study a major recent public/private policy intervention in the United Kingdom: Hull City of Culture 2017. This intervention embodied a multifaceted set of policy logics, combining the desire to boost arts participation, with a market-facing imperative to bolster the city’s ‘brand’. We examine what happened to the city’s ‘cultural projectariat’ (meaning those workers whose career depends on assembling sequences of discrete, time-limited funded cultural projects) during this event. The influx of funds created opportunities for good-quality work, but specific sources of insecurity persisted and in certain respects intensified: including the need for significant unpaid work and permanent competition for resources. City of Culture’s nature as a market-oriented ‘placemaking’ intervention limits its capacity to ameliorate the conditions of cultural work, which has to be conceived as a policy end in itself if conditions of the cultural projectariat are to be improved.

The Case of Russian Phytosociology

The article gives a historical overview of the formation and development of Russian phytosociology and its explicit and implicit relationships with sociology. The reasons for the using by the plant science the conceptual apparatus of sociology are considered. Both sociology and botany deal with systems that are characterized by the discrete-summative principle of organization, the activity of elements of the system and the limited resources of the external environment. These parameters condition such features of the functioning of systems as mutual influences, competition for resources (struggle for existence), selection in accordance with the criteria of fitness, development towards increasing complexity (differentiation of positions, structuring the relationships in the system, etc.), active interaction with the environment and changing the latter for the needs of the system. It is shown that the sociological metaphors used by phytosociologists were inherently tools of systemic generalizations, and have in this regard an interdisciplinary sound. The article examines the interest of P. Sorokin’s for phytosociology, for him it served as an argumentative basis in the dispute with nominalism and a source of conceptual ideas. The assumption is justified that the notion of «interaction», which is central for Sorokin’s sociology, was developed by him under the influence of reading the phytosociological works by V.N. Sukachev and G.F. Morozov. Possible theoretical connotations between phytosociological issues and research interests of modern sociology are emphasized.

WORKING CLASS IN THE CURRENT SOCIOLOGICAL STUDIES: RUSSIAN CONTEXT

For many years, the working class has been an object of interest for Russian sociology. In Soviet sociology, a lot of research has been devoted to workers and industrial sociology. The point of attention of sociologists moved towards the study of labor relations and the protest movement in enterprises in the 1990s. Then the workers stopped being in the center of attention of sociology, but now interest in the working class is returning. This article is a form of analytical reflection on the research agenda for the study of workers by Russian sociologists. The analysis is based on publications on the research of Russian workers in the leading Russian sociological journals. Workers are considered as a social and professional group that is in a status crisis as an archaic social class that lost in the course of market reforms and represents an obstacle to modernization. Russian authors point to the return of the significant role of industrial workers against the background of a focus on the technological breakthrough of the Russian economy. An analysis of publications also shows that in recent years, researchers have found it difficult to access enterprises to study workers in their work environment, which affects the understanding of the situation of industrial workers in Russia. Workers have become a popular and convenient object of study as a statistical artifact present in sociological data bases, but sometimes this data speaks little of the real situation of the industrial working class. The article emphasizes the growing interest of Russian sociologists to workers and new approaches to their study, including the biographical method and the included observation.

Formar y enseñar Sociología: la flexibilidad de la teoría y el valor diferencial de la mirada sociológica

El objetivo en este artículo es reflexionar sobre la formación de profesionales en Sociología en la Facultad de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales de la unam. En primer lugar, se presenta un recorrido breve sobre la historia de la Facultad junto con datos de ingreso, egreso y titulación de la licenciatura en Sociología y de sus planes de estudios. En segundo lugar, se argumenta la idea de la flexibilidad de teorías y conceptos y su conexión con la investigación empírica, preferiblemente y para despertar el interés de los alumnos, repensándola hacia el análisis de situaciones y problemáticas del mundo actual, cada vez más precario, provisional, ansioso de novedades, interconectado y, con frecuencia, agotador. En tercer lugar, y frente a la Sociología espontánea, se exponen algunos principios fundamentales o “estándares comunes” de la mirada sociológica, su valor diferencial, que serán presentados como propuestas de habilidades básicas en la formación de los alumnos

Spatio-Temporal Dynamics of Sociology in Post-1990 Turkey

This study explores the spatio-temporal conditions of producing sociological knowledge at universities at a time of transformation in post-1990 (1990–2017) Turkey. Through a content analysis of the sociology PhD theses submitted in this period, it investigates the questions of where, when, and how sociological knowledge is institutionalized in Turkey. The study has two main findings. First, spatial distribution of sociology PhD theses highlights the ensuing centre–periphery relationships inside Turkey, a country itself located in the periphery. Endowed with better resources, the centre (mainly Ankara and Istanbul) focuses on macro solutions to the problems faced by Turkey and other countries, whereas the rest of the country produces knowledge about their immediate surroundings, that is, particular regions/cities/towns of Turkey. This difference illustrates the degrees to which sociological research in post-1990 Turkey is territorially limited by (Turkish) national borders. Second, temporally speaking, the sociological interest in domestic issues revolves mainly around ‘politics’ and ‘economy’, insofar as they relate to the economic crises, neoliberalism, globalization, and democratization attempts Turkey experienced in the post-1990 period. A closer reading of this spatio-temporality may suggest that Turkish sociology is susceptible to methodological nationalism that downplays the impact of nationalism, conforms to the nation-state and nations, and territorially limits the unit of analysis. Despite the transformations brought about by the period and the spatial differences in knowledge production between the centre and the periphery, sociology in Turkey is bound by the national territorial and ideational boundaries, reproducing the ethnic, political, cultural, and social foundations of Turkish nationalism. This study argues that although Turkish sociology stands on the periphery within the non-Western context, it is nonetheless formalized around its own centre–periphery relationship within the country itself, and that its spatio-temporal institutionalization in the post-1990 period has reproduced an implicit methodological nationalism that relies on Turkish nationalism.

La vida social de la energía: apuntes para el estudio territorializado de las transiciones energéticas

Resumen Se presenta una propuesta teórica y metodológica para el estudio sociológico de la transición energética hacia energías renovables no convencionales, entendida como un proceso de cambio inducido vinculado a cambio climático, cuyos cursos de acción no están exentos de controversias sociotécnicas. La investigación se fundamenta en cuatro años de investigación sobre trayectorias territoriales de producción, uso y significación de la energía en tres regiones del sur-austral de Chile. A partir de una matriz teórica de la transición energética basada en los grados de renovabilidad y convencionalidad de la energía, se identifican diferentes regímenes sociotécnicos a partir de los cuales se debe indagar de modo empírico las formas situadas que adopta esta transición. Cada uno de estos regímenes fue investigado a través de casos de estudio lo que nos permite presentar aprendizajes generales de interés sociológico. A modo de conclusión, se propone ir más allá del concepto de régimen a través de la noción de ensamblaje, lo que permite explorar modos no lineales en que se asocian agentes heterogéneos en la territorialización de la energía. Además, se plantea que los grados de aceptación o rechazo social de la energía no debe ser el motor que mueva la investigación sobre esta materia, sino la forma en que las sociedades definen, debaten y construyen pragmáticamente formas democráticas y justas de uso energético en cada territorio. Desde nuestra perspectiva, esto supone avanzar en comprender estos procesos como parte de las soberanías energéticas de los pueblos.

A Conversation with Paul C. Rosenblatt

Paul C. Rosenblatt is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Family Social Science at the University of Minnesota. He has wide-ranging interests in psychology, sociology, and anthropology. Cultura...

Landscape sociology as developing academic discipline

The common tendency in higher education is specialisation. Landscape has been subject of interest in sociology from its beginnings, and social aspects are one of mane characteristic parts of landscape. Even more – sociology is strong theoretical basis of landscape architecture. The research is made with aim to understand theoretical basis of landscape sociology as developing academic discipline. Methodology used in research is systematic literature review, which provides range of tools to identify connections in theory. Literature review was done to define landscape sociology as important academic discipline in higher education of landscape architecture. Landscape and sociology as academic disciplines have long history, but landscape sociology as separate discipline is still developing. It is important include landscape sociology in landscape architecture higher education.

Who Has the Right to Mourn?: Relational Deference and the Ranking of Grief

Relational by definition, grief is influenced by others’ witness, acknowledgement and validation. Although such influence has drawn sociological interest to the disenfranchised grief of marginalized groups, differential grief within the family goes mostly unaddressed in relational psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. Many factors influence the ranking of grief, including “proprietary rights” conferred by traditional roles and the psychodynamics of the family. In such situations, the more highly-ranked mourners may appropriate another’s grief by claiming a stronger sense of entitlement, conferred by felt anguish, attachment or social standing. Preempting another’s claim may come without conscious intention or even with intent to protect the other from such anguish. The self is injured when one’s right to grieve is withheld, overlooked or otherwise curtailed by others, or waived by oneself. Where one’s grief is deferred to mourners deemed more needy, deserving or powerful, a diminished sense of personal ownership of grief may present itself as generosity, guilt or compliance.

¿Todavía existe la comunidad?: Turismo comunitario y nuevas formas de organización social a caballo entre la tradición y la modernidad.

El turismo comunitario ha reavivado el interés de la Sociología por la noción de comunidad y su capacidad heurística. Algunos investigadores sostienen que la existencia de comunidad depende de la presencia de variables estructurales establecidas por lo primeros clásicos de las ciencias sociales que abordaron el asunto (Durkheim y Tönnies). Para otros, la Modernidad obliga a rastrear la existencia de comunidad en la capacidad de acción colectiva de los grupos humanos. Este trabajo contribuye a este debate discutiendo los resultados del análisis de la iniciativa de turismo étnico de marcado carácter colectivista desarrollada en la comunidad mapuche de Llaguepulli, Chile.