Kategoria BISAC: Social Science >> Sociology - General

In this sweeping cultural history, James Flink provides a fascinating account of the creation of the world's first automobile culture. He offers both a critical survey of the development of automotive technology and the automotive industry and an analysis of the social effects of "automobility" on workers and consumers.

Images by Felix Gonzales-TorresOut There addresses the question of cultural marginalization - the process through which various groups are excluded from access to and participation in the dominant culture. It is a wide-ranging anthology that juxtaposes diverse points of view on issues of gender, race, sexual preference, and class. It takes up the fundamental issues raised when we attempt to define concepts such as "mainstream" and "minority," and it opens up new ways of thinking about culture and representation in our society.

This reissue of Understanding Media marks the thirtieth anniversary (1964-1994) of Marshall McLuhan's classic expose on the state of the then emerging phenomenon of mass media. Terms and phrases such as "the global village" and "the medium is the message" are now part of the lexicon, and McLuhan's theories continue to challenge our sensibilities and our assumptions about how and what we communicate.

There has been a notable resurgence of interest in McLuhan's work in the last few years, fueled by the recent and continuing conjunctions between the cable companies and the...

Koriak have been described as a nomadic people, migrating with the reindeer through rugged terrain. Their autonomy and mobility are salient cultural features that ethnographers and state administrators have found equally fascinating and menacing.

Tundra Passages describes how this indigenous people in the Russian Far East have experienced, interpreted, and struggled with the changing conditions of life on the periphery of post-Soviet Russia.

Rethmann portrays the lives of Koriak women in the locales of Tymlat and Ossora in northern Kamchatka, within a wider framework...

Inspired by Heidegger's concept of the clearing of being, and by Wittgenstein's ideas on human practice, Theodore Schatzki offers a novel approach to understanding the constitution and transformation of social life. Key to the account he develops here is the context in which social life unfolds--the "site of the social"--as a contingent and constantly metamorphosing mesh of practices and material orders. Schatzki's analysis reveals the advantages of this site ontology over the traditional individualist, holistic, and structuralist accounts that have dominated social theory since the...

Japanese Schooling is organized around important crosspoints for understanding the historic roots and contemporary features of Japanese education. These include (1) socialization for discipline at home and in school; (2) the impact of university examinations on educational equality and moral development; and (3) centralized control and national identity. Written by leading American and Japanese scholars, Japanese Schooling is uniquely informative and comprehensive, with wide-ranging and critical analyses of sensitive issues and traditional educational questions. Among the...

The purpose of this volume is to help develop, through a variety of exploratory essays, the art and science of institutional design. The authors look at a variety of good societies as artifacts, as products--at least partly--of design, and consider how such societies can be crafted. They identify themselves with the New Constitutionalism movement, which aims to develop and promote the knowledge necessary for institutional reform and institutional creation through understanding the designer's, creator's, founder's, or reformer's perspective.

The first part of the volume considers...

How do we go about imagining different and better worlds for ourselves? Collective Dreams looks at ideals of community, frequently embraced as the basis for reform across the political spectrum, as the predominant form of political imagination in America today. Examining how these ideals circulate without having much real impact on social change provides an opportunity to explore the difficulties of practicing critical theory in a capitalist society.

Different chapters investigate how ideals of community intersect with conceptions of self and identity, family, the public sphere and...

This book introduces contextualism, an emerging paradigm that has generated much interest and excitement in psychology, sociology, communications research, and other areas of behavioral science. Unlike behaviorism which tries to predict behavior based on a specific set of variables, contextualism asserts that human beings react and learn in a variety of situations and there is no single best kind of behavior. They challenge the man as machine view of behavior.

In this welcome guide, sociologists who have successfully established consulting practices present practical examples of how to apply sociological knowledge and methodological procedures to real life situations. In addition to offering detailed suggestions for training, the contributors explore the many ways in which sociologists can help solve problems faced by business, governmental organizations, social agencies, schools, and churches. The ups and downs of establishing a consulting practice are outlined and supplemented by first-hand accounts of the contributors' experiences.

Within the last decade, social support has become an increasingly popular research topic among professionals in the social sciences. Many empirical studies on social support appeared initially, only to be followed by a spate of theoretical articles attempting to make sense of the growing research literature. A need arose for an integrative overview of both theoretical and practical considerations expressing a consistent perspective on the many unresolved issues in the field. Social Support comprehensively evaluates research and theory from the perspective of both the scientist and human...

In this volume a distinguished group of scholars examines the contributions that behavior analysis can make in meeting the crucial challenges that threaten the survival of individuals, families, societies, and nations, as well as the planet itself. Beginning with the premise that human behavior is the primary cause of our problems, the authors look at methods that allow us to change it and at how these methods may be applied in specific areas--ranging from international violence and environmental degradation to substance abuse and training of the handicapped.

The first part, which...

"Social Theory and Social Practice" is a collection of essays theory and research developments that were advanced by a figure at the forefront of contemporary American and international sociology--James S. Coleman. Themes that run through Coleman's diverse body of work are the subject of this volume. Essays focus on his contributions to social theory (emphasizing formulations which have policy implications) and applications of sociology in public affairs. Coleman's contributions have profoundly influenced and, in several cases, defined the agenda for important sub-fields of sociology:...

This volume is based on the premise that artistic performance is epistemological, a way of knowing self, culture, and other. The nine essays in this book, based on a broad range of ethnic, racial, and gender groups, share a common interest in exploring how performance reveals, shapes, and sometimes transforms personal and cultural identity. Editors Fine and Speer begin by examining the interdisciplinary roots of performance studies and the role of performance studies in the field of communication. They also discuss the power of performance to shape personal and cultural...

The social science approach to risk has matured over the past two decades, with distinct paradigms developing in disciplines such as anthropology, economics, geography, psychology, and sociology. Social Theories of Risk traces the intellectual origins and histories of twelve of the established and emerging paradigms from the perspective of their principal proponents. Each contributor examines the underlying assumptions of his or her paradigm, the foundational issue it seeks to address, and likely future directions of research.

Taken together, these essays illustrate...

White moves from a simple proposition maintaining that all individuals seek suitable surroundings to propose a provocative approach to social and political action. Rooting his position in modern life sciences and particularly in sociobiology and neurobiology, he establishes an IMPish model that is interactional, mentalist, and populational. Interactional in that both heredity and environment are credited for due influence on individuals' traits; mentalist in that individuals' actions can be purposeful rather than simply determined; and populational in his insistence that the unique persona...

Beckstrom explores how discoveries in evolutionary science can help people achieve, but not establish, social goals. Beginning with the principle that human behavior is, to some degree, influenced by genetics, the author considers how conduct can be modified in large population groupings using identified behavioral mechanisms. Aid-giving behavior common to human populations is established as a key factor that is fundamental to an understanding of its flip side involving abuse and neglect. The universal objectives of reducing child abuse, rape, incest, and war are explicitly addressed, as...