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While Garfinkel's early work, captured in Studies in Ethnomethodology (Garfinkel 1967), has received a lot of attention and discussion, this has not been the case for his later work since the 1970s (e.g., Garfinkel 1986, 2002). In this paper, we critically examine the aims of Garfinkel's later ethnomethodological studies of work programme and evaluate key ideas such as the 'missing what' in the sociology of work, 'the unique adequacy requirements of methods', and the notion of 'hybrid studies'. We do so through a detailed engagement with a study that has frequently been singled out as exemplary by Garfinkel for his studies of work programme, namely Livingston's (1986) The Ethnomethodological Foundations of Mathematics. We show how Livingston uses the proof of Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem as a way to exhibit the work involved in understanding mathematical proofs. We then discuss how Livingston uses this example to introduce a distinction between the written 'proof account' (or 'proof description') and the associated 'lived work' of working through that proof, which we argue allows Livingston to provide a powerful critique of a formalist understanding of the objectivity of mathematics. We then discuss three aspects that we find problematic in Livingston's and Garfinkel's claims about Livingston's study. Firstly, we question whether written proofs are best conceived of as descriptions or accounts. Secondly, we interrogate whether an ethnomethodological study could teach mathematicians how to make discoveries. Thirdly, we throw doubt on Garfinkel's claim that Livingston's results are results in mathematics. We conclude this paper with a discussion of how Livingston's study Gödel's proof highlights key tensions in Garfinkel's later work. Firstly, we argue that there exists an ambiguity in Garfinkel's treatment of texts as 'incompetent'. Secondly, we show that Garfinkel's attempt to extend his idea of classical studies from sociology to other professions and disciplines is problematic. Finally, we question Garfinkel's proposals to reorient ethnomethodological studies away from sociological audiences and ask whether ethnomethodological studies promise the delivery of a 'large prize' or, rather, provide something like 'helpful therapy'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the role of visualisations in astrophysics programming work, showing that visualisations are not only outputs for those producing them, but can help those developing them understand how to do their work. Studies of visualization in programming have mainly been of social and cultural factors influencing scientific research. We concentrate on the material aspects of scientific work, as of interest in their own right and on methodological grounds (since capturing the material practices of computer screen-work is an underexplored area). Using a 'video-aided ethnographic' method we analyse an episode of computational astrophysics involving the use of the Python programming language. We identify a selection of activities comprising the screen work of an astrophysics researcher to unpack how those activities contribute to the production of scientific knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This comment provides an overview of the four articles by Lindwall, Lymer and Ivarsson; Lynch and Wong; Macbeth, Wong and Lynch; and Macbeth and Wong, which make up the kernel of this Special Issue of Discourse Studies on Epistemics; and it also examines the reasons for the assorted difficulties the authors of those articles have with the Epistemic Programme (EP) being proposed for conversation analysis (CA). The legitimacy of their concerns is underscored by showing that the charge the EP makes, which is that the CA developed by Sacks, Schegloff and Jefferson gives an incomplete account of linguistic interaction, is founded on a number of mistakes. The first mistake is the idea that CA cannot effectively address so-called action formation. The second is a misunderstanding of the idea of ‘proof procedure’ in CA. The third mistake is that conversation can better be understood through an abstract analytic construction, rather than an emphasis on participants’ analysis. And the fourth is that it is necessary to rely upon an imputed cognitive machinery that is asserted to underlie conversation. The systematicity and generative power of Sacks, Schegloff and Jefferson’s radical work on turn-taking in conversation is emphasised and a question that begs to be answered arises, which is how well the EP compares to that earlier and still-radical work, something that the kernel articles address in their return to key transcripts used in the EP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines amateur music-making using a digital audio workstation, showing how audio and software are used as resources for creating compositions. The article has two aims. Firstly, to depict how digital music-making is formed from routine interactional techniques. Secondly, to probe how researchers might account for such multi-modal activity through a heuristic device: the ' nth member.' Whereas sociology has typically been concerned with the cultural facets of how music is made and consumed, we explore the material practices of collaborative song creation utilizing conversation analytic techniques-'turn-taking' and 'next-selection'-to capture two key interactional moments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we re-examine the implications of the differences between ‘doing’ and ‘writing’ science and mathematics, questioning whether the way that science and mathematics are presented in textbooks or research articles creates a misleading picture of these differences. We focus our discussion on mathematics, in particular on Reuben Hersh’s formulation of the contrast in terms of Goffman’s dramaturgical frontstage–backstage analogy and his claim that various myths about mathematics only fit with how mathematics is presented in the ‘front’, but not with how it is practised in the ‘back’. By investigating examples of both the ‘front’ (graduate lectures in mathematical logic) and the ‘back’ (meetings between supervisor and doctoral students) we examine, first, whether the ‘front’ of mathematics presents a misleading picture of mathematics, and, second, whether the ‘front’ and ‘back’ of mathematics are so discrepant that mathematics really does look certain in the ‘front’, but fallible in the ‘back’. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: Two recent books on the nature of mind and knowledge by Roy Harris—Mindboggling (2008) and After Epistemology (2009)—are examined. We discern some inconsistencies in Harris’s appeals to ‘the mental’ throughout Mindboggling. In our view the strengths of the two books by Roy Harris under discussion here lie more in their criticisms than in the passages where he offers his alternatives. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In this paper, we discuss some implications of John Rawls' paper 'Two Concepts of Rules' (1955) for social science. We argue that Rawls' notion of 'practice' is not a straightforward contribution to sociological theory, but rather re-orients the idea of what understanding social actions might be. We explicate how Rawls' distinction between 'summary' and 'practice' views of rules might play out in approaching mathematical practice and mathematical expressions. We argue that social constructivists like Bloor hold on to a 'summary' conception of rules while Wittgenstein adopts the more radical 'practice' conception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last three decades there have been a variety of studies of what is often referred to as ‘everyday’ or ‘street’ mathematics. These studies have documented a rich variety of arithmetic practices involved in activities such as tailoring, carpet laying, dieting, or grocery shopping. More importantly, these studies have helped to rectify outmoded models of rationality, cognition, and (school) instruction. Despite these important achievements, doubts can be raised about the ways in which theoretical conclusions have been drawn from empirical materials. Furthermore, while these studies rightly criticised prevalent theories of rationality and cognition as too simplistic to account for everyday activities, it seems that some of the proposed alternatives suffer from similar flaws (i.e., are straightforward inversions of the to-be-opposed theories, rather than more nuanced views on complicated issues). In this article we illustrate our sceptical view by discussing four case studies in Jean Lave’s pioneering and influential ‘Cognition in Practice’ (1988). By looking at the case studies in detail, we investigate how Lave’s conclusions relate to the empirical materials and offer alternative characterisations. In particular, we question whether the empirical studies demonstrate the existence of two different kinds of mathematics (‘everyday’ and ‘school,’ or ‘formal’ and ‘informal’) and whether school instruction tries to replace the former with the latter. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between 'subjective' and 'objective' features of social reality (and between 'subjectivist' and 'objectivist' sociological approaches) remains problematic within social thought. Phenomenology is often taken as a paradigmatic example of subjectivist sociology, since it supposedly places exclusive emphasis on actors' 'subjective' interpretations, thereby neglecting 'objective' social structures. In this article, we question whether phenomenology is usefully understood as falling on either side of the standard divides, arguing that phenomenology's conception of 'subjective' experience of social reality includes many features taken to be 'objective' elements of it. We illustrate our argument by a critical examination of Jean Lave's attempt to differentiate social practice theory from phenomenology. We show that many theoretical positions that want to overcome the subjective-objective dualism retain an objectivist conception of the 'subjective' features of social reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: We discuss ways of including circumstances systematically in the analysis of social interactions, providing an example of how psychoanalytic child psychotherapists establish the occasion of group therapy. We use the work of Austin (1961, 1962) and Anscombe (1957) to take on board the fact that social interactions happen in “the here-and-now” and yet are also situated in participants’ lives and social arrangements at large. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Wittgenstein's remarks on rule-following are rightly understood to he corrosive of the project of cognitive science. They do not, however, therefore privilege sociology as a competitor discipline - despite the protestations of some sociologists. Rules are invoked as explanatory devices in social theory, and Wittgenstein is criticized for failing to offer a conception of rule-following amenable to such uses. This reveals a misconception of how rules work, and a misunderstanding of what Wittgenstein's philosophy was meant to achieve. Using Wittgenstein's own arguments about rule-following activities, in particular those concerning mathematics, we demonstrate that, first, rules do not indicate the existence of a realm independent of or superior to the mundane, everyday world, and so cannot be used to 'explain' activities with regard to such a realm. Wittgenstein's remark that rules are followed 'blindly', therefore, cannot arbitrate between different social-theoretical understandings of what it means to follow a rule, but deals in very different debates and in very different terms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Linguistic relativism is the thesis that the grammatical structures of different languages imply different conceptions of reality. In this paper we critically discuss one form of linguistic relativism, which argues that grammatical differences between the English and Yoruba language exhibit differences in how English and Yoruba speakers ‘see’ reality (namely in terms of ‘spatiotemporal particulars’ and ‘sortal particulars’, respectively). We challenge the idea that linguistic relativism is an empirical thesis, i.e., a thesis that is substantiated through anthropological examples. We show that linguistic relativism is based on two assumptions: firstly, that the purpose of language is to describe the world; secondly, that being able to speak presupposes an ontological theory of the ultimate constituents of the world. We argue that the attempt to extract the outline of that theory from the language inevitably distorts the portrayal of language-using practice itself. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Cultural relativism is supposed to be a bold and provocative thesis. In this paper we challenge the idea that it is an empirical thesis, i.e., one that is supported through anthropological and historical examples. We focus on mathematical relativism, the view that a mathematics from another culture or time might be so radically divergent from our mathematics that "theirs" would stand in direct conflict with "ours" (and in that sense constitute an alternative mathematics). We question in what sense the examples given to support the general thesis are relativistic about mathematics and argue that on close inspection they are not, and certainly not in any radical sense. We do not contest the fact that there can be great mathematical diversity between cultures, but wonder whether it makes sense to talk of "the same" mathematical forms in heterogeneous mathematical environments. Finally, while relativists see the later Wittgenstein as providing support for their own thesis, we claim that Wittgenstein argues against both realism and relativism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We reject the claim advanced by McHoul and Rapley that our remarks implied any ironic attitude toward 'lay usage'. We do not think that elucidating the grammar of use involves any sort of irony and argue that such a charge is based upon the misconception (interestingly shared by many cognitivist thinkers) that ordinary use is a function of lay users' beliefs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Theory of Mind (ToM) is deeply dependent upon an array of (uncritically adopted but contestable) assumptions from contemporary philosophy of mind. We argue that some of these assumptions carry key and tacit but implausible conceptions of the nature and role of language in the 'acquisition' of ToM and seek to show that without these misconceptions ToM itself becomes superfluous. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a response of the author, to Martin Kusch's article "Rule-Scepticism and the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge." Philosopher Martin Kusch re-opens the controversy between David Bloor and Michael Lynch over the application of Ludwig Wingenstein's philosophy to the problem of rule-scepticism. Kusch comes down on Bloor's side against Lynch's deflationist argument, but opposes floor's claim to have answered the sceptic. Bloor and Kusch agree that the sceptic can be answered and they also agree upon the form that an adequate answer needs to take. Kusch denies that Bloor's argument satisfies the requirements: namely, for a non-circular reductive explanation in which "intentionality" is derived from "non intentional" causes. According to the author, arguments about whether they should "explain practices" sociologically or otherwise are apt to be complicated by the fact that scarcely anyone takes the trouble to make clear what it is about practices, that can be explained.

Questions Ian Hacking's claim that the notion is perspicuous in the examination of historical instances through the discussion of the possibility of retrospective application of the diagnostic category of post-traumatic stress disorder. Kevin McMillan's view that there are deeper philosophical merits to the idea; Argument that neither Hacking's treatment of historical cases nor McMillan's direct philosophical elaboration of Hacking's position sustain this claim.

Abstract The paper addresses the problem of the conceptualisation of morality in sociology. The traditional sociological conception of morality was based upon the acceptance of a fact/value dichotomy, implying that sociology portrays the factual nature of morality, which thereby becomes equivalent to group conformity The opposition of fact and value was brought into question by trends of thought that followed from, respectively, Alfred Schutz and Ludwig Wittgenstein. The line from Schutz's ideas led towards their reformulation by Harold Garfinkel, who to large extent integrated the ‘moral’ with the ‘cognitive’. Wittgenstein's influence, through, especially Peter Winch, John W. Cook and Alfred Louch undercut the idea that sociological descriptions were themselves purely factual, rather than integrally evaluative. A third stream is represented by Alasdair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor, who adopt the idea that morality must be understood in its social and historical context, and explicitly reject the separation of fact and value in moral inquiry. The fact/value distinction is the source of chronic problems for the sociology of morality. Specifically, a sociological account of morality, that would define the correct understanding of the nature of morality – ie identify what substantive character and content is appropriate to it – is not possible. The disintegration of the fact/value dichotomy also means that the idea that the social context can itself be described independently of normative considerations is an illusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Responds to comments made by Steve Fuller and Paul A. Roth on Ian Hacking's work 'Rewriting the Soul,' (1995). Achievement verb; Action word; Conceptual change; Description/redescription of action; Identity of action.

Comments on Steve Fuller's study of the philosophy of science and Thomas S. Kuhn's book "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions". Question of whether Kuhn has a model of science; Sociological treatment of Kuhn's notion of science; Treatment by Kuhn of his scheme as a heuristic; Emphasis by Kuhn that natural sciences tend to become detailed.

Discusses a way in which cognitive science attempts to explain actions. Difference between cognitive science and ethnomethodologically influenced explanations of action; Conceptions of plans, rules and instructions according to cognitive science; Association of plans with actions.

The "projection problem" is one that underlies many attempts at understanding pattern recognition in the visual system and many other aspects of perceptual functioning and learning. The problem pertains to the supposed difficulties in acquiring the capacity to recognize innumerable instances of a general pattern from the presentation of one or a few cases. We argue that this is a false problem, an artefact of the assumptions that underlie its formation, and that these exhibit standard philosophical misconceptions about the nature of instruction and learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses some issues that arise from the fact of 'conceptual change'. We focus on the difficulties that Ian Hacking encountered when considering whether the consequence of conceptual change is the fact that the past of individual actions is indeterminate (Hacking, 1995). We consider his use of Anscombe's thesis on actions under description and find that he misrepresents it. We further find that he neglects tenses of descriptions and redescriptions, the contrast of which is essential to concepts that entail a contrast in understandings of how the matters were then, how they are now, or will be in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kuhn's `taxonomic conception' of natural kinds enables him to defend and re-specify the notion of incommensurability against the idea that it is reference, not meaning/use, that is overwhelmingly important. Kuhn's ghost still lacks any reason to believe that referentialist essentialism undercuts his central arguments in SSR – and indeed, any reason to believe that such essentialism is even coherent, considered as a doctrine about anything remotely resembling our actual science. The actual relation of Kuhn to Kripke-Putnam essentialism, is as follows: Kuhn decisively undermines it – drawing upon the inadequacies of such essentialism when faced with the failure of attempts to instantiate in history or contemporaneously its `thought-experiment' – and leaves the field open instead for his own more `realistic', deflationary way of thinking about the operation of `natural kinds' in science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The topic of shop-floor work has been extensively examined within sociology. However, the organizational structures within which this work takes place have, in the most part, been taken as unexamined givens. Yet, their operation is also the shop-floor work of some people. This paper examines the way in which the stable organizational structures within which shop-floor work takes place are achieved. It is based upon a fieldwork investigation of a large commercial printer and focuses upon the collaborative work of those who are involved in scheduling the production of a job and their use of 'the production calculus' in planning the work of the site. The print industry is undergoing considerable technological change and scheduling technologies have been developed to automate this work. However, there has been little take up of these technologies and the paper also considers how the characteristics of operating the production calculus in practice may account for this. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Professor Wetherick (2000) returns to address the issues between us. In our view, the motley of disconnected arguments that he presents are united by their foundational misconception of our position. In dealing with these as systematically as we can, we shall attempt to restate our original line of attack in relation to the points which he raises. These points pertain to the notion that we are 'linguistic determinists'; that we fail to grasp the true nature of psychology's problem with human perception; and that we persist in denying to psychology any legitimate problems at all. In our final reply, we shall tackle these matters as succinctly as we can in an effort to show that they are all misplaced, artifacts of a failure to appreciate the precise nature of our position. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rule following is often made an unnecessary mystery in the philosophy of social science. One form of mystification is the issue of ‘rule finitism‘, which raises the puzzle as to how a learner can possibly extend the rule to applications beyond those examples which have been given as instruction in the rule. Despite the claim that this problem originated in the work of Wittgenstein, it is clear that his philosophical method is designed to evaporate, not perpetuate, such problems. The supposed problem of rule finitism is malformed, deriving from misconceptions about the relation between understanding a rule and making an application of it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our response to Professor Wetherick (1999) encompasses some issues beyond the purview of his contribution, but which we believe are relevant to a serious appraisal of his comments on our original paper on J.J. Gibson (Sharrock & Coulter, 1998). In our view, Wetherick perists in the conflation of conceptual and empirical questions, presenting a more complex 'solution' to the Gibsonian problem which we had attempted not to solve but to dissolve. Therefore, we are led to treat his constructive proposals in the same way as we did those of Gibson, namely as misplaced attempts to theorize about the nature of human visual capacities. We contest his appeal to the concept of an 'object' in his theorizing about vision. Moreover, we note that Wetherick assumes as fact a point which we seriously contested in our original paper: the causal role of the retinal image in human vision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the argument put forward by Ojelanki Nygwenyama and Kalle Lyytinen that Juergen Habermas‘s theory of communicative action is relevant for the analysis and design of groupware systems. We suggest that CSCW champions of Habermas often overlook the fact that his theory can be criticised in its own right, and go on to outline its contestable character in an appraisal of his understanding of the ’ideal speech situation‘. We then move to Nygwenyama and Lyytinen‘s implementation of Habermas‘s schema and argue that their categories of analysis are both arbitrarily constructed and applied. In conclusion, we question the extent to which grand, holistic, synthesising sociological theories offer a way forward for designers and point to the difficulties of practically applying Nygwenyama and Lyytinen‘s categories of analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on ethnomethodology in Great Britain. Immediately on publication in 1967, Harold Garfinkel's Studies in Ethnomethodology made a strong and controversial impact on British sociology, which attracted attention than was altogether beneficial to the longer term health of the enterprise within the British concept. Initial interest and misplaced enthusiasm quickly faded, sometimes replaced by a resentment that ethnomethodology had not lived up to the image rather arbitrarily created for it. Other fashions came along, and the volume of comment expanded, especially the gratuitous and negative kind. The number who have remained well disposed to ethnomethodology through the period is small, a substantial proportion of them being linked through the Sociology Department at Manchester University in England. Studies of a more or less ethnomethodological sort have covered a range of substantive topics including the formulation of arguments in sociology texts, the analysis of newspaper headlines and stories, courtroom proceedings, interviews, interrogations, educational and business simulations, classroom organization, doctor-patient encounters, moral categories and political speeches, among others.

We address a problem examined by sociologists of ‘Big Science’: the coordination of individuals on large-scale projects—in this case, industrial technology projects. We consider co-ordination to be a problem of social order which can be addressed through ethnomethodology's understanding of accountable action. We propose that the technology producers studied attend to the problem of the coordination of their work in the design of their actions and interactions as organizationally accountable. We subsequently examine the methodical practices through which they interrelate their actions within an organizational context, and thus organize the co-ordination of their technological work and the production of their technology outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Across the disciplinary frontiers of the social sciences, studies by social scientists treating their own investigative practices as sites of empirical inquiry have proliferated. Most of these studies have been retrospective, historical, after-the-fact reconstructions of social scientific studies mixing interview data with the (predominantly textual) traces that investigations leave behind. Observational studies of in situ work in social science research are, however, relatively scarce. Ethnomethodology was an early and prominent attempt to treat social science methodology as a topic for sociological investigations and, in this paper, we draw out what we see as its distinctive contribution: namely, a focus on troubles as features of the in situ, practical accomplishment of method, in particular, the way that research outcomes are shaped by the local practices of investigators in response to the troubles they encounter along the way. Based on two case studies, we distinguish methodological troubles as problems and methodological troubles as phenomena to be studied, and suggest the latter orientation provides an alternate starting point for addressing social scientists' investigative practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Ontologies – a form of structured and logically related knowledge or classification hierarchy embedded in a computer system – are regarded by many scientists as having enormous promise for the consistent use and re-use of data. To realise this promise, however, is not straightforward. In this paper, based on ethnographic observation, we argue that the challenges for ontology building are ‘social’ as much as they are technical. By this we mean the routine work undertaken in the building process and the problems and difficulties entailed can be understood in terms of the practices of knowledge workers and the practical nature of ‘sorting things out’. Getting a better sense of how, in practise, this work gets done gives a sense of the main challenges of building successful ontologies and how this impacts on the design of tool support. In considering the practices of one group in particular, we try to show how, for members, the technical problems of determining what classification structure is appropriate, and what its boundaries might be, depend substantially on assumptions about the ‘community’ and its interests and purposes. This ‘turn to the social’ has ramifications for the understanding of ontology building and use. Specifically, ‘modelling’ approaches to ontology building tell us little about the practical organisation of the work and how this relates to the prospect of successful sharing. Ethnographic enquiry may reveal important issues that are otherwise missed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Many debates about surveillance at work are framed by a set of a priori assumptions about the nature of the employment relationship that inhibits efforts to understand the complexity of employee responses to the spread of new technology at work. In particular, the debate about the prevalence of resistance is hamstrung from the outset by the assumption that all apparently non-compliant acts, whether intentional or not, are to be counted as acts of resistance. Against this background this paper seeks to redress the balance by reviewing results from an ethnographic study of surveillance-capable technologies in a number of British workplaces. It argues for greater attention to be paid to the empirical character of the social relations at work in and through which technologies are deployed and in the context of which employee responses are played out. In particular, it suggests that the resistance/compliance couple is too blunt an analytic instrument to capture the richness of those social relations. It argues, moreover, that there is an urgent need to reinstate the social in analyses of workplace relations just as respondents in the study frequently found themselves struggling to reinstate the social dimensions of work in the face of individualizing technologies. At the same time all parties to working social relations bring with them to the workplace understandings and definitions of legitimacy that have their origins at least partly outside the world of work. These definitions of legitimacy exercise a powerful influence on employee responses. Nowhere is this clearer than in the context of privacy where our respondents' expectations and understandings diverged significantly from those to be found in much academic literature and social commentary itself frequently framed in terms of a range of a priori assumptions about the priority attached to privacy at work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]