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Over the past few years, the skepticism against the stance of value neutrality and the reception of the Frankfurt School in the wake of renewed attention to Marxism in a Critical Sociology has once again focused attention on the problem of the integration of theory and praxis in sociology. Bearing in mind social philosopher Karl Marx's famous statement, philosophers have only interpreted the world in different ways, but the point is to change it, members of the Frankfurt School recognized the problem and perhaps difficulty, of praxis in sociology from the very beginning. This paper is primarily an attempt to present a critique of current approaches to field work and especially of participant observation. This particular focus is important for two reasons. First, ethnographic work has become of paramount importance given the sophisticated manipulation of people's lives today. The intricate organization of the work place, the divisive and paralyzing structure especially of the urban setting. The second reason for such an extended critique is that it would guide people to politically and methodologically adequate approaches to field work.

This paper focuses its attention upon the relationship between the dominant ideas in American sociology and the receptivity, opposition, or indifference to the ideas of Karl Marx. It documents that early American sociology basically ignored Marx's ideas. When his ideas were addressed, the modal response was overwhelmingly negative, and typically along ideological lines. A classificatory scheme is developed to identify the ideological nature of the treatment of Karl Marx in early American sociology. In effect, Marx was defined as beyond the limits of valid inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This short paper presents a few of the issues which divide contemporary Marxists and shows how their debates relate to Marx's original work In the first part, I discuss the family, law and the world system in the light of two notions of social structure. In the second part, I consider the dynamics of capitalism and the struggles between classes, races and genders as potential motors of change. This is followed by an outline of Marx's understanding of the persistence of capitalism, the notion of reproduction of social relations, and how the state becomes involved in the organization of struggles and in the preservation of the conditions of accumulation In the final part, the past is examined for the light it may shed on the future Has history a prior purpose, or telos? How did Marx and how do Marxists conceive of the transition from one period of history to another? What can we say about the transition to socialism based on the experience of the last hundred years? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]