scholarly journals Feminism and the sociology of everyday life

2003 ◽  
pp. 151-169
Author(s):  
Ivana Spasic

This paper examines the influences of feminist thought on sociological theory and research, refracted through the conceptualization of the sphere of everyday life. It is argued that there are important theoretical affinities between feminism and the sociology of everyday life, as it has developed since mid-20th century. Main feminist contributions to sociological study of everyday life are identified at two levels: substantive (the study of formerly neglected social phenomena, particularly the private sphere), and epistemological (the questioning of positivistic ideals of objective and neutral social science). The position of the feminist theorist Dorothy Smith is selected for a more detailed critical discussion. In the concluding part of the paper some controversial points in the feminist concept of the sociology of everyday life are indicated.

2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-79 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben Highmore

From a remarkably innovative point of departure, Ben Highmore (University of Sussex) suggests that modernist literature and art were not the only cultural practices concerned with reclaiming the everyday and imbuing it with significance. At the same time, Roger Caillois was studying the spontaneous interactions involved in games such as hopscotch, while other small scale institutions such as the Pioneer Health Centre in Peckham, London attempted to reconcile systematic study and knowledge with the non-systematic exchanges in games and play. Highmore suggests that such experiments comprise a less-often recognised ‘modernist heritage’, and argues powerfully for their importance within early-twentieth century anthropology and the newly-emerged field of cultural studies.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 53-80
Author(s):  
Sari Hanafi

This study investigates the preachers and their Friday sermons in Lebanon, raising the following questions: What are the profiles of preachers in Lebanon and their academic qualifications? What are the topics evoked in their sermons? In instances where they diagnosis and analyze the political and the social, what kind of arguments are used to persuade their audiences? What kind of contact do they have with the social sciences? It draws on forty-two semi-structured interviews with preachers and content analysis of 210 preachers’ Friday sermons, all conducted between 2012 and 2015 among Sunni and Shia mosques. Drawing from Max Weber’s typology, the analysis of Friday sermons shows that most of the preachers represent both the saint and the traditional, but rarely the scholar. While they are dealing extensively with political and social phenomena, rarely do they have knowledge of social science


2021 ◽  
pp. 1468795X2199824
Author(s):  
Patrick Baert ◽  
Marcus Morgan ◽  
Rin Ushiyama

This article introduces ‘existence theory’ as a new approach to sociological theory and research. Existence theory starts from the assumption that people organise their lives around a limited set of existential milestones. Cultural expectations are such that without the accomplishment of those milestones, individuals may experience their lives as incomplete. Examples of milestones can include the attainment of formal education, a lasting partnership and the creation of a family, but in general the milestones which are important to individuals and their precise articulation will depend on a variety of cultural and structural factors. The achievement of existential milestones often depends on that of other existential milestones, thereby producing what we call an ‘existential ladder’. The article also elaborates on the significance of ‘existential urgency’ in that, due to a variety of factors (some biological, some cultural and structural), there are time limits on when certain existential milestones ought to be achieved by. In contemporary society, we note that individuals seem to have more choice about which milestones are important to them and when they can be achieved, although we emphasise that this flexibility is unevenly distributed. This then provides a steppingstone towards an elaboration of the power dynamics and inequalities underlying both the experience and the achievement of existential milestones. Finally, this paper shows how existence theory helps to reflect on a variety of social phenomena of contemporary significance: populism in politics, forced migration, and the coronavirus pandemic.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (263) ◽  
pp. 19-24
Author(s):  
John Useem

AbstractThe SSRC’s Committee on Sociolinguistics (1963–1979) was formed to explore how the nascent interdisciplinary field of sociolinguistics could deepen scholarly understanding of the intersection of language with social, cultural, and political questions. In this 1963 piece, John Useem, a committee member, explains how “developing the sociological study of language” would advance social science. He emphasizes the potential contribution to social knowledge through research on how language is used across cultural contexts and social divides of class, geography, race, and ethnicity.


2021 ◽  
pp. 146879412110059
Author(s):  
Barbara Barbosa Neves ◽  
Josephine Wilson ◽  
Alexandra Sanders ◽  
Renata Kokanović

This article draws on crystallization, a qualitative framework developed by Laurel Richardson and Laura Ellingson, to show the potential of using sociological narratives and creative writing to better analyze and represent the lived experiences of loneliness among older people living in Australian care homes. Crystallization uses a multi-genre approach to study and present social phenomena. At its core is a concern for the ethics of representation, which is critical when engaging with vulnerable populations. We use two case studies from research on loneliness to illustrate an application of crystallization through different narrative types. To supplement our sociological narratives, we invited author Josephine Wilson to write creative narratives based on the case studies. Josephine was awarded the prestigious Miles Franklin Literary Award in 2017 for Extinctions, a novel exploring themes such as later life and loneliness. By contrasting the two approaches—sociological and creative narratives—we discuss the implications of crystallization for qualitative research.


2015 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 94-114 ◽  
Author(s):  
Semi Purhonen

This article first examines the role of the concept of generation in Pierre Bourdieu’s work. It shows that Bourdieu’s usage of the concept of generation varied throughout his œuvre and that Bourdieu seldom if ever used the concept in the same sense as Karl Mannheim and many subsequent sociologists who have understood generation as a potential source of identity and political mobilization. However, and second, the article argues that Bourdieu’s sociology does have much to offer for the sociological study of generations, but only if we stop concentrating on those rare passages in which he explicitly used the word ‘generation’. We should focus instead on his more general approach to the genesis of social groupings, classification struggles and the difficult relationships of representation. The application and extension of Bourdieu’s ideas demonstrated here can provide a welcome antidote to so-called generationalism – a simplified and exaggerated picture of generations, which dates back to early 20th-century European intellectuals and which can still be found in today’s popular discourses as well as in academic studies.


1970 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 421-456
Author(s):  
A. P. M. Coxon ◽  
Patrick Doreian ◽  
Robin Oakley ◽  
Ian B. Stephen ◽  
Bryan R. Wilson ◽  
...  

2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 472-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Murray

Health psychology formally came of age in the United Kingdom in the 1980s, but it was prefigured by much discussion about challenges to the dominance of biomedicine in healthcare and debates. This articles focuses on what could be termed the pre-history of health psychology in the UK. This was the period in the earlier 20th century when psychological approaches were dominated by psychoanalysis which was followed by behaviourism and then cognitivism. Review of this pre-history provides the backdrop for the rise of health psychology in the UK and also reveals the tensions between the different theoretical perspectives.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document