Back to Search
Start Over
Counting the dead and regulating the living: early modern statistics and the formation of the sociological imagination (1662-1897).
- Source :
-
The British journal of sociology [Br J Sociol] 2009 Sep; Vol. 60 (3), pp. 603-21. - Publication Year :
- 2009
-
Abstract
- This paper examines the contributions made by early modern statistical literature to the formation of the sociological imagination. Starting in the mid-seventeenth century, the fields of 'political arithmetic' and vital and moral statistics provided a discursive framework within which it became possible to identify and study aggregate dynamics and structures underlying seemingly random and episodic aspects of life (birth, death, divorce, health). Focusing primarily on developments in England, the paper identifies three significant watershed moments in the emergence of the sociological imagination: the discovery of the political and economic dimensions of life; the articulation of socio-statistical patterns underlying various life events and episodes; and the establishment of causal connections between social variables and individual choices. These developments did not amount to or directly result in the creation of the discipline of sociology, yet, they made it possible to make conceptual connections between the personal and the social.
- Subjects :
- England
History, 17th Century
History, 18th Century
History, 19th Century
History, 20th Century
History, 21st Century
Humans
Imagination
Life Change Events
Morals
Politics
Risk Assessment history
Social Environment
Social Values
Socioeconomic Factors
Models, Psychological
Models, Statistical
Sociology history
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 1468-4446
- Volume :
- 60
- Issue :
- 3
- Database :
- MEDLINE
- Journal :
- The British journal of sociology
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 19703179
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-4446.2009.01260.x