The Unavoidable variety of social theories

Sociological Imagination and InvestigationLECTURE 9

Frequently made complaints

Why can’t Social Theorists agree on basic terms and approaches and get on with research?

Why do Sociologists re-visit the founding fathers (when most natural scientists don’t)?

Why do Social Theorists write books disagreeing with one another, instead of telling us something new about the social?

All knowledge is conceptually formed (1)

Theories are propositions, that is statements that are true or false.

Take 3 examples

A. ‘Big cats are dangerous to people’

B. ‘It’s been snowing, so we can go out and make a snowman’

C. ‘We (Brazilian men) are red macaws’

All knowledge is conceptually formed (2)

Look at the words in italics, which are concepts too We don’t find the world labelled by them We learn them as part of natural language All languages are storehouses of concepts, but they

DO NOT conceptualize the world in the same way

AND some concepts are more useful than others; compare ‘wasting disease’ [a tautology], with ‘consumption’ [another tautology] with ‘tuberculosis’

All knowledge is conceptually formed (3)

In English ‘Big cats are dangerous’ is both true and false [which CANNOT BE]

All knowledge is conceptually formed (4)

Inuit has 12 words for ‘snow’ Enabling Eskimos to say (in effect) “It’s snowing

impactable snow” Because snow is more important to their lives English speakers have to go out and try But English speakers can learn Inuit and then

make the same discriminations All languages are ‘borrowers’: ‘jodhpurs’,

‘pyjamas’, ‘Royal Air Force’, ‘Mafia’

All knowledge is conceptually formed (5)

‘We (Brazilian men) are red macaws’

Sense data does not come as ‘labelled pictures’

Concepts (in natural and technical languages) carve the world up differently

They affect how we know it (EPISTEMOLOGY) But this DOES NOT mean (ONTOLOGICALLY)

that ‘we live in different worlds’ AND concepts change meaning/referents over

time. Think of ‘childhood’, ‘youth’, ‘adulthood’, ‘old’ and the saying “60 is the new 40”

We study Durkheim, Marx & Weber because there is no agreement about the appropriate way to conceptualise society

Individualism versus Collectivism Should concepts of society refer only to aggregates of

‘individual properties’? (INDIVIDUALISM) E.g. Army is the plural of soldierE.g. The ‘Lower class is all those earning below the

minimum wage’ Because we know ‘people exist’ We know they exercise ‘causal powers’ – so no

‘reification’ Weber advocates this in Theory of Soc & Econ Org. but

does not stick to it in his studies of world religions

The Collectivism of Durkheim & Marx

The relational properties and powers of ‘collectivities’ cannot always be reduced to concepts referring to ‘interpersonal relationships’ or aggregate properties

Consider Marx’s concept of ‘capital’ as opposed to money

Consider how both thought the ‘division of labour’ was a relational property

However, they differ conceptually, because D held we should only study (collectivist) ‘social facts’; M included both individual & collective concepts

Subjectivism and Objectivism

Can we derive our concepts solely from people’s ideas about the social world (from their SUBJECTIVE meanings)? This is not Weber but Constructionism

Or should concepts include objective social features of which people may not be aware, even though they are influenced by them? E.g. ‘ideology’, ‘finance market operations’, ‘debt culture’.

Subjectivism and Objectivism (2)An example

Think about the effects of inflation on those with fixed incomes.

1. Objective constraints are undeniable, despite their understanding

2. But their subjectivity explains what they actually do

Conclusion: you have to decideabout these 2 conceptual debates

These debates are not superimposed There are 3 positions possible on each

Opt for one side of each debate Opt for the other side Work at combining them, by answering:How are structure and agency related (e.g. Marx:

how does a ‘class in itself’ become a ‘class for itself?

How are objectivism and subjectivism related (e.g. personal choice within social constraints)