The Art of Social Forms and the Social Forms of Art: The Sociology-Aesthetics Nexus in Georg Simmel's Thought

2008 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 344-362 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo de la Fuente
Keyword(s):  
Social Factors ◽  
Social Bond ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
The Social

This article examines the sociology-aesthetics nexus in Georg Simmel's thought. The article suggests that it is useful to divide Simmel's linking of sociology and aesthetics into three distinct types of propositions: (1) claims regarding the parallels between art and social form (the “art of social forms”); (2) statements regarding principles of sociological ordering in art and aesthetic objects (the “social forms of art”); and (3) analytical propositions where aesthetic and social factors are shown to work in combination. In the latter case, the sociology-aesthetic nexus moves beyond mere analogy. It is argued that in those instances where Simmel shows that aesthetic factors are central to the social bond the linking of aesthetics and sociology is theoretically most insightful.

Kinetic Communism

2020 ◽  
pp. 198-214
Author(s):  
Thomas Nail
Keyword(s):  
Metabolic Process ◽  
Social Condition ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Material Production ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Difference ◽  
As If

This chapter argues that since the fetish of value is something produced kinetically, its alternative, communism, must also be something understood kinetically, that is, having its own form of motion. In particular, the previous chapters have aimed to show that what is fundamentally at stake in the difference between material production and fetishism is the transparency and direction of the form of motion. Only when the social form of motion is left fully uncovered by coats, mirrors, and fogs can it be collectively organized without devalorization, appropriation, and mystical domination. Communism is the material social condition in which production is treated not as if it were coming from what is produced but as a threefold metabolic process itself. The thesis of this chapter then is that previous social forms of motion have always relied on a certain degree of fetishism of this motion.

Nuisance or discerning? The social construction of street hawkers in Ghana

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 102-117 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sam Sarpong ◽  
Ibrahim B. Nabubie
Keyword(s):  
Social Constructionism ◽  
Social Factors ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Social Bond ◽  
Social Phenomena ◽  
Daily Lives ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Social Agent ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Social

Purpose – The paper aims to focus on how the dualism “petty trading and traffic” exacerbates the development of a social bond among traders from various communities and ethnic groups in Ghana. As understood in their normal innocuous sense, “traffic and petty trading” independently mark off two generally distinguishable exclusive partners. However, both petty trading and traffic now denote essential aspects of contemporary Ghana’s new social order shared uniquely among informal traders. The paper dilates on this phenomenon. Design/methodology/approach – The theory underpinning this study is social constructionism. Social constructionism is part of a post-modern understanding of the nature of reality. It is a strand of sociology, pertaining to the ways in which social phenomena are created, institutionalised and made into tradition by humans. The core idea of constructionism, therefore, is that some social agent produces or controls some object. ’s (1967) situational constraints thesis also provides an important element to this paper. The thesis maintains that the poor in society are constrained by the facts of their situation; hence, the poor are unable to translate many of their ideals into reality in view of the considerable poverty that engulfs them. The thesis, reiterates that once the constraints of poverty are removed, the poor would have no difficulty adopting mainstream behavioural patterns and seizing available opportunities. The thesis is significant in exploring the objectives of this paper. Findings – The paper finds that petty trading has given its adherents a new wave of life. The picture that emerges is that, although street hawkers are seen as a nuisance, a failure in society and lacking knowledge, they have become mindful of what society thinks about them. As a result, some have devised means to cope with what they do and also to find new ways to address the challenges facing them. The findings confirmed that people are self-reflexive beings and that they shape their own behaviour despite the influence of a variety of social factors that may constrain them. The study found that street hawkers have found a way to make life more meaningful for themselves than are actually perceived. Originality/value – The paper seeks to discover the daily lives of petty traders, which have been stealthily tied in to urban development and planning. It brings a new dimension to the issue of petty trading. The fundamental argument of the paper is that the multidimensional nature of poverty is leading petty traders to a new consciousness which bodes well for them. These traders are shaping their own behaviour despite the influence of a variety of social factors that may constrain them. The social bond and interrelationship that permeate their working relationship has created a basis for which they now forge close ties that promote an inclusion from the exclusion that they are generally enjoined to.

scholarly journals Analysis of Individual and Social Forms of Psychological Trauma

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 283-298
Author(s):  
A.I. Krasilo
Keyword(s):  
Reference Group ◽  
Psychological Trauma ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
Personality Research ◽  
Projective Methods ◽  
The Social ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

The article attempts to determine its socio-psychological essence through the analysis of the social form of psychological trauma, as well as to identify the psychological nature of the pathological neoplasms that have arisen as a result of it, the specificity of which largely determines the methods and technology of personalistic counseling. These neoplasms are both individual psychological, including the sphere of experiences, and socio-psychological, affecting the relationship of the victims. The integration of the dominant parasitic "Ego" into the depth of the victim's personality, up to the very first level of the primary trusting relationship between the all-powerful and loving mother and a helpless child, we called the introjection of the personifier. As a result of the analysis, we come to the need for a specific restructuring of the irrational relationships of the victim with two other participants in the traumatic situation: the beneficiary, who receives personal benefits from this situation, and the reference group of the victim, who is traumatically personified by him in the image of an impersonal social personifier. The main methods of victims’ examination during the thirty years of counseling were: clinical conversation and projective methods of personality research.

scholarly journals Investigating journal peer review as scientific object of study: unabridged version – Part II

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanne Gaudet
Keyword(s):  
Peer Review ◽  
Structural Properties ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Legal Obligation ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Rational Decision Making ◽  
Scientific Object ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
The Social ◽  
Object Of Study

The main goal of this paper is to construct journal peer review as a scientific object of study based on historical research into the shaping of its structural properties. This paper is a second in a two-part series. Journal peer review performed in the natural sciences has been an object of study since at least 1830. Researchers mostly implicitly frame it as a rational system with expectations of rational decision-making. This in spite of research debunking rationality where journal peer review can yield low inter-rater reliability, be purportedly biased and conservative, and cannot readily detect fraud or misconduct. Furthermore, journal peer review is consistently presented as a process started in 1665 at the first journals and as holding a gatekeeper function for quality science. In contrast, socio-historical research portrays journal peer review as emulating previous social processes regulating what is to be considered as scientific knowledge (or not) (cf., inquisition, censorship) and early learned societies as engaged in peer review with a legal obligation under censorship. However, to date few researchers have sought to investigate journal peer review beyond a pre-constructed process or self-evident object of study. I construct journal peer review as a scientific object of study with key analytical dimensions: structural properties. I use the concept of social form to capture how individuals relate around a particular content. For the social form of ‘boundary judgement’, content refers to decisions from the judgement of scientific written texts held to account to an overarching knowledge system. Given its roots in censorship with its function of bounding science, I frame journal peer review as following precursor forms of inquisition and censorship. The main implication from insights in the paper is that structural properties in boundary judgement social forms are understood as dynamic when looked at through a historical lens.

scholarly journals Social Theory, Photography and the Visual Aesthetic of Cultural Modernity

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry Ray
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Social Realism ◽  
Social Form ◽  
Photographic Image ◽  
Social Forms ◽  
The Social ◽  
New Vision ◽  
Realism Debate

Social theory and photographic aesthetics both engage with issues of representation, realism and validity, having crossed paths in theoretical and methodological controversies. This discussion begins with reflections on the realism debate in photography, arguing that beyond the polar positions of realism and constructivism the photographic image is essentially ambivalent, reflecting the ways in which it is situated within cultural modernity. The discussion draws critically on Simmel’s sociology of the visual to elucidate these issues and compares his concept of social forms and their development with the emergence of the photograph. Several dimensions of ambivalence are elaborated with reference to the politics and aesthetics socially engaged photography in the first half of the 20th century. It presents a case for the autonomy of the photographic as a social form that nonetheless has the potential to point beyond reality to immanent possibilities. The discussion exemplifies the processes of aesthetic formation with reference to the ‘New Vision’ artwork of László Moholy-Nagy and the social realism of Edith Tudor Hart.

Domestic Integration and Suicide in the Provinces of Canada

Crisis ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antoon A. Leenaars ◽  
David Lester
Keyword(s):  
Social Factors ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Negative Association ◽  
Birth Rates ◽  
Marriage Rates ◽  
Suicide Rates ◽  
The Social ◽  
Divorce Rates ◽  
Low Levels ◽  
Over Time

Canada's rate of suicide varies from province to province. The classical theory of suicide, which attempts to explain the social suicide rate, stems from Durkheim, who argued that low levels of social integration and regulation are associated with high rates of suicide. The present study explored whether social factors (divorce, marriage, and birth rates) do in fact predict suicide rates over time for each province (period studied: 1950-1990). The results showed a positive association between divorce rates and suicide rates, and a negative association between birth rates and suicide rates. Marriage rates showed no consistent association, an anomaly as compared to research from other nations.

Comparing the Impact of Religious Discourse on HIV/AIDS in Islam and Christianity in Africa

2012 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sloane Speakman
Keyword(s):  
Social Factors ◽  
Negative Relationship ◽  
Hiv Prevalence ◽  
Religious Discourse ◽  
Prevalence Rates ◽  
The Social ◽  
High Prevalence ◽  
Islam And Christianity ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Impact

In examining the strikingly high prevalence rates of HIV in many parts of Africa, reaching as high as 5% in some areas, how does the discourse promoted by the predominant religions across the continent, Islam and Christianity, affect the outlook of their followers on the epidemic? This question becomes even more intriguing after discovering the dramatic difference in rate of HIV prevalence between Muslims and Christians in Africa, confirmed by studies that have found a negative relationship to exist between HIV prevalence and being Muslim in Africa, even in Sub-Saharan African nations. Why does this gap in prevalence rates exist? Does Islam advocate participating in less risky behavior more so than Christianity? By comparing the social construction, epidemiological understanding and public responses among Muslim populations in Africa with Christian ones, it becomes apparent that many similarities exist between the two regarding discourse and that, rather than religious discourse itself, other social factors, such as circumcision practices, contribute more to the disparity in HIV prevalence than originally thought.

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