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As previous research has observed, medical students and physicians alike confront vast amounts of knowledge in their education and practice, such that no one clinician can know everything there is to know about biomedicine. Even before clerkships, medical students learn to cope with this impossibility by prioritizing certain information based on its perceived utility for exams and clinical practice. Many factors can shape this process, including teamwork, wherein individual medical students rely on one another to address gaps in knowledge at the level of the group. This paper will draw on qualitative data from two allopathic medical schools in the American Midwest to demonstrate that peer-to-peer learning, a widely utilized pedagogical modality in North American medical schools, is amongst the earliest places where future physicians learn how to rely on their peers in the profession as they make choices about what to know and what not to know about biomedicine: cultivating a culture of "intraprofessionalism" between students with different knowledges and values, as they prepare to enter the same profession. The paper will also consider how differences in the student populations at two field sites impact intraprofessional development. Drawing on scholarship of peer-based learning strategies and the sociology and anthropology of medical education, the authors argue that peer-to-peer learning is a key site in the professional socialization of medical students toward the effective management of medical knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors describe the image of a silhouette of William Edward Burghardt Du Bois which was featured in the cover of the journal. They discuss the reasons that Du Bois's image is a meaningful choice, their deep appreciation for Du Bois's approach to social analysis, and information on a journal's paper and what happens when one submits a paper to the journal.

In the past 20 years, divorce has increased in Indonesia. Indonesian statistics show that divorces initiated by women exceed those by men. One issue that is often neglected is how socioeconomic differences also play a role in this matter. Drawing on our collaborative research on Muslim divorces in Indonesia, this paper focuses on the interplay between divorce strategies and socioeconomic differences among Muslim couples. Our in-depth interviews with 93 Muslim men and women and 19 judges from Islamic courts show that class differences shape distinctive dynamics of divorce among Muslim Indonesians. Couples from less educated, lower-income backgrounds accept marriage dissolution more easily, with women becoming much less tolerant of men's behaviors such as infliction of domestic violence, infidelity, and failure to provide financial support. Educated, middle-class urban couples divorce for similar reasons but tend to experience a lengthier process accompanied by complex layers of conflict. Many educated women's narratives emphasize their ability to support themselves through working, and a desire to be free of a bad marriage at any cost. Class and education thus contribute to significant differences in the experience and trajectories of divorce in Indonesia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social ontology studies the nature and properties of social reality while social metaontology examines the relationship between ontology and the social sciences, which is often treated as a normative question. However, social sciences themselves contain ontological theses, raising the descriptive question of how these internal ontologies relate to the rest of the social sciences. This paper argues that important parts of sociology have an anti-foundationalist metaontology. This descriptive claim is used to build a normative argument against foundationalism and is supported by examining the works of Durkheim and Weber and how their metaontological beliefs continue to influence many sociologists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a fruitful tension in ethnomethodological work. On the one hand, real-world data are used to rein in analytical privilege. On the other, conceptual discussions necessarily take place in a more open analytical space. Describing settings in detail and thinking about things in the abstract are both essential components of the ethnomethodological project. What ethnographies might consist in complicates this picture. Garfinkel initially deflated the concept of 'ethnography', using it to refer to how all members of society make sense of their world. Sacks, on the other hand, initially construed his sociological project as a more rigorous form of professional ethnography. Ethnographic methods rightly remain an important tool for ethnomethodological analyses. They provide an empirical grounding for analysis and facilitate 'thinking about things' in a more open manner than some other forms of data. This paper argues that ethnographic analyses more generally can be used as ethnomethodological resources, (re)introducing the idea that others' fieldwork and analyses are legitimate resources for ethnomethodological work. Some materials from Elijah Anderson's classic ethnography A Place on the Corner are used to illustrate the possibilities taking this approach might offer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to comprehensively examine the effects of societal and individual characteristics on work-related attitudes, specifically work commitment and work orientations, using a single dataset and comparable models. It also seeks to relate these attitudes to classic theories and understand how societal factors shape work-related attitudes. The analysis is based on data collected by the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) in its work orientations survey. Data is analyzed using factor analyses, correspondence analyses, and multilevel regressions. The paper provides an overview of work-related attitudes at the country level and a detailed analysis of societal and individual variables that shape these attitudes. The results indicate that individual attitudes reflect large societal trends and developments, which are discussed with reference to current studies and classic theories. This paper contributes to understanding work-related attitudes by offering a comprehensive analysis of the effects of societal and individual characteristics, using a single dataset and comparable models. It also relates these attitudes to classic theories and discusses how societal factors shape work-related attitudes. The findings also have policy implications, particularly in the recruitment and retention of highly qualified and motivated workers in different countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to comprehensively examine the effects of societal and individual characteristics on work-related attitudes, specifically work commitment and work orientations, using a single dataset and comparable models. It also seeks to relate these attitudes to classic theories and understand how societal factors shape work-related attitudes. The analysis is based on data collected by the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) in its work orientations survey. Data is analyzed using factor analyses, correspondence analyses, and multilevel regressions. The paper provides an overview of work-related attitudes at the country level and a detailed analysis of societal and individual variables that shape these attitudes. The results indicate that individual attitudes reflect large societal trends and developments, which are discussed with reference to current studies and classic theories. This paper contributes to understanding work-related attitudes by offering a comprehensive analysis of the effects of societal and individual characteristics, using a single dataset and comparable models. It also relates these attitudes to classic theories and discusses how societal factors shape work-related attitudes. The findings also have policy implications, particularly in the recruitment and retention of highly qualified and motivated workers in different countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Erving Goffman has a reputation as an intellectual maverick who did not fit neatly into any disciplinary mold. His failure to adhere to professional conventions and occasionally off-putting demeanor are mentioned as an aside that has little to do with his oversize influence on the science of society. This paper advances a thesis that Goffman's status as the most cited American sociologist and widespread influence across social science is related to his principled refusal to fit his scholarship into prevailing scholarly canons. The argument is made that Goffman shared with his mentor, Everett Hughes, misgivings about the narrow professional focus in contemporary sociology, that his cross-disciplinary approach advanced social inquiry beyond its traditional confines, and that his colloquial style and penchant for long essays helped disseminate his ideas. The discussion starts with an overview of Goffman's professional career, after which it moves to the reception of his ideas by fellow sociologists and the impact of his work on neighboring disciplines. The study draws on the interviews, correspondence, and other documents assembled in the Erving Goffman Archives, as well as on several social science citation indexes and datasets illuminating Goffman's stature in various fields of scholarship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main objective of the paper is to identify the logic of the sociological field in the GDR, looking at how it was spatialized in the city of East Berlin. In this regard, I am less interested in providing an overview of the different research streams of the main sociologists operating in the scientific and academic institutes located in Berlin than in reconstructing some crucial dynamics at work there and highlighting their effects at the social and symbolic levels. The underlying idea is that, especially in East Berlin, the sociological knowledge produced was less homogeneous than it has been represented in the existing literature. Without negating the existence of shared aspects characterizing Marxist-Leninist sociology, also superimposed on the political elite, a field analysis enables us to see how the different positions and trajectories of GDR-sociologists had an impact on their approaches to theoretical, epistemological, and methodological questions, and on their understanding and uses of concepts deriving from both Marxist-Leninist and "bourgeois" sociology. In the analysis, I will first compare the social trajectories of two of my interview-partners as paradigmatic of two different sociological habitus depending on their different academic/political socialization, networks, and positions in the field. As a second step, I will present a sketch of the sociological field drawn from 63 curricula of sociologists active in East Berlin in an attempt to pinpoint, on a larger scale, the homologies between the social and symbolic spaces of the field. Thus, the underlying idea is to examine the intersection of the "quasi-structural properties" of the field with its "phenomenological aspects" concerning the "feel for the game." While the two understandings of field are interdependent, it is in the second one that the physical space as a localized social space played a crucial role in defining the material, social, and cultural constraints and opportunities actors faced which, in turn, influenced their practices and choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper charts the changing intersections between sociology and science and technology studies (STS) using computational textual analysis. We characterize this "quali-quantitative" approach as a Big Data method, as this calls attention to the commixture of textual and numeric data that characterizes Big Data. The term Big Data, too, calls attention to the increasing privatization of both data and data analytics tools. The data mining was done using a commercial analytics tool, IBM SPSS Modeler, that to the best of our knowledge has not yet been used for STS or sociological research. The identification of intersections occurred as part of a larger project to analyze political-economic and epistemic changes within STS, focusing on academic publishing. These epistemic changes were identified qualitatively, through 76 interviews with STS scholars, and quantitatively, through a computational analysis of three decades of STS journals (1990–2019). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The past decade has seen a resurgence of interdisciplinary interest in fiscal studies, from the new fiscal sociology to fiscal geographies and beyond, with roots in the 20th century theories of Schumpeter (liberal) and O'Connor (Marxian). The notion of a 'tax state' remains particularly germane, and indeed fiscal studies have all but narrowed to assessments of the relations and implications of taxation. This paper calls for a meaningful engagement with the 'fiscal' in fiscal studies where taxation is better understood as being but one component of public sector revenue and expenditure (alongside other important features like asset ownership, debt/credit, and intergovernmental transfers). More than an academic quibble over terminology or unit of analysis, narrowing 'fiscal' to 'tax' obscures many budget items and misses out on important temporal trends in the political economy of state revenue and expenditure. These issues are explored in two parts: the roots of fiscal studies (politicizing theoretical underpinnings), and the various conjunctural features of the fiscal state (tracing the temporal through Canadian examples). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on papers by Michael Mulkay, Nigel Gilbert and John O'Neill which deal with the literary aspects of sociological redescription. Definition of sociological accounts; Shortage of contrasts in social science; Modes by which sociological accounts should be analyzed.

Decades of scholarly efforts to reignite the theoretical integration between sociology and biology have come to partial fruition in the birth of evolutionary sociology at the turn of the twentieth-first century. This paper examines one of the most elaborated versions of the paradigm—"new evolutionary sociology" (NES)—proposed by Jonathan H. Turner and colleagues. NES emphasizes purposeful, multilevel selective pressure targeted at corporate units, groups, or societies—rather than the blind, Darwinian natural selection on individuals—from which institutional systems are developed. Despite its contribution, NES possesses conceptual lacunae that have fettered NES in specific and evolutionary sociology in general from becoming a novel and truly evolutionary-cum-sociological paradigm in explaining social phenomena. This paper identifies three conceptual hiatuses of NES, in that it lacks due deliberation of (1) the gene-culture interaction that bridges individual behaviors—via natural, sexual, group, and multilevel selections—with the emerging sociocultural formations; (2) the epistemic role of fitness as a post factum propensity in empirical analysis; and (3) the concept of causal mechanism utilized to explain the diverse paths leading to the emergent phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Merton proposed middle range theories, not as ends in themselves, but as bases for a consolidation to explain broader phenomenon. More than a half century has passed since Merton's consolidation proposal and in that time a number of experimentally tested middle range theories have been developed. Certainly, the next step should be a consolidation. Yet, to our knowledge, no one has previously offered a consolidation of experimentally tested theories and applied it for explanation. This paper offers a consolidation of middle range theories formulated to explain the rise of the pristine state. Two theories of this consolidation, Status Characteristics Theory and Elementary Theory, form the core of what Analytic Sociologists have called a toolbox of theories. Our toolbox forms an integrated consolidation in two ways. First, the social structures modeled by the theories form a path-dependent process of increasing benefits gained by the elites of the structures. Second, the end conditions of each step of the process are the initial conditions of the next. Whereas the theories in our toolbox have previously been seen as applying exclusively to microstructures, we have encountered no difficulties in scaling them up to apply to macrostructures. While we hope the consolidation has validity in explaining the occurrence of pristine states, this paper's significance lies in its demonstration that today social theories can be consolidated and applied for explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this introduction, we thank those who supported and contributed to our special issue of Classical Sociology, on the work and life of André Gorz. We then provide a sketch of Gorz's place in intellectual history. Along the way, we explain some of our motivations for editing the special issue, then move on to a discussion of our contributors' papers. We end with a reiteration of our goals for the issue, and with thanks once more to those who helped make it happen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a republication of Judith N. Shklar's paper "Rights in the Liberal Tradition" first published in an issue of Colorado College Studies in 1992. This is the first time the piece has been made digitally available. Edward Hall and Matt Sleat provide a brief foreword to the essay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of this paper is to examine the 'existence theory' proposed by Patrick Baert, Marcus Morgan, and Rin Ushiyama. To this end, it focuses on some key issues that could, and arguably should, be explored in more detail, especially if the authors decide to develop their project further, permitting them to establish a new interdisciplinary branch of inquiry. The comments and suggestions made in this paper are meant to be constructive, supporting the idea that Baert, Morgan, and Ushiyama's outline could, and should, be turned into a bold, systematic, and long-term research programme. More specifically, the in-depth analysis of Baert, Morgan, and Ushiyama's theoretical framework demonstrates that their undertaking, which draws on central insights from both existentialism and phenomenology, contributes to bridging the disciplinary gap between philosophy and sociology. The paper concludes by asserting that Baert, Morgan, and Ushiyama's model provides a solid foundation for an ambitious, but viable, project that may result in the creation of a new current of research, capable of generating valuable insights into the tension-laden confluence of existential milestones, existential ladders, and existential urgencies in the theatre of human life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qualitative social scientists working in medical faculties have to meet multiple expectations. On the one hand, they are expected to comply with the philosophical and theoretical expectations of the social sciences. On the other hand, they may also be expected to produce publications which align with biomedical definitions and framings of quality. As interdisciplinary scholars, they must handle (at least) two sets of journal editors, peer reviewers, grant-awarding panels, and conference audiences. In this paper, we extend the current knowledge base on the ‘dual expectations’ challenge by drawing on Orlikowski and Yates’ theoretical concept of communicative genres. A ‘genre’ in this context is a format of communication (e.g. letter, email, academic paper, and conference presentation) aimed at a particular audience, having a particular material form and socio-linguistic style, and governed by both formal requirements and unwritten social rules. Becoming a member of any community of practice involves becoming familiar with its accepted communicative genres and adept in using them. Academic writing, for example, is a craft that is learned through participation in the social process of communicating one’s ideas to one’s peers in journal articles and other formats. In this reflective paper, we show how the concept of a communicative genre can sensitise us to the conflicting and often dissonant expectations and rule systems governing different academic fields. We use this key concept to suggest ways in which the faculty can support early-career researchers to progress in careers which straddle qualitative social science and medical science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are many contradictions in previous studies of the status of depressive symptoms among Chinese migrant children, the number of which in the compulsory education stage is about 13.9 million. This systematic review and meta-analysis were designed to compare depressive symptoms among migrant children and their urban children. Around 2,710 papers were retrieved from PubMed, OVID, the Web of Knowledge, CNKI, Wan Fang, Chongqing VIP, and Chinese Social Sciences Citation Index on January 27, 2020. Thirty-Two studies met study criteria with 14,906 migrant children and 10,792 urban children. Migrant children scored significantly higher for depressive symptoms score (SMD = 0.307, 95% CI [0.222, 0.393]). Region significantly influenced the difference of depressive symptoms between migrant children and urban children. Large effect sizes came from studies using scales that focus on depressive mood while studies using scales that focus on depressive behavioural symptoms had small effect sizes. Future research should focus on treatments to decrease depressive mood of migrant children. Future studies can add information about the length of their current stay in the urban location to improve the quality of study. PROSPERO registry: Systematic review registration no. CRD42018090676. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: How do learning communities influence academic performance in Introductory Psychology? Method: The present research examines the relationship between participation in first-year students learning communities and academic performance across a variety of course requirements (midterms, finals, papers, and class participation) in introductory psychology and, for comparison, sociology courses. Results: Students who took Introductory Psychology as part of a first-year-student learning community outperformed their peers (who took the same course without a learning community) on the first exam of the semester and were less likely to miss assignments but otherwise showed no significant differences on the other course assignments; introductory sociology students part of these communities showed even greater differences in performance that lasted through the end of the semester. Conclusion: First-year students learning communities offers significant albeit limited benefits for student performance in introductory courses in the social sciences. Teaching Implications: Short of institutional efforts to enact programming for first-year learning communities, introductory psychology instructors can attempt to simulate the experience of such communities by promoting a sense of belonging via extra-curricular service or discipline-related activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a number of linked articles and monographs over the last decade (e.g. Love, 2010, 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017), literary scholar and critic Heather Love has called for a descriptive (re)turn in the humanities, repeatedly taking up examples of descriptive methods in the social sciences as exemplifying what that (re)turn might look like and achieve. Those of us working as sociologists, anthropologists, science and technology studies scholars and researchers in allied social science fields thus find ourselves reflected back in Love's work, encountering our own research practices in an unfamiliar light through it. In a period where our established methods and analytical priorities are subject to challenges on many fronts from within our own disciplines, it is hard not be struck by Love's provocative invocation of the social sciences as interlocutors and see in it an invitation to contribute to the debate she has sought to initiate by revisiting our own approaches to the problem of description. Inspired by Love's intervention, the eight papers that form this Special Issue demonstrate that by re-engaging with description we stand to learn a great deal. While the articles themselves are topically distinct and geographically varied, they are all based on empirical research and written to facilitate a reorientation to the role of description in our research practices. What exactly is going on when we describe an ancient papyrus as present or missing, a machine as intelligent, noise as music, a disease as undiagnosable, a death as good or bad, deserved or undeserved, care as appropriate or inappropriate, policies as failing or effective? As the papers show, these are important questions to ask. By asking them, we find ourselves in positions to better understand what goes into 'indexing and making visible forms of material and social reality' (Love, 2013: 412) as well as what is involved, more troublingly, in erasing, making invisible and dematerialising those realities or even, indeed, in uncovering those erasures and the means by which they were effected. As this special issue underlines, thinking with Love by thinking with descriptions is a rewarding exercise precisely because it opens these matters up to view. We hope others take up Love's invitation to re-engage with description for that very reason. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most social scientists agree that case studies are useful for "theory building," but ethnographic methods papers often look to survey research for case selection strategies. This is due to a common but untenable distinction between theoretical and empirical generalization, which obscures how theoretically inclined ethnographers make implicit external validity claims. I analyze several exemplary ethnographies to show that (a) the distinction between theoretically and empirically oriented ethnography revolves around competing conventions for making claims that others accept as provisionally externally valid, (b) comparative-historical sociology provides a framework for evaluating how theoretically oriented ethnographies make such claims, and (c) each approach to making validity claims is optimized by different kinds of cases. Empirically oriented ethnographies make inductive claims via "pointy" cases wherein a phenomenon is pronounced or bifurcated. Theoretically oriented ethnographers are like post–Millian historical sociologist who triangulate past studies with resolutive or negative cases to make constitutive arguments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper brings reflexivity into conversation with debates about positionality and live sociology to argue for reflexivity to be reimagined as an enduring practice that is collaborative, responsible, iterative, engaged, agile and creative. We elaborate our argument with reference to examples and contemplations drawn from our experiences researching what Brexit means for Britons living in the EU-27 for the BrExpats research project, which was informed from the outset by reflexive practice. We outline three (of a number of) potential strategies for engaging in reflexive practice: reflexive positioning, reflexive navigating and reflexive interpreting or sense-making. We acknowledge that these are not separate actions in practice but are conceptually distinguishable aspects of an ongoing reflexive practice, informed by our understanding of the cognitive relationship between reflexivity and practice theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Due to an increasingly complex mixture of different types of public spaces and their functions in cities, the role of public spaces can be enhanced to serve users under certain circumstances. This paper examines Carmona's classification of urban spaces in Al-Baha, Saudi Arabia. Carmona introduces a classification that uses aspects of function, perception, and ownership to distinguish between space types. Twenty urban space types are recognized in four groups, representing a variety from clearly public to private space. The classifications of public spaces will be discussed to arrive at classifications for public spaces based on how public spaces are managed. The article builds an understanding of how such classifications relate to how real public spaces are provided today. In this case study, a Geographic Information System (GIS) map is created for Al-Baha Central District and includes the resulting classifications. From the 119 urban spaces selected to represent this study equally distributed across the study area, there are 12 types that public spaces match Carmona's classification. The classification of urban spaces for this case study revealed the complexity of public spaces' nature and the difficulty of distinguishing what is public. Public spaces tend to change and develop over time through other uses and activities. However, the classification of public spaces is a valuable tool that policymakers and planners can use to set comprehensive development plan programs and plan open space strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theories play an important role in guiding intimate partner homicide (IPH) prevention research and practice. This study is the first systematic review of theories employed to explain why someone might kill their intimate partner. This review used rigorous methods to locate and synthesize literature that described explanatory theories of IPH perpetration. Using set search terms, we systematically searched 15 databases and repositories for theory-focused documents (i.e., theory papers or analyses) published in English from 2003 to 2018. Eighteen documents met these inclusion criteria and identified 22 individual theories that seek to explain why people might kill their intimate partners. These theories fell within four broader theoretical perspectives: feminist, evolutionary, sociological/criminological, and combined. Key tenets and focal populations of these 22 theories were identified and organized into a compendium of explanatory theories of IPH perpetration. Potential strengths and limitations of each of the four perspectives were described. Review findings underscored the likely importance of addressing gender as well as risk and protective factors at all levels of the social ecological model in efforts to understand IPH perpetration. The review findings highlighted the need for both integrated theories and a broader conceptual organizing framework to guide work aimed at IPH perpetration prevention to leverage the strengths of disparate theoretical perspectives. With the goal of informing future research, a preliminary iteration of such a framework is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to define transcendental relativization, by using the binary in some anthropological works, and to give a description of it along with Niklas Luhmann's sociology. We examine how the binary [the West/non-West] has been used in some anthropological works and how it has contributed not only to understanding 'them' as a research object but also to realizing 'our' conceptual limitations. This paper is an attempt to deal with political or power-relational asymmetry and scientific observational asymmetry in anthropological works. Luhmann's sociology, which is based on the functional analysis and theory of social systems, shows that the binary approach in anthropology can be seen as a semantic form of science system, which realizes the existence of blind spots in anthropological observation, and is a possible strategy for anthropological investigations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a further tribute to feminist scholar Jessie Bernard, in this paper, we review the entire collection of the National Council on Family Relations' Jessie Bernard Outstanding papers awarded to feminist junior scholars spanning from 1990 to 2018. In so doing, we showcase Jessie Bernard's devotion to mentoring young scholars as we highlight evolving feminist family scholarship of student/new professionals. In this paper, we sought to:(a) honor Jessie Bernard's intellectual legacy, (b) celebrate contributions of young feminist family scholar's work, and (c) explore how the award collection maps on to wider feminist theoretical debates and empirical shifts within feminist family science over the past three decades. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically discusses the limitations of theorising social work from psychological and sociological perspectives and argues that phenomenology offers more opportunity to understand the embodied experiences of service users and social workers themselves. The paper argues that psychology and sociology have a limited analysis of being-in-the-world, which ought to be social work's primary consideration. The paper offers an overview of the sociology of risk before embarking on an extensive description and discussion of Heidegger's and Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology applied to the lived experience of child protection social workers working within risk society. The argument is put that phenomenology is a useful tool for understanding the lived experience of social work practitioners. Findings: The authors conclude that embodied social work practice containing fear and anxiety can be thought of as akin to taking part in extreme risk sports and that this is an unhealthy experience that is likely to skew decision-making and adversely affect the lives of social workers and service users. Applications: The authors argue that phenomenology can enhance understanding of practice and decision-making and offers insights into the lived experience of social workers. Phenomenology is useful for helping social workers negotiate risk-saturated environments, through a focus on meaning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to contribute to the theoretical discussion and empirical application of phenomenology in the sociology of sport by drawing on Maxine Sheets-Johnstone's theories. I propose that Sheets-Johnstone's movement-focused phenomenology can be complementary to Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology of the body in the analyses of sporting moves and the learning of new moves. I mainly applied two concepts from Sheets-Johnstone, tactile-kinesthetic/kinetic dynamics and emotion-motion dynamics, to explore the moving body in waka ama (outrigger canoe) paddling, based on my beginner's and other competent paddlers' experiences. Findings demonstrate that a moving/paddling body is spontaneously a tactile-kinesthetic/kinetic, emotion-motion and intercorporeal body. These bodily dimensions enrich our understandings of the ways of learning new movements, doing sport and doing sport together. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper responds to the 'existence theory' proposed by Baert, Morgan and Ushiyama. It considers their proposals in light of two main thematics: the general account of human existence, and the more empirical sociology of existential milestones. Both elements are appraised in light of existentialist philosophy and earlier attempts at 'existentialist sociology'. It is suggested that the authors engage with generational theory, and also give an account of the commodification of significant life-stages by the milestones culture industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review paper marks the 70th anniversary of Current Sociology, the first journal founded by the International Sociological Association (ISA). The past seven decades have been a time of immense change within sociology and around the world, and the shifts within the structure and content of the journal mirror these transformations. Current Sociology today is a vastly different publication to the bibliography focused journal of 1952, and remains one of the top global sociology journals, and a proudly international publication. This short overview traces the history of Current Sociology across the decades, highlighting the work of the editors in guiding the development of the journal, and providing a glimpse into the development of the discipline, and the social developments of the past 70 years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does the discipline of Sociology need to be defended from fragmentation by the mobilisation of a canon derived from its classical legacy? The paper provides an exposition of the arguments of Turner, Susen and O'Neill concerning fragmentation of Sociology as a discipline. It investigates whether there is fragmentation or reinvigorated synthesis in three examples: inequality beyond class, posthumanism and postmodernism. It draws on a reading of contemporary theoretical developments in Sociology. It concludes that the classical legacy is important and that engagement with external forces has reinvigorated rather than fragmented the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This section introduces several articles related to Chinese sociology, published in the December 1989 issue of the Journal International Sociology.

In this paper I seek to delineate how the relationship between social work and sociology has been regarded in more recent years as represented by textbooks. In the light of such writing, I review the nature, themes and extent of sociological interest in social work in the past and the present. I set out a partial and provisional agenda for interlacing disciplinary and professional work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Howard Becker's practice of description has been debated, critiqued and reclaimed in a range of fields including sociology, anthropology, cultural studies, Science & Technology Studies, critical drug studies and more recently Heather Love's (2015) appraisal of deviance studies. Much of this debate concerns the uses of social research methods and their political effects. Taking up these issues with the construction of social scientific knowledge in Becker's work, this article returns to the methodological problem of description in Becker's research on drug use. Focusing on the legacy of Becker's empirical studies of deviance and the critiques of his research methods, it addresses the problem of description in the research process. In reviewing the methodological relevance of Becker's problem of description as a tool for thinking sociologically, the paper evaluates the contribution of descriptive methods for contemporary sociology and knowledge production. In so doing, it demonstrates how description is transformative of objects, problems and disciplinary practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to begin a consideration of the relationship between social work and home in the time of the Covid-19 global pandemic, where staying at home has become a matter of public health. It draws on my own experiences as a practising social worker as well as more personal reflections on the meaning of home, to suggest that social workers are uniquely placed to understand home. It suggests that despite this, we have perhaps lost sight of the emotional and spiritual necessity of home and that there are significant costs to doing so. As such, it calls for a re-centring of home within social work practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Home matters, for people's everyday life and for social research, in ways that are still lacking a systematic sociological framework of analysis. As a contribution toward this framework, we define home as an emplaced relationship that prioritizes certain socio-material contexts over others, by virtue of the emotional, affective and practical values attached to them, in forms and degrees that change over space and time. This understanding highlights the interdependence between relational, cultural and structural aspects of home as a distinctive social experience. We then connect the sociological debate with the discourse on home across social sciences more broadly, with a particular emphasis on the heuristics, practices and multiscalarity of home. In terms of practical research, the methodological bases of 'home studies' are still in development, also regarding the prospects of translating and comparing home across socio-cultural and spatial contexts. Nonetheless, this Special Issue of Current Sociology opens up new ways to advance the field of home studies – theoretically in our opening paper, and empirically in the six articles that follow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Epigenetic processes, and the investigative practices that take these as their focus, are of increasing interest to a range of professionals beyond biomedicine. This has been piqued by, especially, the belief that bioscientific research is demonstrating new molecular mechanisms through which the social and physical environment impact upon the bodies of humans and other animals. Beyond the laboratory, epigenetic notions are entangled with wider ideas about the malleability of the soma (e.g., relating to neuroscience). In many contexts (including, to an extent, education), this intertwinement has contributed to producing and valourising a conception of a particularly plastic body. In this paper, I draw on a range of biomedical and education-related texts in order to outline and reflect upon the notions of 'education' and 'epigenetics' that are supported through and propelled by an array of writings that, to greater or lesser extents, bring these spheres of praxis into conversation. Discussions of epigenetics and stress, for instance, are framing certain kinds of educational work (e.g., with new parents) as a means of intervening in soma and society. In so doing, they implicitly extend ideas about what education is and what it can do. On the other hand, writings from educational researchers, for example, are enrolling epigenetic findings and ideas to support various positions or approaches. Many education researchers will be sceptical of some of the more hyperbolic assertations made about the significance of epigenetics. However, the fact that a nascent discourse connecting education and epigenetics is emerging is suggestive of a need for reciprocal, thoughtful, and critical exchange with bioscientists who seek to address educational issues, or whose work is being enrolled by others to do so. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary : How does one go about doing or engaging in ethnomethodological study of local occasions? Would such study be of value for social workers, hence would it help them to understand the everyday accomplishment of practice as social work? Harold Garfinkel, the founder of ethnomethodology, argued that the task is to start with and to be in the midst of ordinary and everyday activities. A beginning in ordinary, mundane, and everyday activities is also to be surrounded by taken-for-granted understandings, frameworks, and facts or facticities. The focus on "facticities" of everyday things directs us to attend to utterly ordinary and mundane interactions, and here there is deep congruence with social work interests and practices. Findings: This paper turns to Garfinkel's oeuvre to set out in readily understandable language the orientation and tools needed for social workers to do ethnomethodological studies. A focal question is: Just how might social workers in the midst of practice actually go about engaging in EM? Application: By taking up tools from ethnomethodology, social workers can better understand and explicate the essential reflexivity of their everyday practice. As a result, EM provides a pathway for both understanding and teaching effective social work through a reflective and reflexive turn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

My sociological imagination was ignited in a small New England town, complete with rolling hills, farm fields, and forest, a three-classroom-schoolhouse, Methodist church, general store, and Town Hall. Given how much of the U.S. population resides outside of big city neighborhoods, I suspect that I am not alone in having first stretched my sociological muscles in terrain outside of the big city neighborhoods responsible for generating so many of the concepts and theories of community and urban sociology. In this context, Mattson's paper powerfully calls us to consider: what is an "urban sociology" of sexualities that does not just focus on big cities and their institutions? Forstie builds a very compelling argument about what we have missed by focusing on sexualities in the context of big cities and, secondarily, in rural areas. [Extracted from the article]

This paper explores key concepts in the writings of Weber in the years preceding the publication of the first edition of Karl Jaspers' Allgemeine Psychopathologie, focusing on the concept of understanding (Verstehen). This is a key hermeneutic concept and is discussed within the larger context of the epistemological and methodological reflections of both authors. They similarly tried to import the understanding within the humanistic disciplines as a rigorous but anti-reductionist scientific method. However, while Weber tried to mix explanation and understanding according to a legal metaphor, Jaspers retained Dilthey's sharper distinction between explanation in natural sciences and understanding in humanistic sciences. Finally, Jaspers' understanding is relatively more empathic, while Weber's understanding is more rationalistic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue of Cross-Cultural Research presents four papers each of which in their own way addresses the question of how Arctic populations tackle the high levels of unpredictability and risk associated with their environment. It takes as a starting point the evidence for and against aspects of disequilibrium between humans, animals, and their environment. The authors consider both contemporary and historical Indigenous Arctic populations and the dynamics of human–animal relations in the context of an ever-changing socioecology of the Arctic. Three overarching sources of disequilibrium are identified: (a) disruption in existing ecological networks due to climate and environmental upheaval, (b) effects of sociopolitical change (including migration and disease), and, finally, (c) changes to subsistence strategies. Based on contemporary field studies from across the Arctic, including the Ust'-Avam and Samoyed from the Taimyr Region in Russia, Sami in Finland, Yukagir and Chukchi from Siberia, and the historic Thule community from Greenland, the authors illustrate how, despite apparent disequilibria, there is nevertheless notable resilience evident in the coupling of human-environmental systems. Documenting past and present changes in local livelihoods, subsistence patterns, and sociocultural practices helps us understand the wider context in which these cultures persist. It also allows us to explore what factors are significant in supporting the long-term resilience of Indigenous communities, especially in the context of challenges, such as high levels of addiction, depression and suicide, facing contemporary arctic societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the United States, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is seeking to encourage researchers to move away from diagnostic tools like the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (the DSM). A key mechanism for this is the "Research Domain Criteria" (RDoC) initiative, closely associated with former NIMH Director Thomas Insel. This article examines how key figures in US (and UK) psychiatry construct the purpose, nature, and implications of the ambiguous RDoC project; that is, how its novelty is constituted through discourse. In this paper, I explore and analyze these actors' accounts of what is new, important, or (un)desirable about RDoC, demonstrating how they are constituted through institutional context and personal affects. In my interviews with mental health opinion leaders, RDoC is presented as overly reliant on neurobiological epistemologies, distant from clinical imaginaries and imperatives, and introduced in a top-down manner inconsistent with the professional norms of scientific research. Ultimately, the article aims to add empirical depth to current understandings about the epistemological and ontological politics of contemporary (US) psychiatry and to contribute to science and technology studies (STS) debates about "the new" in technoscience. Accordingly, I use discussions about RDoC as a case study in the sociology of novelty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores how social justice orientated education research might engage with emerging ideas and approaches from the new biological sciences, and suggests a biosocial future for empirical education research that connects molecular biology - epigenetics, nutrigenomics and neuroscience - with sociology of education. In beginning to consider what the biosocial means for education the paper works through two pressing questions 'what happens when we learn?' and 'are relationships important in the classroom?', bringing together emerging evidence across sociology, pedagogy, molecular biology and neuroscience. The paper shows how what we ask, how we go about doing research, and the sorts of answers that we might offer all shift with a biosocial orientation. While valid concerns continue to be raised by critical education researchers over some of the directions of research in the biological sciences and the policy uses of this, this paper advocates collaborative, inter-disciplinary research across social and biological sciences. Such biosocial research, it is argued, has the potential to develop hybrid conceptual frames; pose new types of questions; envisage research methodologies and methods in new ways; and offer profound new insights into the making of inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through a meta-literature review, this paper examines the changing contours of Chinese sociology of homosexuality in contemporary China. It unfolds the different theoretical orientations and methodologies that construct the modern male homosexual subject under major socio-economic and political changes. Chinese sociology of homosexuality started in the reform era and has been dominated by Western knowledge production and the political ideology of the communist party-state. Fused with the bio-medical model and the state's modernization project in the 1980s-1990s, the sociological study adopted a functionalist and positivistic approach with survey-based methodology in the main which focused on the etiology of homosexuality. A new transnational knowledge production of sociology of homosexuality has formed since the 2000s which has shifted towards a constructivist/ post-structuralist approach and reflexive qualitative methodology. The new sociological study examines the rise of male (as well as female) homosexual identity in China, questions the hetero/homosexual binary and discusses how an individual makes sense of homosexual identity to form same-sex intimate relationships. By tracing the epistemology of homosexuality in contemporary China, this paper rethinks the dominance of the Western construction and the role of the state in shaping the knowledge of homosexuality and proposes alternative spaces for theorizing Chinese sexual identities, desires and practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In what way can social action be simultaneously inquired into and ethically evaluated by social theory? This paper explores the responsibility sociology has with regard to the political and ethical implications of its knowledge production and does so through a case study examination of the sociological concept of role. It compares and evaluates the different orientations that ground the concept of role and Arendt's concept of action, which is then expanded to address the critique of the social sciences by theorists like Arendt and Foucault. The paper engages a particular tradition of reflexive sociology in the context of the danger of banal evil (Eichmann) and in the context of modern structures of domination that makes that danger more prevalent. Arguing that a theoretical non-empirical reflexivity is called for, and drawing on the phenomenological reflexivity of Berger and the constitutive reflexivity of Blum and McHugh, the paper seeks to demonstrate the need for a reflexive awareness of the actor's responsibility for action and the theorist's responsibility for formulating action that can make conceptual space for reasoned evaluation oriented by and to principle. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since Blau and Duncan's seminal work on social mobility, researchers have used subjective measures of occupational prestige to understand either the change or stability in generational socioeconomic statuses. While subjective measures of occupational prestige have been developed, the creation of measures of educational status and prestige that might serve as parallels to these measures has received less attention. In this paper, we attempt to create such a measure and then use it to test the relationship between educational status (measured through the status of college majors) and three important post-baccalaureate outcomes: income, educational attainment, and occupational prestige. Our results, based on a survey of 718 undergraduate seniors, shows that majors differ in prestige just as occupations do. Then, using the National Survey of College Graduates, we confirm that those differences are meaningful in predicting early career incomes, the attainment of an advanced degree, and the prestige rating of college graduates' occupations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Treatment interference (i.e., one unit’s potential outcomes depend on other units’ treatment) is prevalent in social settings. Ignoring treatment interference can lead to biased estimates of treatment effects and incorrect statistical inferences. Some recent studies have started to incorporate treatment interference into causal inference. But treatment interference is often assumed to follow a simple structure (e.g., treatment interference exists only within groups) or measured in a simplistic way (e.g., only based on the number of treated friends). In this paper, I highlight the importance of collecting data on actual treatment diffusion in order to more accurately measure treatment interference. Furthermore, I show that with accurate measures of treatment interference, we can identify and estimate a series of causal effects that are previously unavailable, including the direct treatment effect, treatment interference effect, and treatment effect on interference. I illustrate the methods through a case study of a social network–based smoking prevention intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]