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Since Sociology was established in 1967, the journal has assumed a significant role in shaping the discipline. In the interim years it is often said that the very practice of sociology has now ‘spun out’ beyond the dedicated departments that were once the centres of sociological practice. This raises questions as to the relationship between sociology and other disciplines, questions that are compelling and arguably distinct from a welcome recognition of sociology’s undoubted intellectual hybridity. The extent to which this is a productive tension or one that requires a resolution is an ongoing conversation to which this special issue speaks. In this introductory article we take what we consider to be an innovative route that is guided by the theme of ‘Bringing Sociology Home’ whilst simultaneously recognising the enormous strengths brought by the multidisciplinary developments of the last 50 volumes. We set out the terrain before introducing a mixture of short and substantive papers from contributors, as well as interviews, with scholars who have made a contribution to the study of the discipline of sociology both inside and beyond the pages of the journal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a research in British Departments of sociology. The aims of this paper are twofold. First, a set of quantitative indicators of research outputs and research inputs is constructed for all sixty-seven British sociology departments that were assessed in the 1992 Research Assessment Exercise so that individual departments can see how their own research profile compared with that of other departments during the assessment period. Secondly, this paper examines the statistical relationship between the research ratings awarded to departments of sociology and the various indicators of research inputs and research outputs that can be constructed from the 1992 Research Assessment Exercise database. Specifically, the aim is to discover the extent to which variations in the research rating between departments of sociology can be explained by these research input and research output indicators. This paper has shown that some interesting and potentially useful research indicators can be constructed at department level from the 1992 Research Assessment Exercise. In particular, it is possible for individual departments of sociology in Great Britain to compare their own research activity across a range of research output and research input indicators with the research activity of other departments.

This paper presents a reanalysis of the British, French and Swedish mobility data first presented by Erikson et al. (1979). A descriptive model is specified and used to identify precisely where the differences in the relative openness of the three societies are located. In doing this the paper seeks both to synthesize previous findings and to extend our knowledge of the mobility processes at work in the three societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Braverman and his followers have been useful and influential in reviving a sociology of work. However as well as stimulating debate, the Braverman model has also created impediments to further analysis. This paper discusses some of these limitations and argues that, in part, they result from a particular reading of Marx which neglects crucial Marxian categories. In part, they result from weaknesses and ambiguities in Marxian theory. The second part of the paper focuses on the concept of control, and makes a plea for a revival of interest in the pre-Braverrnan sociology of the workplace. It is suggested that such work conjoined with that of recent theorists provides a more adequate basis for theory of capitalist labour processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This second and concluding pan of the paper deals with a third problem area; the relationship between values and explanation. It is discussed by examining Myrdal's distinctions between valuations and value premises and between theoretical and practical research; Stretton's conception of the role of the `valuing skill' in all kinds of socio- historical research; and Maclntyre's arguments concerning categories and accounts that combine either evaluation and description or evaluation and explanation. Like the first part of the paper, it is illustrated by studies in the history and sociology of revolutions. Again, the main aim is methodological clarification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While various attempts have been made to link nature and society more closely together within environmental sociology, it now appears as though there is a general acceptance of rather traditional divisions between these two domains. Yet ecology specifies that natural and social entities are bound together in complex interrelations. Why then does sociology insist on sifting out the social from the natural? The paper takes this question as its starting point and seeks to identify what environmental sociology might gain and lose from a shift towards ecological thinking. It does so by examining the case of actor-network theory, an approach that, in significant respects, closely approximates a kind of 'ecological sociology'. Actor-network theory is 'co-constructionist': it seeks to identify how relations and entities come into being together. Critics have focused on the problems of co-constructionism: they have argued that human actors generally possess powers of reflection (through language) and that these powers of reflection provide motive forces for action. Thus some form of social analysis is still necessary. Any ecological sociology will thus need to bring these two perspectives together so that humans and non-humans can be considered within the same frame of reference but so the distinctions that generally hold between the two can also be assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On the basis of a fourfold typology referring to different definitions of the social-structure concept, and of a critique of Giddens's and Bourdieu's strategies for transcending the divide between objectivist and subjectivist sociologies, this paper argues that rapprochement rather than transcendence is the way to overcome the existing fragmentation and for bringing closer together structural/structuralist and interpretative paradigms in the social sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to explore sociology as an imaginative pursuit. After a brief reconsideration of Mills's notion of 'the sociological imagination' I examine three areas illustrating the various imaginations within the discipline: the work of Robert K. Merton; ethnomethodology; and the diversities of feminist scholarship. Two particular case studies are explored: the sociology of the body and the use of autobiographical studies in sociology. I conclude with some suggestions for the encouragement of imaginative thought within the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper comments on the debate between Martin Bulmer and Donald Fisher, which appears in an earlier issue of this journal, concerning the influence of Rockefeller philanthropy on the social sciences between the wars. Three central issues of contention are distinguished and rival claims are evaluated. I argue that new empirical evidence drawn from the foundations' archives does not support some of their arguments although each interpretation has its merits. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to the recent articles in Sociology on the concept of `strategy', this paper aims to make a contribution to the debate by drawing attention to some of its gendered aspects. We seek to raise some further questions without necessarily providing clear-cut answers. We argue that the concept is rooted within masculine spheres of activity, and yet has been widely applied to women's lives, particularly in considering some of the contextual constraints of domestic activities. We consider the reasons for the attractiveness of the concept, as well as the dangers in applying it to women's domestic lives, using illustrations from our own empirical work. While we have found an alternative language difficult to find, we are concerned that the sociological conceptualisation of women's lives in the private sphere needs to work outward from the domestic rather than inward from the public. Furthermore, such conceptual reconsideration may also assist our understandings of female and male lives in public settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A remarkable variety of academic treatments of family life are in broad agreement as to the processes of development and change occurring within families in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. A wide range of authors regard the following as a set of interconnected changes: family household members increasingly come to have a sense of themselves as a distinctive and sacrosanct unit, 'the family', which is separated from the wider social world; emotional relationships within the family household become very intense; gender divisions become more acute, with the sharp demarcation between a housewife/mother role and an earner/father role; respect for the rights of the individual is increased -- loyalty to oneself may take precedence over loyalty to the family. My aim in this paper is to confront this 'classical' corpus of historical and sociological analysis with a particular set of experiential data -- oral accounts of growing up in urban Scotland in the early 1900s gathered by me in 1975-77 (Jamieson 1983). As we shall see, these data cast into doubt several of the generalisations contained in the 'classical' corpus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the light of the recent growth of artificial intelligence (A!), and of its implications for understanding human behaviour, this paper evaluates the prospects for an association between sociology and artificial intelligence. Current presumptions about the distinction between human behaviour and artificial intelligence are identified through a survey of discussions about A! and 'expert systems'. These discussions exhibit a restricted view of sociological competence, a marked rhetoric of progress and a wide variation in assessments of the state of the art. By drawing upon recent themes in the social study of science, these discussions are shown to depend on certain key dichotomies and on an interpretive flexibility associated with the notions of intelligence and expertise. The range of possible associations between sociology and A! reflects the extent to which we are willing to adopt these features of Al discourse. It is suggested that one of the more important options is to view the Al phenomenon as an occasion for reassessing the central axiom of sociology that there is something distinctively `social' about human behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents author's remarks on the paper "The Role of Philanthropic Foundations in the Reproduction and Production of Hegemony: Rockefeller Foundation and Social Sciences," by Donald Fisher. The history of the large American private philanthropic foundations is of particular significance for the history of the social sciences, both in the U.S. and Great Britain, as they developed in the first half of the twentieth century. Applied to the social sciences, foundations are held to have perverted the course of development of a number of disciplines, including sociology, in the capitalist interests of their founders and the technocratic interests of foundation officials. Donald Fisher has performed a major service in documenting in considerable empirical detail the range and scope of activities of the major philanthropic foundations. One of the Fisher's central propositions is that foundations have represented interests of the ruling class. His interpretation of the key McKenzie-King affair of 1914-15, when the Rockefeller Family was publicly censured for using foundation funds to further their business interests, demonstrates the tendentious nature of his approach.

This article focuses on the paper on bootstrapped induction published in the earlier issue that was a part of an extended body of work in which the problem of reference from a sociological point of view was considered. The great sociological importance of the problem of reference will be apparent. If the proper use of a term can be unproblematically fixed in advance by its meaning, or by secure reasoning from its previous usage, or indeed, by anything at all, so that what it refers to is completely and immutably specified, then verbal rules have set implications, norms may govern and determine, values may command actions. A number of interesting alternative approaches are to be found in the sociology of knowledge and science, the context of much of my own work. There is no indication of why it should bear upon the question of the correctness of mechanism. Worse, there is no indication of what dehumanization and reduction consist in. And there is certainly no evidence offered of any connection between the use of mechanistic representations and the production of either of these outcomes.

Recent years have seen a proliferation of industrial relations courses yet the status of the subject is still far from clear. Concern has been expressed about its lack of theoretical development and that having eschewed theory for empiricism it appears to be helpless in the face of practical problems. The reformism of the `Oxford School' reached an impasse in the 1970s both practically and theoretically. In the face of this impasse the void was filled by a more radical approach based upon an alternative economic analysis. Whilst there appears to have been a temporary lull in the hostilities the pluralist and Marxist approaches still vie for supremacy. This paper attempts to examine the object of industrial relations by submitting it to a critique. I argue that it is trapped theoretically within the confines of empiricism. During the course of the critique I discover that industrial relations is not the study of industrial relations; it is the study of objectified ideologies or rules. Given a definition of law I suggest that the academic distinction between industrial relations and the sociology of law should be re-examined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our aim is the development of a formal basis for the analysis of institutional structure. While the concept of an institution is a central one in sociology, there has been much doubt about its analytical utility (Buckley, 1967: 161). The notion of a role- programme model, set out and discussed in this paper, appears to offer a precise analytical version of the institution concept. Its formal basis rests on representational techniques developed in information science. The approach is presented and exemplified with reference to a common institution, the restaurant, specifically waitress-customer interaction patterns, and its main implications for the analysis of institutional structure are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Any sociological description is an organisation of perspectives which necessarily throws certain ideas out of focus. The sociology of deviance has characteristically ignored one major quality of crime, its capacity to inflict distress upon people. Not all crimes impose suffering, and not all forms of inflicted suffering are illegal, but the criminal law is conventionally held to be concerned with the regulation of damage to the physical or material self. En its neglect of that quality, sociology has distorted its analysis of a number of problems. One such problem, that of motivation, is examined in this paper. It is argued that many deviant acts produce discomfort in others and a description of motives must comprehend how that discomfort is defined and tolerated by the deviant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents information related to November 1986 issue of the journal "Sociology." Sociology is, however, a general journal, so it is expected that papers should not be on topics only of interest to specialists in a particular field, and that work in specialized areas should as far as possible be written in a way which makes it accessible to those outside that field. There could be a useful role for articles whose aim is to introduce specialist work of potentially wider interest to the sociological general reader, and we should like to encourage those who normally submit elsewhere to write them. The journal has already institutionalized the `Trend Report'. In addition to this, bibliographical surveys, which might help to update those whose primary commitment is to teaching as well as to inform those whose central interests are elsewhere, would be welcomed, as would short articles on practical issues of research method. It would be helpful if proposals for articles of this kind could be discussed in advance with the Editor; offers, or ideas which others might act on, will be welcomed. Some work of this kind may be invited; it will all, however, be subject to the usual refereeing process.

This article presents information about the journal "Sociology." With its next issue the journal "Sociology" will enter its eleventh year of publication. British sociology like sociology in general has changed a great deal in that time, becoming in many ways a more diversified and controversial as well as a more developed field of work. The journal shall from time to time in future be publishing commissioned articles reviewing issues, developments and debates in selected fields of work within sociology and we shall be also trying to find ways to pay more attention to developments in sociology outside the English-speaking world. Readers who can help the journal to realise this policy of range and diversity either by submitting original papers for publication or by making suggestions as to other ways in which it could be pursued are urged to write to the editor.