The Role of Theory

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Swedberg
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Types Of Knowledge ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way

This chapter looks at the role of theory in theorizing. Knowing theory, in order to be good at theorizing in social science, is not the same as having a knowledge of the history of social theory. It is true that it is helpful to have some of the skills of an intellectual historian when one tries to figure out what a concept means, why a theory looks the way it does today, and similar issues. However, this is not the kind of knowledge that one basically needs to have in order to be good at theorizing. The two types of knowledge that are needed in order to theorize well are knowledge of the basics of social theory and knowledge of a number of concepts, mechanisms, and theories.

scholarly journals The Special Apparatus (al-Niẓām al-Khāṣṣ): The Rise of Nationalist Militancy in the Ranks of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood

Religions ◽  
2022 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 77
Author(s):  
Ahmed Abou El Zalaf
Keyword(s):  
Political Violence ◽  
Systematic Study ◽  
Muslim Brotherhood ◽  
British Colonization ◽  
Special Apparatus ◽  
Depth Study ◽  
History Of ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
The Way

Existing scholarship has largely focused on the role of Sayyid Qutb’s ideas when analyzing the Muslim Brotherhood’s violent history. Perceiving Qutb’s ideas as paving the way for radical interpretations of jihad, many studies linked the Brotherhood’s violent history with this key ideologue. Yet, in so doing, many studies overlooked the importance of the Special Apparatus in shaping this violent history of the Brotherhood, long before Qutb joined the organization. Through an in-depth study of memoires and accounts penned by Brotherhood members and leaders, and a systematic study of British and American intelligence sources, I attempt to shed light on this understudied formation of the Brotherhood, the Special Apparatus. This paper looks at the development of anti-colonial militancy in Egypt, particularly the part played by the Brotherhood until 1954. It contends that political violence, in the context of British colonization, antedated the Brotherhood’s foundation, and was in some instances considered as a legitimate and even distinguished duty among anti-colonial factions. The application of violence was on no account a part of the Brotherhood’s core strategy, but the organization, nevertheless, established an armed and secret wing tasked with the fulfillment of what a segment of its members perceived as the duty of anti-colonial jihad.

Reading the Human Drama in Film and Fiction

2019 ◽  
pp. 13-42
Author(s):  
Wyatt Moss-Wellington
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Core Values ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The Way

This chapter goes into greater detail regarding the history of humanist thought and the way a narrative-based humanism might be exhumed from humanism’s philosophical lineage. It looks at the differences between Renaissance, canonical, and contemporary secular humanisms and the set of values that are conjured when a narrative is described as “humanistic.” It makes a case for humanism as both a style of storytelling, and a reading method, and thus establishes a “humanist hermeneutics” that will be carried through the remainder of the book. In so doing, this chapter sets up some core values of narrative humanism: it describes the difference between narrative and character complexity, the use of social science as a hermeneutic tool, the value of incomplete striving for understanding rather than grand theories that totalise people’s worlds, and finally describes some of the alternatives to humanism before concluding.

Veronicas and Artists

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Contemporary Art ◽  
Religious Images ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of Art ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way ◽  
Contemporary Artists

Chapter One deals with several central issues with regard to understanding the role of religious motifs in contemporary art. Besides being a repetition of imagery from the past, religious motifs embedded in contemporary artworks become a means to problematise not only the way different periods in the history of art are delimited, but larger and seemingly more rigid distinctions as those between art and non-art images. Early religious images differ significantly from art images. The two types are regulated according to different sets of rules related to the conditions of their production, display, appreciation and the way images are invested with the status of being true or authentic instances of art or sacred images. Chapter One provides a discussion of the important motif of the image not made by an artist’s hand, or acheiropoietos, and its survival and transformation, including its traces in contemporary image-making practices. All images are the result of human making; they are fictions. The way the conditions of these fictions are negotiated, or the way the role of the maker is brought to visibility, or concealed, is a defining feature of the specific regime of representation. While the cult image concealed its maker in order to maintain its public significance, and the later art image celebrated the artist as a re-inventor of the old image, contemporary artists cite religious images in order to reflect on the very procedures that produce the public significance and status of images.

Social Jurisprudence

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-26
Keyword(s):  
Social Science ◽  
Marriage Equality ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Law ◽  
Legal Arguments

This chapter provides a brief history of law and the role of social science in courtroom battles, further reviewing the use of social science in marriage equality cases. One of the more striking features in marriage equality litigation was the prominent role of social science in addressing issues germane to the legal arguments on both sides. The chapter concludes by discussing how social science may have influenced litigation and whether such influence was appropriate.

The Role of Building Materials in Architectural Design

2014 ◽  
Vol 679 ◽  
pp. 6-13
Author(s):  
Hafedh Abed Yahya ◽  
Muna Hanim Abdul Samad
Keyword(s):  
Design Process ◽  
Architectural Design ◽  
Building Materials ◽  
Historical Evolution ◽  
Core Element ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Architecture ◽  
Major Factors ◽  
The Way

The argumentation of previous studies demonstrated the historical evolution of the materials in architecture and the position of the materials in the design process. The purpose is to recognize the role of materials in architectural design, and the materials are a core element of the design process. This paper is about the way materials can be used to create personality and character of the design. The research finds two overlapping roles for materials which are providing technical functionality and building personality. Thus building materials were one of the major factors for new innovation forms through the history of architecture. Keywords: Building Materials, Architectural Design, Technical Functionality, Aesthetic Attributes.

Redefining the Role of Experiment in Bacon's Natural History: How Baconian was Descartes before Emerging from His Cocoon?

2012 ◽  
Vol 17 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 158-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mădălina Giurgea ◽  
Laura Georgescu
Keyword(s):  
Natural History ◽  
Rene Descartes ◽  
Relevant Information ◽  
Francis Bacon ◽  
René Descartes ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way

AbstractIn this article we argue that the views that Francis Bacon and René Descartes held about the role of experiments in the process of discovery are closer than previously accepted. Looking at the way experiments and the heuristics of experimentation are embedded in Bacon's posthumous History of Dense and Rare and Descartes' Discourses 8, 9, 10 of the Meteorology, we will show that experiments help the investigator both in solving specific problems that could not have otherwise been foreseen and in generating relevant information that advances the scope of the investigation.

History Repeating Itself. The function of turning points and continuity in three historical narratives on operetta

2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 102
Author(s):  
Mikael Strömberg
Keyword(s):  
Turning Points ◽  
Source Material ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Narrative Strategy ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Way

The article’s primary aim is to discuss the function of turning points and continuity within historiography. That a historical narrative, produced at a certain time and place, influence the way the historian shapes and develops the argument is problematized by an emphasis on the complex relationship between turning points and continuity as colligatory concepts within an argumentative framework. Aided by a number of examples from three historical narratives on operetta, the article stresses the importance of creating new narratives about the past. Two specific examples from the history of operetta, the birth of the genre and the role of music, are used to illustrate the need to revise not only the use of source material and the narrative strategy used, but also how the argument proposed by the historian gathers strength. The interpretation of turning points and continuity as colligatory concepts illustrate the need to revise earlier historical narratives when trying to counteract the repetitiveness of history.

scholarly journals KAZAKH BATYRY BECOMING AN EXAMPLE OF COURAGE AND HEROISM

2020 ◽  
Vol 67 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
A.S. Sagatova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Past History ◽  
National History ◽  
Native Land ◽  
The Past ◽  
Self Development ◽  
History Of ◽  
Cognitive Foundations ◽  
Independent Country ◽  
The Way

Today our independent country is following the path of self-development, paying attention to the cognitive foundations and roots of our national history. The beginning of the striving for the realization of great goals - reveals its essence in connection with the study of the history of the country, native land. Having analyzed the past history, the author in his article, referring to the merit and activities of great personalities who have left a bright mark and contributed to great historical achievements, focuses on the role of their worldview. This marked the beginning of the study of the personality of Kazakh batyrs, who were messengers of spirit and honor on the way to the unity of our country, an example of courage and heroism - an example of the steppe.

scholarly journals The Role of Descartes’s Dream in the Meditations and in the Historical Ontology of Ourselves

2018 ◽  
pp. 84
Author(s):  
Edward McGushin
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Care Of The Self ◽  
Historical Ontology ◽  
Negative Power ◽  
The Arts ◽  
History Of ◽  
Relations Of Power ◽  
Positive Source ◽  
The Way

This paper situates the dream-hypothesis in Descartes’s First Meditation within the historical ontology of ourselves. It looks at the way in which the dream enters into and transforms Descartes’ relation to his “system of actuality.” In order to get free from his confinement within his system of actuality – an actuality defined by relations of power-knowledge, government, veridiction, and subjectivity – Descartes draws on the disruptive, negative capacity of the dream. But, while Descartes draws on the dream to get himself free and to establish a way of thinking and living differently, he also disqualifies the dream as a positive source of knowledge, truth, or subjectivity. Excavating this ambivalent place of the dream in the genealogy of our present, we aim to recover the dream not only in its negative power but also to open up the possibility of re-imagining its positivity as a form of counter-conduct, problematization, and element in the care of the self. This paper represents one piece of a larger genealogical study that examines the history of relationships between the arts of dreaming and the problematization of power-truth-subjectivity.

scholarly journals The Role of Peace Process in Mitigating the Trust-Deficit in Pak-Afghan Bilateral Relations

2018 ◽  
Vol III (II) ◽  
pp. 421-438
Author(s):  
Huma Qayum ◽  
Nargis Zaman ◽  
Syed Ali Shah
Keyword(s):  
Peace Process ◽  
Geographical Proximity ◽  
Entire Region ◽  
Bilateral Relations ◽  
Dialogue Process ◽  
History Of ◽  
Table Talk ◽  
Diplomatic Relationship ◽  
The Way

The history of Pak-Afghan relations is dominated more by conflicts then by cooperation since emergence of Pakistan. In the ongoing pattern of peace process, it is proposed that Pakistan should pave the way to bring the Taliban on negotiation table for peace and stability in Afghanistan. The recent steps taken in the form of different Confidence Building Measures show flurry of diplomatic relationship in the emerging cordiality between the two countries. Diverse civil society groups of Pakistan are of the view that the drawdown of US forces from Afghanistan will ultimately create a power vacuum and plunge the country again into yet another civil war. Pakistan’s efforts to use its influence to bring the Taliban on table talk will smooth the way for peace, stability and prosperity of Afghanistan as well as security of the entire region. Keeping in view the geographical proximity of the two countries, Pakistan’s own vital interests are attached to peace and stability in Afghanistan. Pakistan took cognizance of this very fact and played highly constructive role in facilitating dialogue process in Afghanistan and improving bilateral ties of the two countries.

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