Shaping the Future of Sociology: The Challenge of Interdisciplinarity beyond the Social Sciences

Sociology ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 51 (6) ◽  
pp. 1169-1185 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Lyle
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Disciplinary Boundaries ◽  
Shared Spaces ◽  
The Social ◽  
Interdisciplinary Projects ◽  
Shared Commitment ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Effective Contribution

Despite the increasing push towards interdisciplinarity across the physical and social sciences, little is known about the realities of working across such diverse disciplinary boundaries. This article provides empirical insight into the challenges of collaboration from the perspective of a sociologist working on an interdisciplinary project focused on developing a medical device. Findings suggest the effective contribution of sociological research is affected by the framing of interdisciplinary projects. From the beginning, the project pursued a narrow framing focused on scientific development, pushing the sociological research outside the relevance of the project. Reframing is negotiated in shared spaces between disciplines, and fieldwork became important in reframing the project to include the sociological research. However, without commitment to addressing a societal problem, it was impossible for sociology to contribute effectively. Sociologists embarking on similar endeavours should ensure there is shared commitment towards a social issue to prevent the marginalization of sociological research.

scholarly journals The Relevance of Inequality Research in Sociology for Inequality Reduction

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 237802312110201
Author(s):  
Thomas A. DiPrete ◽  
Brittany N. Fox-Williams
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Policy ◽  
Social Inequality ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Life Chances ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Large Scale Change ◽  
The Subject

Social inequality is a central topic of research in the social sciences. Decades of research have deepened our understanding of the characteristics and causes of social inequality. At the same time, social inequality has markedly increased during the past 40 years, and progress on reducing poverty and improving the life chances of Americans in the bottom half of the distribution has been frustratingly slow. How useful has sociological research been to the task of reducing inequality? The authors analyze the stance taken by sociological research on the subject of reducing inequality. They identify an imbalance in the literature between the discipline’s continual efforts to motivate the plausibility of large-scale change and its lesser efforts to identify feasible strategies of change either through social policy or by enhancing individual and local agency with the potential to cumulate into meaningful progress on inequality reduction.

Stabilizing American Society: Kenneth Boulding and the Integration of the Social Sciences, 1943–1980

2010 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 221-265 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philippe Fontaine
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
World War ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Main Determinant ◽  
Disciplinary Boundaries ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Right

ArgumentFor more than thirty years after World War II, the unconventional economist Kenneth E. Boulding (1910–1993) was a fervent advocate of the integration of the social sciences. Building on common general principles from various fields, notably economics, political science, and sociology, Boulding claimed that an integrated social science in which mental images were recognized as the main determinant of human behavior would allow for a better understanding of society. Boulding's approach culminated in the social triangle, a view of society as comprised of three main social organizers – exchange, threat, and love – combined in varying proportions. According to this view, the problems of American society were caused by an unbalanced combination of these three organizers. The goal of integrated social scientific knowledge was therefore to help policy makers achieve the “right” proportions of exchange, threat, and love that would lead to social stabilization. Though he was hopeful that cross-disciplinary exchanges would overcome the shortcomings of too narrow specialization, Boulding found that rather than being the locus of a peaceful and mutually beneficial exchange, disciplinary boundaries were often the occasion of conflict and miscommunication.

The Everyday in a Time of Transformation: Exploring a Single South African Lifeworld after 20 Years of Democracy

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 32-54
Author(s):  
P. Conrad Kotze ◽  
Jan K. Coetzee
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Contemporary Debate ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Ontological Turn ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Epistemological Framework

Transformation has come to be a defining characteristic of contemporary societies, while it has rarely been studied in a way that gives acknowledgement to both its societal effects and the experience thereof by the individual. This article discusses a recent study that attempts to do just that. The everyday life of a South African is explored within the context of changes that can be linked, more or less directly, to those that have characterized South Africa as a state since the end of apartheid in 1994. The study strives to avoid the pitfalls associated with either an empirical or solely constructivist appreciation of this phenomenon, but rather represents an integral onto-epistemological framework for the practice of sociological research. The illustrated framework is argued to facilitate an analysis of social reality that encompasses all aspects thereof, from the objectively given to the intersubjectively constructed and subjectively constituted. While not requiring extensive development on the theoretical or methodological level, the possibility of carrying out such an integral study is highlighted as being comfortably within the capabilities of sociology as a discipline. While the article sheds light on the experience of transformation, it is also intended to contribute to the contemporary debate surrounding the current “ontological turn” within the social sciences.

Social Sciences between the Systems: The Ecuadorian University between Science, Education, Politics and Economy

2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philipp Altmann
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Education Politics ◽  
The Social ◽  
Science And Politics ◽  
Global North ◽  
Self Production ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Operative Closure

Universities are, like all organizations, at the intersection of different functional subsystems. They are not only dedicated to research (science) and teaching (education) but are also place for communications that form part of politics, economics and so on. But, what happens to universities, and, more precisely, social sciences in university, if the social system they work in is not differentiated in the way the social sciences in the Global North are used to? What if there is no clear distinction between science and politics? Does academic autonomy lead in this situation to some kind of ‘university as a subsystem’, complete with its own code and autopoiesis? Or will the different subsystems de-differentiate increasingly, as predicted by Luhmann? This contribution will analyse social sciences in Ecuadorian universities as an example for organizations at the intersection of functional systems that are not fully differentiated. The development, the operative closure, the institutionalization and the self-production of a concrete discipline under constant pressure of other social systems will be analysed. The goal is a further insight into processes of differentiation in the Global South and the role of institutions in these processes. Part of this is the attempt to actualize and criticize Niklas Luhmann’s approach of systems theory to regions outside of the Global North. JEL: O300, Z130

scholarly journals History as inspiration: Tracing Franco-Chinese architectural elements in Hanoi old houses

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vu Thi Hanh
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Capital City ◽  
Early 20Th Century ◽  
Ancient History ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
Architectural Elements ◽  
Research Article ◽  
The Social ◽  
Networks Analysis ◽  
Insight Into

History is written in textbooks but is indubitably remembered through cultural artifacts and architecture. This is particularly the case when one thinks of Hanoi, the capital city of Vietnam, where its thousands of years of ancient history can be found in the old citadels, and more than half a century of French colonialism can be glimpsed in the Old Quarter houses. Many of these structures have survived the brutality of wars and now feed into the nostalgia of French aesthetic. Yet, in what way can we come to gain greater insight into a cultural space where there is an interconnection between religion, house designs, and forms of feeling? One can find an answer to this question in a newly-published scientific research article titled “Cultural evolution in Vietnam's early 20th century: A Bayesian networks analysis of Hanoi Franco-Chinese house designs” in the Social Sciences and Humanities Open journal of Elsevier.

scholarly journals Comparing the Emergence of Technical and Social Sciences Research in Artificial Intelligence

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexandre K. Ligo ◽  
Krista Rand ◽  
Jason Bassett ◽  
S. E. Galaitsi ◽  
Benjamin D. Trump ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Social Science ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
Societal Implications ◽  
Security Engineering ◽  
Research Areas ◽  
The Social ◽  
Collaborative Engagement ◽  
Scientists And Engineers

Applications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be examined from perspectives of different disciplines and research areas ranging from computer science and security, engineering, policymaking, and sociology. The technical scholarship of emerging technologies usually precedes the discussion of their societal implications but can benefit from social science insight in scientific development. Therefore, there is an urgent need for scientists and engineers developing AI algorithms and applications to actively engage with scholars in the social sciences. Without collaborative engagement, developers may encounter resistance to the approval and adoption of their technological advancements. This paper reviews a dataset, collected by Elsevier from the Scopus database, of papers on AI application published between 1997 and 2018, and examines how the co-development of technical and social science communities has grown throughout AI's earliest to latest stages of development. Thus far, more AI research exists that combines social science and technical explorations than AI scholarship of social sciences alone, and both categories are dwarfed by technical research. Moreover, we identify a relative absence of AI research related to its societal implications such as governance, ethics, or moral implications of the technology. The future of AI scholarship will benefit from both technical and social science examinations of the discipline's risk assessment, governance, and public engagement needs, to foster advances in AI that are sustainable, risk-informed, and societally beneficial.

Pursuing Salvation on the Playground

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas K. Rademacher
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Sociology Department ◽  
Childhood Development ◽  
Child Rearing ◽  
Christian Tradition ◽  
Professional Career ◽  
Catholic University ◽  
The Social ◽  
Catholic University Of America ◽  
Insight Into

Paul Hanly Furfey spent his early professional career, from the time of his hire onto the faculty of the sociology department at Catholic University of America to the time just before he took a sabbatical to Germany, emphasizing scientific resources for social reform through childhood development. He promoted the integration of the social sciences and the Christian tradition as a way to effectively socialize children. He believed that the latest psychological and sociological standards provided important insight into child-rearing and that the data provided by these disciplines should be joined to spiritual resources in order to be effective in the more important question of salvation. Children could be raised to honourable adulthood and ultimately merit heaven given a conventional approach to childrearing. He continued his explorations into the place of philosophy and theology in the field of sociology. He challenged a materialist bias in the field while criticizing those who did not pursue their research with adequate rigor.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Gabrielle Watson
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Criminal Justice ◽  
Academic Interest ◽  
Disciplinary Boundaries ◽  
A Value ◽  
The Social ◽  
Penal Institutions ◽  
Justice Practice

Respect is a value whose importance in contemporary criminal justice many would endorse in principle. It is well established that every person, by virtue of his humanity, has a claim to respect that need not be negotiated and cannot be forfeited. Rich and ongoing debates about respect beyond criminal justice—notably, in philosophy and elsewhere in the social sciences—indicate that scholarly interest in respect surpasses disciplinary boundaries, that it is of considerable explanatory and normative scope, and that it matters. It is curious, then, that despite academic interest in the democratic design of penal institutions in recent decades, respect is more akin to a slogan than a foundational value of criminal justice practice.

Who owns 'culture'?1

1996 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. Thomas Lawson ◽  
Robert N. McCauley
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Early Childhood Development ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
Childhood Development ◽  
Cross Cultural Study ◽  
Fieldwork Experience ◽  
Cultural Research ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cross Cultural Research ◽  
Insight Into

AbstractNo one owns the concept 'culture'. Anthropology's long-standing proprietary claim on the concept rests on three sorts of contentions - none of which are convincing. Anthropology's overwhelmingly interpretive approaches to cultural materials have led to a preoccupation with the details of cultural materials at the expense of formulating explanatory theories. This has, among other things, rendered fieldwork experience sufficient for professional credentials. However, if the details are all that matter, then comparative and cross-cultural research, as well as most of the social sciences, make no sense. Contrary to this view, it is proposed here that theories reveal which details matter. Cognitive accounts of the sort we advanced in Rethinking Religion (1990) offer a firm theoretical basis for cross-cultural study of religious materials. Other types of research concerning non-human primates, early childhood development, and various social and cognitive impairments also offer insight into culture (without relying on fieldwork studies).

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document