A Return to Innocence? The Social Construction of the Geopolitical Climate of the Post-Invasion Caribbean

1989 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 183-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry B. Levine
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Social Scientist ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Value Judgments ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Theoretical Position ◽  
A Value ◽  
The Social ◽  
Conception Of Man

Under what conditions may a social scientist legitimately pass judgment on the geopolitical climate of a region? The question is not easy to answer. First, it presupposes acknowledgement that there are value issues embedded in such judgments. Second, while a value-free attitude may indeed be attempted, such an attitude is difficult to achieve. All too frequently, evaluation of a region's “climate” is based on the values of the evaluator (and often without disclosure of this fact to unsuspecting readers).This is especially likely when the observer adopts a theoretical position, taking insufficient account of the tension between society and actors. Unfortunately, such theories give social scientists the false feeling that they have some sort of preferred cognitive vantage point. Theories which incorporate an “oversocialized conception of man” (Wrong, 196l) or, alternatively, an “overly psychological conception of society,” ignore the fact that people act and make decisions about those actions, both of which are based upon value-judgments, and which do not have a one-to-one correlation with any given social situation.

Value judgments in social science

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tom L. Beauchamp
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Social Scientist ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Scientific Practices ◽  
Scientific Theories ◽  
Value Judgments ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Political Values ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Impact

Leading theorists in the social sciences have insisted that value judgments should be strictly separated from scientific judgments, which should be value-free. Yet these same thinkers recognize that social scientists are often committed to values in carrying out their work and may be motivated by moral goals of removing or remedying social conditions. From this perspective, scientific conclusions (one sort of fact) and moral commitments (one sort of value) are intertwined in scientific practices, and the question arises whether a social scientist qua scientist makes value judgments or only makes such judgments in a nonscientific capacity. Related questions concern the role played by moral, social, and political values in the pursuit of scientific knowledge and the impact of these values on scientific theories and methods.

Legal Reform and Social Construction: Violence, Gender, and the Law

1994 ◽  
Vol 19 (04) ◽  
pp. 829-852 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Frohmann ◽  
Elizabeth Mertz
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Political Ideology ◽  
Direct Action ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Legal Reforms ◽  
The Past ◽  
Multiple Dimensions ◽  
The Social

As scholars and activists have addressed the problem of violence against women in the past 25 years, their efforts have increasingly attuned us to the multiple dimensions of the issue. Early activists hoped to change the structure of power relations in our society, as well as the political ideology that tolerated violence against women, through legislation, education, direct action, and direct services. This activism resulted in a plethora of changes to the legal codes and protocols relating to rape and battering. Today, social scientists and legal scholars are evaluating the effects of these reforms, questioning anew the ability of law by itself to redress societal inequalities. As they uncover the limitations of legal reforms enacted in the past two decades, scholars are turning—or returning—to ask about the social and cultural contexts within which laws are formulated, enforced, and interpreted.

scholarly journals The Foundational Lawlessness of the Law Itself: Racial Criminalization & the Punitive Roots of Punishment in America

Daedalus ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 151 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-120
Author(s):  
Khalil Gibran Muhammad
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Ethnic Studies ◽  
Brute Force ◽  
Behavioral Models ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Basic Assumptions ◽  
The Social ◽  
Legal Structures ◽  
The Law ◽  
Over Time

Abstract Empirical researchers and criminal justice practitioners have generally set aside history in exchange for behavioral models and methodologies that focus primarily on crime itself as the most measurable and verifiable driver of American punitiveness. There are innumerable legal and political questions that have arisen out of these approaches. Everything from the social construction of illegality to the politicization of punishment to the stigmatization of physical identities and social statuses have long called into question the legal structures that underpin what counts as crime and how punishment is distributed. And yet, until quite recently, the question of what history has to offer has mostly been left to historians, historically minded social scientists, critical race and ethnic studies scholars, community and prison-based activists, investigative journalists, and rights advocates. What is at stake is precisely the foundational lawlessness of the law itself. At all times, a White outlaw culture that rewarded brute force and strength of arms against racialized others unsettles basic assumptions about how we are to understand criminalization and punitiveness over time: that is, who has counted as a criminal and to what end has the state used violence or punishment?

Why social scientists still need phenomenology

Thesis Eleven ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 072551362110643
Author(s):  
Christopher Houston
Keyword(s):  
Social Scientist ◽  
Pierre Bourdieu ◽  
Cultural Analysis ◽  
Natural Attitude ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Suspension Of Disbelief ◽  
Do So ◽  
Critical Science

Pierre Bourdieu famously dismissed phenomenology as offering anything useful to a critical science of society – even as he drew heavily upon its themes in his own work. This paper makes a case for why Bourdieu’s judgement should not be the last word on phenomenology. To do so it first reanimates phenomenology’s evocative language and concepts to illustrate their continuing centrality to social scientists’ ambitions to apprehend human engagement with the world. Part II shows how two crucial insights of phenomenology, its discovery of both the natural attitude and of the phenomenological epoche, allow an account of perception properly responsive to its intertwined personal and collective aspects. Contra Bourdieu, the paper’s third section asserts that phenomenology’s substantive socio-cultural analysis simultaneously entails methodological consequences for the social scientist, reversing their suspension of disbelief vis-à-vis the life-worlds of interlocutors and inaugurating the suspension of belief vis-à-vis their own natural attitudes.

Imagination and Art

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Swedberg
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Social Scientist ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Basic Knowledge ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Social ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter examines the role of imagination and the arts in helping social scientists to theorize well. However deep one's basic knowledge of social theory is, and however many concepts, mechanisms, and theories one knows, unless this knowledge is used in an imaginative way, the result will be dull and noncreative. A good research topic should among other things operate as an analogon—that is, it should be able to set off the theoretical imagination of the social scientist. Then, when a social scientist writes, he or she may want to write in such a way that the reader's theoretical imagination is stirred. Besides imagination, the chapter also discusses the relationship of social theory to art. There are a number of reason for this, including the fact that in modern society, art is perceived as the height of imagination and creativity.

scholarly journals Can social scientists be the change agents for diabetes prevention? Diabetes-related knowledge, attitude, and practice among social scientists

2013 ◽  
Vol 01 (01) ◽  
pp. 032-036
Author(s):  
Raman Shetty ◽  
Biranchi Jena ◽  
Adibabu Kadithi
Keyword(s):  
Social Scientist ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Change Agents ◽  
Slow Motion ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Attitude And Practice ◽  
The Social ◽  
Microsoft Office ◽  
Be The Change ◽  
Knowledge Attitude And Practice

Abstract Introduction:Diabetes is an emergency in slow motion in India. There is an urgent need of improving awareness and education on diabetes in the community and the social scientist working in the community health are the important group to make this happen. Objectives:To assess the prevalence of diabetes among the social scientists and measure their knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP) on diabetes. Materials and Methods:A delegate of social scientists attending a national conference on social science and health were screened for random blood sugar and a survey was conducted through a structured self-answered questionnaire on KAP in diabetes. Excel Microsoft Office 2010 package was used for descriptive analysis. Results:A total of 245 social scientists attended the conference; of them, 211 (86%) social scientists voluntarily participated in diabetes screening, and among them, 99 (47%) voluntarily responded on KAP questionnaire. Prevalence rate of diabetes among social scientists was found to be 9.5% and the study revealed that the knowledge was fair, attitude was positive, and practice was good among the social scientists working in the field of social health. Conclusion:The social scientists could be the Change Agents for the changing diabetes in the community through appropriate strategies involving them.

Toward a Theory of State Intervention

1980 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 155-205
Author(s):  
Ira J. Cohen
Keyword(s):  
Historical Development ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Social Scientist ◽  
State Intervention ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Capitalist Economy ◽  
Economic Relationships ◽  
The Social ◽  
Political Economic

State intervention into the ownership, financing, and regulation of various industries and sectors of the capitalist economy is a phenomenon as old as capitalism itself. In the last 15 years this topic has become a focal point of vigorous interest among social scientists. Given the manifest problems to be found within current political-economic relationships, it is not surprising that a great deal of this attention has been focused on the contemporary scene. Nevertheless, a small number of works have undertaken the explanation of the historical development of state intervention. Unfortunately, the historian in search of explanatory guidance is confronted here with a series of less than comprehensive analyses which move at descriptive and explanatory cross-purposes. The first tasks of the social scientist or historian who wishes to address the development of state intervention therefore must be to classify and clarify the accounts which have been proposed.

Social Scientists and the Point IV Program

1950 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 26-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Omer Stewart
Keyword(s):  
Social Scientist ◽  
Applied Anthropology ◽  
Agricultural Economics ◽  
Annual Conference ◽  
Department Of Agriculture ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Farm Population ◽  
The Social ◽  
Sociological Society

The role of the social scientist in the Point IV Program was discussed at a meeting sponsored jointly by the Society for Applied Anthropology and the American Sociological Society, during the Annual Conference of the Sociological Society in Denver, September 8, 1950. Chairman of the meeting was Carl C. Taylor, Head, Division of Farm Population and Rural Life, Bureau of Agricultural Economics, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

scholarly journals Bangunan Pembentukan Teori Konstruksi Sosial Peter L Berger: Teori Pembedah Realitas Ganda Kehidupan Manusia

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nurkhalis Nurkhalis
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
Social Construction ◽  
High Power ◽  
Social Problems ◽  
Social Reality ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Social Construction Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Dynamic ◽  
Two Sides

AbstractThis article examines two realities of life experienced by humans in living. These two realities are subjective and objective, both of which have a high power of study when combined. As the development of phenomena or social problems increasingly complex, the presence of Social Construction theory becomes a bridge to see the social situation in the two sides of the subjective and objective. As the sociologists struggle arguing for subjective and objective dominance, the Social Construction theory takes its position as peacemaker by giving portions on both sides that are equally important. Therefore, it is appropriate that the Social Construction theory is categorized into the critical theory of a set of tools closer to the social reality for observing the social dynamic and social static.Keywords: Subjective, Objective, Social Construction theory, Social Dynamic, Social Static

Promoting the Dignity of the Child in Hospital

2003 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paula Reed ◽  
Pam Smith ◽  
Margaret Fletcher ◽  
Angela Bradding
Keyword(s):  
Social Construction ◽  
Subjective Experience ◽  
Health Workers ◽  
District General Hospital ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
Theoretical Position ◽  
The Social ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
The Relationship

This article aims to deconstruct the concept of dignity in a way that is meaningful, in particular to nurses and other health workers who seek to promote the dignity of children in their care. Despite the emphasis in a variety of codes and policies to promote dignity, there is a lack of a clear definition of dignity in the literature. In particular there is little reference to dignity, theoretically or empirically, as it relates to children. Without clarity it is not possible to act in an ethical way on behalf of children whose dignity could otherwise be compromised. The theoretical position taken has evolved from the medico-nursing and philosophical discourse concerning the nature of human dignity and more recent sociological texts that discuss the social construction of the child and childhood. The article is further influenced by additional insights derived from an ethnographic pilot study at a large district general hospital. This study was undertaken in an attempt to appreciate the subjective experience of dignity by children, and to begin to address the empirical gap in the literature and promote discussion. The concept of a macro and a micro dignity is discussed, together with the role of the nurse in articulating the relationship between the two. The importance of control and witnesses in the experience of dignity is discussed and, finally, also the ethical implications when seeking to promote the dignity of children.

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