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The Socialist Ideas of the British Left’s Alternative Economic Strategy
by Baris TufekciThis book provides the first book-length study of the political and economic ideas of the British left’s Alternative Economic Strategy in the 1970s and early 1980s. Discussing the AES’s approaches to capitalism, the nation state and the working class, it argues that existing academic accounts have significantly overstated the radicalism of the strategy. Perhaps more notable, especially in the light of its stated ‘revolutionary’ aims, was the extent of its moderation – its continuities with post-war Labour revisionism, its marked reluctance to look beyond the market economy, the degree of its preoccupation with Britain’s global-economic status, and its inability to break with Labourist politics of class co-operation in the national interest. While the book argues that the AES was the last ‘class politics’ socialist initiative in mainstream British politics, it also explores the ways in which its ideas perhaps prepared the way for New Labour in the 1990s, and its relationship with 'Corbynism' since 2015.
The Socialist Party of America: A Complete History
by Jack RossAt a time when the word “socialist” is but one of numerous political epithets that are generally divorced from the historical context of America’s political history, The Socialist Party of America presents a new, mature understanding of America’s most important minor political party of the twentieth century. From the party’s origins in the labor and populist movements at the end of the nineteenth century, to its heyday with the charismatic Eugene V. Debs, and to its persistence through the Depression and the Second World War under the steady leadership of “America’s conscience,” Norman Thomas, The Socialist Party of America guides readers through the party’s twilight, ultimate demise, and the successor groups that arose following its collapse.Based on archival research, Jack Ross’s study challenges the orthodoxies of both sides of the historiographical debate as well as assumptions about the Socialist Party in historical memory. Ross similarly covers the related emergence of neoconservatism and other facets of contemporary American politics and assesses some of the more sensational charges from the right about contemporary liberalism and the “radicalism” of Barack Obama.
The Socially Concerned Today
by John Kenneth GalbraithIn this Brief, Accessible Book, The Distinguished Teacher and former President of the American Economic Association, John Kenneth Galbraith, records his views on such critical subjects as what the goals of a socially concerned society should be today, reflections on the principles of distribution of wealth, flaws in the market system, the state of higher education, and related aspects of society and the economy.
The Socially Just School
by John Smyth Barry Down Peter McinerneyThis book explores schools and how they can function as social institutions that advance the interests and life chances of all young people, especially those who are already the most marginalized and at an educational disadvantage. Social justice is a key theme as the book examines the needs of youth, the concept of school culture, school/community relations, socially critical pedagogy, curriculum and leadership and a socially critical approach to work. The Socially Just School is based upon four decades of intensive writing and researching of young lives. This work presents an alternative to the damaging school reform in which schools are made to serve the interests of the economy, education systems, the military, corporate or national interests. Readers will discover the hallmarks of socially just schools: - They educationally engage young people regardless of class, race, family or neighbourhood location and they engage them around their own educational aspirations. - They regard all young people as being morally entitled to a rewarding and satisfying experience of school, not only those whose backgrounds happen to fit with the values of schools. - They treat young people as having strengths and being 'at promise' rather than being 'at risk' and with 'deficits' or as 'bundles of pathologies' to be remedied or 'fixed'. - They are 'active listeners' to the lives and cultures of their students and communities and they construct learning experiences that are embedded in young lives. This highly readable book will appeal to students and scholars in education and sociology, as well as to teachers and school administrators with an interest in social justice.
The Societal Impact of Technology (Routledge Revivals)
by Savvas A. KatsikidesPublished in 1998. This text is concerned with research issues within the context of the emerging information age. The book draws together research which is devoted to key questions examining the relationship between the various and widely discussed developments of technological systems and their societal impacts. Increasing interest and research into the information society and their euphorical assumptions is creating a wide spectrum of societal criticism. Computer supported work for instance has led to the development of innovative organizational processes based on technological developments and communications paradigms. In particular the focus is centred on the perspectives of such Networking Entities and their many varied implications. The book links sociology with technology and aims to lead it to wider discussions of the above issues.
The Society of Mind
by Marvin MinskyMarvin Minsky -- one of the fathers of computer science and co-founder of the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at MIT -- gives a revolutionary answer to the age-old question: "How does the mind work?" Minsky brilliantly portrays the mind as a "society" of tiny components that are themselves mindless. Mirroring his theory, Minsky boldly casts The Society of Mind as an intellectual puzzle whose pieces are assembled along the way. Each chapter -- on a self-contained page -- corresponds to a piece in the puzzle. As the pages turn, a unified theory of the mind emerges, like a mosaic. Ingenious, amusing, and easy to read, The Society of Mind is an adventure in imagination.
The Society of Timid Souls
by Polly MorlandA journey into the modern life of an ancient virtue - bravery - and a quest to understand who might possess it and how With The Society of Timid Souls, or How To Be Brave, documentary filmmaker Polly Morland sets out to investigate bravery, a quality that she has always felt she lacked. The book takes inspiration from a vividly eccentric, and radical, self-help group for stage-frightened performers in 1940s Manhattan, which coincided with the terrifying height of World War II and was called The Society of Timid Souls. Seventy years later, as anxiety about everything from terrorism to economic meltdown continues, Morland argues that courage has become a virtue in crisis. We are, she says, all Timid Souls now. Despite a career in which she has filmed in rebel-held Colombian jungles and at the edge of Balkan mass graves, interviewing convicted murderers, drug-traffickers, and terrorists, Morland herself has never felt brave. Often, the very reverse. So she sets out to discover how and why courage is achieved in an age of anxiety and whether it might even be learned. Drawing on her interviews and encounters with soldiers and civilians, bullfighters and big-wave surfers, dissidents fighting for freedom and cancer patients fighting for their lives, Morland examines bravery across the spectrum: from the first childhood act of defiance by Bernard Lafayette, a leader of the civil rights movement who later faced down the KKK in Alabama, or the reflexive will-to-survive of Vjollca Berisha, a Kosovo Albanian who endured a massacre by playing dead among the bodies of her own family, to the small acts of everyday bravery that quietly punctuate our lives, in schoolyards, labor wards, and hospices the world over. Along the way, Morland draws attention to some of the myths of bravery that have been conjured and perpetuated over time and argues that, often, courage exists as much in the telling as in the doing. At once an exploration of what bravery means and a chronicle of the author's personal journey among those who embody it, The Society of Timid Souls is a profound, approachable meditation on this most valued and mysterious of human qualities. In setting off on the trail of the lionhearted, Polly Morland finds out a great deal about what makes some of us extraordinary, and what of the extraordinary we all share.From the Hardcover edition.
The Society of the Spectacle
by Guy DebordFew works of political and cultural theory have been as enduringly provocative as Guy Debord’s Society of the Spectacle. From its publication amid the social upheavals of the 1960s to the present, the volatile theses of this book have decisively transformed debates on the shape of modernity, capitalism, and everyday life in the late twentieth century. Now finally available in a superb English translation approved by the author, Debord’s text remains as crucial as ever for understanding the contemporary effects of power, which are increasingly inseparable from the new virtual worlds of our rapidly changing image / information culture. <P><P>“In all that has happened in the last twenty years, the most important change lies in the very continuity of the spectacle. Quite simply, the spectacle’s domination has succeeded in raising a whole generation moulded to its laws. The extraordinary new conditions in which this entire generation has lived constitute a comprehensive summary of all that, henceforth, the spectacle will forbid; and also all that it will permit.”— Guy Debord (1988)
The Socio-Cognitive Approach to Communication and Pragmatics (Perspectives in Pragmatics, Philosophy & Psychology #33)
by Istvan KecskesThe book aims to serve as a theoretical framework for the socio-cognitive approach (SCA) that is an alternative to the two main lines of pragmatics research: linguistic-philosophical pragmatics and sociocultural-interactional pragmatics. SCA broadens the scope of the field with an intent to incorporate not only L1 communication but also intercultural communication, and communication in a second language. The author integrates the pragmatic view of cooperation and the cognitive view of egocentrism and emphasizes that both cooperation and egocentrism are manifested in all phases of communication, albeit to varying extents. SCA places equal importance on the social and cognitive individual factors in pragmatics. The author claims that while (social) cooperation is an intention-directed practice that is governed by relevance, (individual) egocentrism is an attention-oriented trait dominated by salience.The book serves as a theoretical guide for researchers and students who would like to understand how we need to change first language-based theories to make sense of what happens not only in L1 but also in intercultural and multi-lingual interactions.
The Socio-Ethical Dimension of Knowledge: The Mission of Logical Empiricism (Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook #26)
by Christian Damböck Adam Tamas TubolyThis book studies how the relationship between philosophy, morality, politics, and science was conceived in the Vienna Circle and how this group of philosophers tried to position science as an antidote to totalitarianism and irrationalism. This leads to investigation of the still understudied views of the Vienna Circle on moral philosophy, meta-ethics, and the relationship between philosophy of science and politics. Including papers from an international group of scholars, The Socio-ethical Dimension of Knowledge: The Mission of Logical Empiricism addresses these topics and makes them available to scholars in the field of history of philosophy of science.
The Socioecological Educator: A 21st Century Renewal of Physical, Health,Environment and Outdoor Education
by Amy Cutter-Mackenzie Justen O'Connor Ruth Jeanes Trent Brown Laura Alfrey Brian WattchowThis volume offers an alternative vision for education and has been written for those who are passionate about teaching and learning, in schools, universities and in the community, and providing people with the values, knowledge and skills needed to face complex social and environmental challenges. Working across boundaries the socio-ecological educator is a visionary who strives to build community connections and strengthen relationships with the natural world. The ideas and real-world case studies presented in this book will bring that vision a step closer to reality.
The Socioeconomics of Nationalism in China: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives (Routledge Studies in the Modern World Economy)
by C. Simon FanThis book analyzes Chinese nationalism from the perspective of social economics. It posits a conceptual framework in which national status is treated as a "luxury" while material consumption is considered as a "necessity" in people’s preferences, which implies that popular nationalism tends to increase with economic development. The book extensively uses the tools of game theory and behavioral economics to analyze inter-ethnical and international conflicts in historical and contemporary China. The author’s economic approach to the subject of nationalism brings fresh and critical insights into the Chinese historical events and relations with foreign countries. For example, it helps resolve the following puzzles: Why did most Chinese support an ethnic minority, the Manchus, to be their ruler after the collapse of the Ming dynasty? In the Boxer Rebellion, why did the Qing dynasty declare war against more than eight foreign powers when it knew well that any of the countries could defeat China easily? What are the fundamental causes of the 1962 Sino-Indian War and the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese War? Who is responsible for the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade? This book attempts to answer the questions based on the theories of social economics and rational choice, which will interest those researching on nationalism, China studies, international relations, history and political economy.
The Sociolinguistics of Written Identity: Constructing a Self
by John S. SchmitThis book examines the ways in which a writer’s presentation of self can achieve or impede access to power. Conversations about written voice and style have traditionally revolved around the aesthetics of stylistic choice. These choices, while they help establish a writer’s presence in a text, too often ignore the needs of written identity as it crosses genres, disciplines, and rhetorical purposes. In contrast to stylistic investigations of a writer’s "voice" and its various components—diction, detail, imagery, syntax, and tone, for example—this book focuses on language variation and the linguistic features of a writer’s presence in a text, as well as the establishment of a writer’s social, cultural, and personal identity in a given text. The author attempts to explain the methods by which writers present themselves to their audiences. This book will be of particular interest to students and teachers of rhetoric and composition studies, as well as writers more broadly.
The Sociological Predicament: Academia and the Contradictions of Working Class Consciousness
by Alexander ThomasA sociological phenomenon afflicts sociology itself: academics think of themselves as the vanguard of the working class despite the fact that they are not working class, as the noble willingness to side with the oppressed contrasts scholars’ reliance on authority to bolster their politics.While there are no simple solutions to this contradiction, a necessary beginning is for sociologists (and other academics) to acknowledge the reality of their own class privilege as members of the professional-managerial class. The Sociological Predicament is then a conscious and deliberate work of professional self-loathing that traces the evolution of ideologies found in academia from the mid-twentieth century to today, which demonstrates the ways in which biases around class have given short shrift to the concerns of working class Americans in deindustrialized cities and towns that have ultimately turned away from and then against them.Intellectuals have not historically been on the side of the oppressed but have been instrumental in developing ideologies that sustain the status quo, and this book crucially asks whether academics’ presence on the left ultimately serves conservative ends.
The Sociology of Compromise after Conflict (Palgrave Studies in Compromise after Conflict)
by John D. BrewerThis book introduces a new and original sociological conceptualization of compromise after conflict and is based on six-years of study amongst victims of conflict in Northern Ireland, South Africa and Sri Lanka, with case studies from Sierra Leone and Colombia. A sociological approach to compromise is contrasted with approaches in Moral and Political Philosophy and is evaluated for its theoretical utility and empirical robustness with in-depth interview data from victims of conflicts around the globe. The individual chapters are written to illustrate, evaluate and test the conceptualization using the victim data, and an afterword reflects on the new empirical agenda in victim research opened up by a sociological approach to compromise. This volume is part of a larger series of works from a programme advancing a sociological approach to peace processes with a view to seeing how orthodox approaches within International Relations and Political Science are illuminated by the application of the sociological imagination.
The Sociology of Education (Routledge Library Editions: Sociology of Education #40)
by P W MusgraveFirst published in 1979, this third edition of The Sociology of Education at the time held the field as the standard textbook on the subject. It takes into account the changes that occurred in the field from the publication of the first edition in 1965 and the second edition in 1972. The book is divided into three parts: the first considers the way in which the child becomes a social being and the influences upon them of the family, the peer group and the mass media; the second deals with the sociology of schooling and looks at different types and stages of schools, as well as the attitudes and forms of interaction within them; and finally the third traces the relationship between education and social institutions, and looks at the balance between the preservation of social stability and the introduction of change.
The Sociology of Education: Introductory Analytical Perspectives (Routledge Library Editions: Sociology of Education #54)
by Donald Francis SwiftFirst published in 1969, this book examines the educational process as a whole in relation to its society. The discussion is set within a specifically sociological frame of reference and looks at the school as an organisation as well as the social environment surrounding the school. It concludes by considering some of the basic issues concerning the functions of education for society. Written at a time when sociological studies of education were scarce, this ground-breaking work will be of interest to those studying education and its relationship with society.
The Sociology of Educational Inequality (Routledge Library Editions: Education)
by William TylerWhat is the most significant factor for explaining why some individuals are more successful than others – genetic inheritance, privileged background or luck? Although conventional approaches stress the prime importance of one of these, Tyler argues that such theories fail to deal adequately with the complexity of educational inequality and suggests that Boudon’s model of opportunity and mobility would provide us with a more productive explanation. By applying this model to post-war British education he shows how we might effectively think our approaches to the ‘cycle of deprivation’, comprehensive reform and educational spending.
The Sociology of Knowledge: Toward a Deeper Understanding of the History of Ideas (International Library Of Sociology Ser.)
by Werner StarkThis volume serves as both an introduction to the field of the sociology of knowledge and an interpretation of the thought of the major figures associated with its development More than a compendium of ideas, Stark seeks here to put order into what he regarded as a diffuse tradition of diverse bodies of thought, in particular the seemingly irreconcilable conflict between the study of the political element in thought identified here with Karl Mannheim and the investigation of the social element in thinking associated with the work of Max Scheler.The sociology of knowledge is primarily directed toward the study of the precise ways that human experience, through the mediation of knowledge, takes on a conscious and communicable shape. While both schools dealt with by Stark assume that the pursuit of truth is not purposeful apart from socially and historically determined structures of meaning, the tradition extending from Marx to Mannheim seeks to expose hidden factors that turn us away from the truth while that of Weber and Scheler attempts to identify social forces that impart a definite direction to our search for itIn order to reconcile opposing theoretical positions, Stark seeks to lay the foundations for a theory of the social determination of thought by directing his inquiry to the philosophical problem of truth in a manner compatible with cultural sociology. Stark's theoretical legacy to the sociology of knowledge is that social influences operate everywhere through a group's ethos. From this, many systems of ideas and social categories emanate, revealing partial glimpses of a synthetic whole.The outcome of Stark's work is a general theory of social determination remarkably consistent with contemporary interests in the broad range of cultural studies, whose focus is best described as the use of philosophical, literary, and historical approaches to study the social construction of meaning. The Sociology of Knowledge will be of great interest to social scientists, philosophers, and intellectual historians.
The Sociology of Literature
by Gisèle SapiroThe Sociology of Literature is a pithy primer on the history, affordances, and potential futures of this growing field of study, which finds its origins in the French Enlightenment, and its most salient expression as a sociological pursuit in the work of Pierre Bourdieu. Addressing the epistemological premises of the field at present, the book also refutes the common criticism that the sociology of literature does not take the text to be the central object of study. From this rebuttal, Gisèle Sapiro, the field's leading theorist, is able to demonstrate convincingly one of the greatest affordances of the discipline: its in-built methods for accounting for the roles and behaviors of agents and institutions (publishing houses, prize committees, etc.) in the circulation and reception of texts. While Sapiro emphasizes the rich interdisciplinary nature of the approach on display, articulating the way in which it draws on literary history, sociology, postcolonial studies, book history, gender studies, and media studies, among others, the book also stands as a defense of the sociology of literature as a discipline in its own right.
The Sociology of Philosophies
by Randall CollinsRandall Collins traces the movement of philosophical thought in ancient Greece, China, Japan, India, the medieval Islamic and Jewish world, medieval Christendom, and modern Europe. What emerges from this history is a social theory of intellectual change, one that avoids both the reduction of ideas to the influences of society at large and the purely contingent local construction of meanings. Instead, Collins focuses on the social locations where sophisticated ideas are formed: the patterns of intellectual networks and their inner divisions and conflicts.
The Sociology of Political Praxis (RLE (RLE (RLE (RLE (RLE (RLE (RLE (RLE: Gramsci): An Introduction to Gramsci's Theory
by Leonardo SalaminiThis volume analyses the philosophical nature of Gramsci’s Marxism and its Hegelian source, the radical critique of the economistic tradition and the original analyses of the role of superstructures, ideology, consciousness and subjectivity in the revolutionary process. It relates the central themes of Gramsci’s writings, such as hegemony, ‘historical blocs’, the role of intellectuals and political praxis, to the more peripheral ones, such as science, language, literature and art. The introduction includes a brief intellectual biography of Gramsci.
The Sociology of Postmarxism (Routledge Advances in Sociology)
by Richard HowsonPostmarxism is often depicted as a point of intersection for a set of inter-disciplinary theories that are in themselves complex and dense. Bringing the postmarxist theory of Ernesto Laclau into the field of political sociology through a close reading and analysis of postmarxism and its relationship to ‘the social’, A Sociology of Postmarxism develops key postmarxist arguments in an engaging and sociologically applicable way. Indeed, through a threefold method of analysis, Howson first unpacks the relationship between ‘the social’ and ‘the political’ by analysing key allied theories to show where the points of connection occur. This is then followed by an insightful analysis of the key features of postmarxist theory such as antagonism and the inevitability of social dislocation, the political importance of hegemony; and the empty signifier thesis and equivalence to show how such theory can be applied at a sociological level. Finally, through the use of sociological categories such as masculinities, migration and social capital, the foregoing theoretical analyses are synthesised to show the social nature of postmarxism and particularly in the context of aspiration and co-operation. This enlightening volume will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as postdoctoral researchers who are interested in fields such as Political Sociology, Post Marxist Political Theory and Social Theory.
The Sociology of School Organization: Contemporary Sociology of the School (Routledge Library Editions: Sociology of Education #30)
by Ronald KingFirst published in 1983, this volume assembles recent theory on school organization, drawing on a wide range of research, mainly on schools in contemporary Britain but with some illuminating historical and overseas comparisons. It examines elements of organization both within and outside the school, and shows how they vary with the age, sex, ethnicity and social class of pupils, as well as school size and efficiency. It argues how, with understanding, organizational patterns may be changed to respond to new objectives and how they may become more effective and responsive to human needs in schools and classrooms.
The Sociology of Teaching
by Waller Willard"The Sociology of Teaching" by Waller Willard is a groundbreaking exploration of the complex social dynamics that shape the educational environment. Willard, a pioneering sociologist, provides a comprehensive analysis of the interactions between teachers, students, and the institutional structures within which they operate. This seminal work delves into the sociological aspects of teaching, offering profound insights into the roles, relationships, and cultural norms that influence the educational process.Willard's detailed examination covers various dimensions of the teaching profession, including the authority and social status of teachers, the impact of organizational culture on educational practices, and the intricate socialization processes that occur within schools. He explores the ways in which teachers' identities and behaviors are shaped by their social contexts, as well as the expectations and pressures imposed by society and educational institutions.One of the key contributions of "The Sociology of Teaching" is its analysis of the teacher-student relationship. Willard investigates how power dynamics, communication patterns, and social expectations influence interactions in the classroom. He highlights the reciprocal nature of this relationship, showing how both teachers and students affect and are affected by each other's behaviors and attitudes.Willard also addresses the broader societal implications of education, discussing how schools serve as agents of socialization, transmit cultural values, and contribute to social stratification. His work underscores the importance of understanding the social context of teaching to develop more effective educational policies and practices."The Sociology of Teaching" is an essential read for educators, sociologists, and policymakers interested in the intersection of education and society. Willard's rigorous research and insightful analysis provide a valuable framework for examining the social dimensions of teaching, making this book a timeless resource for those seeking to understand and improve the educational system.