Anthony Giddens and Modern Social Theory
Anthony Giddens and Modern Social Theory

Author: Kenneth Tucker

Publisher: SAGE

Published: 1998-09-24

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 0857022873

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Anthony Giddens is widely recognized as one of the most important sociologists of the post-war period. This is the first full-length work to examine Giddens′ social theory. It guides the reader through Giddens′ early attempt to overcome the duality of structure and agency. He saw this duality as a major failing of social theories of modernity. His attempt to resolve the problem can be regarded as the key to the development of his brandmark `structuration theory′. The book is the most complete and thorough assessment of Giddens′ work currently available. It incorporates insights from many different perspectives into his theory of structuration, his work on the formation of cultural identities and the fate of the nation-state. This far-reaching work also touches on issues such as the transformation of modern intimacy and sexuality, and the fate of politics in late modern society.

Modern Reconstruction of Classical Thought: Talcott Parsons
Modern Reconstruction of Classical Thought: Talcott Parsons

Author: Jeffrey Alexander

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-04-03

Total Pages: 559

ISBN-13: 1317808614

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In this volume the author maintains that sociology must learn to combine the insights of both Durkheim and Marx and that it can only do so on the presuppositional ground that Weber set forth. Alexander maintains that the idealist and materialist traditions must be transformed into analytic dimensions of multidimensional and synthetic theory. This volume focusses on the writing of Talcott Parsons, the only modern thinker who can be considered a true peer of the classical founders, and examines his own profoundly ambivalent attempt to carry out this analytic transformation.

The Meaning of General Theoretical Sociology
The Meaning of General Theoretical Sociology

Author: Thomas J. Fararo

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1992-07-31

Total Pages: 412

ISBN-13: 9780521437950

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This book sets out a generative structuralist conception of general theoretical sociology; its philosophy, its problems, and its methods. The field is defined as a comprehensive research tradition with many intersecting subtraditions that share conceptual components.

The New Blackwell Companion to Social Theory
The New Blackwell Companion to Social Theory

Author: Bryan S. Turner

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2016-09-26

Total Pages: 642

ISBN-13: 1119250749

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A comprehensive new collection covering the principal traditions and critical contemporary issues of social theory. Builds on the success of The Blackwell Companion to Social Theory, second edition with substantial revisions, entirely new contributions, and a fresh editorial direction Explores contemporary areas such as actor network theory, social constructionism, human rights and cosmopolitanism Includes chapters on demography, science and technology studies, and genetics and social theory Emphasizes key areas of sociology which have had an important impact in shaping the discipline as a whole

Theoretical Logic in Sociology
Theoretical Logic in Sociology

Author: Jeffrey C. Alexander

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-03-11

Total Pages: 1669

ISBN-13: 1317807057

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This four volume work, originally published in the 1980s and out of print for some years, represents a major attempt to redirect the course of contemporary sociological thought. Jeffrey Alexander analyses the most general and fundamental elements of sociological thinking about action and order and their ramifications for empirical study. He insists that sociological thought need not choose between voluntary action and social constraint. The four volumes can be read independently of one another as each presents a distinctive theoretical argument in its own right. The first volume is directed at contemporary problems and controversies, not only in ‘theory’ but in the philosophy and sociology of science. The last three volumes make interpretations, confronting the individual theorists, and the secondary literature, on their own terms.

Handbook of Sociological Theory
Handbook of Sociological Theory

Author: Jonathan H. Turner

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2006-11-22

Total Pages: 731

ISBN-13: 0387362746

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This wide-ranging handbook presents in-depth discussions on the array of subspecialties that comprise the field of sociological theory. Prominent theorists working in a variety of traditions discuss methodologies and strategies; the cultural turn in sociological theorizing; interaction processes; theorizing from the systemic and macro level; new directions in evolutionary theorizing; power, conflict, and change; and theorizing from assumptions of rationality.

The Theory of Communicative Action: Volume 2
The Theory of Communicative Action: Volume 2

Author: Juergen Habermas

Publisher: Beacon Press

Published: 1985-03-01

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 9780807014011

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Juergen Habermas opens Volume 2 with a brilliant reinterpretation of Mead and Durkheim and then develops his own approach to society, combining two hitherto competing paradigms, "system" and "lifeworld." The strength of this combination is then demonstrated in a detailed critique of Parsons's theory of social systems. Concluding with a critical reconstruction of the Weberan and Marxian treatment of modernity and its discontents, Habermas sets a new agenda for the critical theory of contemporary society. The combination of historical and theoretical sweep, analytical acumen and synthetic power, imagination and engagement mark this as one of the great works of twentieth-century social theory.

Founders, Classics, Canons
Founders, Classics, Canons

Author: Peter Baehr

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-09-08

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 1351519301

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Founders, classics, and canons have been vitally important in helping to frame sociology's identity. Within the academy today, a number of positions feminist, postmodernist, postcolonial question the status of "tradition."In Founders, Classics, Canons, Peter Baehr defends the continuing importance of sociology's classics and traditions in a university education. Baehr offers arguments against interpreting, defending, and attacking sociology's great texts and authors in terms of founders and canons. He demonstrates why, in logical and historical terms, discourses and traditions cannot actually be "founded" and why the term "founder" has little explanatory content. Equally, he takes issue with the notion of "canon" and argues that the analogy between the theological canon and sociological classic texts, though seductive, is mistaken.Although he questions the uses to which the concepts of founder, classic, and canon have been put, Baehr is not dismissive. On the contrary, he seeks to understand the value and meaning these concepts have for the people who employ them in the cultural battle to affirm or attack the liberal university tradition.

Positivism, Presupposition and Current Controversies (Theoretical Logic in Sociology)
Positivism, Presupposition and Current Controversies (Theoretical Logic in Sociology)

Author: Jeffrey C. Alexander

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-04-24

Total Pages: 256

ISBN-13: 1317808827

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This volume begins by challenging the bases of the recent scientization of sociology. Then it challenges some of the ambitious claims of recent theoretical debate. The author not only reinterprets the most important classical and modern sociological theories but extracts from the debates the elements of a more satisfactory, inclusive approach to these general theoretical points.

Talcott Parsons on Economy and Society (RLE Social Theory)
Talcott Parsons on Economy and Society (RLE Social Theory)

Author: Bryan S. Turner

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-08-27

Total Pages: 136

ISBN-13: 1317652258

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'In this remarkable collection of essays, Holton and Turner demonstrate that Parsonian sociology addresses the most central problems of our time – issues of sickness and health, power and inequality, the nature of capitalism and its possible alternatives. They develop a mature and original perspective on Parsons as the only classical theorist who avoided crippling nostalgia. Holton and Turner not only talk about Parsonian sociology in a profound and insightful way, they do it, and do it well. As sociology moves away from the rigid dichotomies of earlier debate, this book will help point the way.' – Jeffrey Alexander, Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in Sociology, UCLA