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Tag: sociology
Make your own rules
Here's a photo taken a while ago that never made it into a post. It's an advert I saw on a bus shelter. It isn't the clearest photo in the world, but it tells a story. The story it tells is very clearly expressed by the sociologist Zygmunt Bauman. It shows that in our society, … Continue reading Make your own rules
Richard Sennett on the Rituals, Pleasures and Politics of Cooperation | David Bollier
Explaining Political Judgement
Fourcultures has previously reviewed the work of Perri 6 , Professor of social policy at Nottingham Trent University. The Institutional Dynamics of Culture (which he edited with Gerald Mars) remains the most important compendium of sources on Mary Douglas's cultural theory. His latest book is Explaining Political Judgement, which looks to be a very thorough … Continue reading Explaining Political Judgement
Am I an Atom?
Nice quote from the introduction to journalist and academic Jeff Jarvis’s new book, Public Parts: “Society splinters and splits and then reshapes in new forms. Think of us as atoms in molecules. Centuries ago, our molecules were villages and tribes; location defined us and often religion guided us. In Europe, Gutenberg empowered Luther to smash … Continue reading Am I an Atom?
Evidence-based riots
It's been hard to move recently for people leaping to conclusions. Everyone with an Internet connection has already posted an opinion about the supposedly obvious causes of the London riots. Medhi Hassan's heartfelt plea for pundits to to stop generalising certainly makes sense. The introduction reads: The debate about the riots is being hijacked by … Continue reading Evidence-based riots
Willful Blindness
Margaret Heffernan has written a book on willful blindness [excerpt] and there's a great article in New Statesman. Here's just one of the telling quotations Heffernan uses to illustrate her case. It comes from the economist Paul Krugmann, speaking of the blind spots in his own economic modelling: "I think there's a pretty good case … Continue reading Willful Blindness
Understanding Society
This blog, by Daniel Little, chancellor of the University of Michigan-Dearborn, I like.
Four types of institutional control
This diagram comes from a book edited by Christopher Hood (et al.) It shows how contrived randomness can be seen as a method of social control in public institutions (Hood et al. 2004:8). As mentioned in a Fourcultures post on how to beat the odds and escape your fate, Hood wrote: “Contrived randomness denotes control … Continue reading Four types of institutional control
L’analyse culturelle de Mary Douglas
- une contribution à la sociologie des institutions. Here's a good summary of Mary Douglas's Cultural Theory written in French (with an English abstract). It was published in SociologieS in 2006. Marcel Calvez, « L’analyse culturelle de Mary Douglas : une contribution à la sociologie des institutions », SociologieS [En ligne], Théories et recherches, mis … Continue reading L’analyse culturelle de Mary Douglas
Four Cultures 