What Use is Sociology? E-Book

Zygmunt Bauman

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Seitenzahl: 186

Beschreibung

What's the use of sociology? The question has been asked often enough and it leaves a lingering doubt in the minds of many. At a time when there is widespread scepticism about the value of sociology and of the social sciences generally, this short book by one of the world's leading thinkers offers a passionate, engaging and important statement of the need for sociology. In a series of conversations with Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester, Zygmunt Bauman explains why sociology is necessary if we hope to live fully human lives. But the kind of sociology he advocates is one which sees 'use' as more than economic success and knowledge as more than the generation of facts. Bauman makes a powerful case for the practice of sociology as an ongoing dialogue with human experience, and in so doing he issues a call for us all to start questioning the common sense of our everyday lives. He also offers the clearest statement yet of the principles which inform his own work, reflecting on his life and career and on the role of sociology in our contemporary liquid-modern world. This book stands as a testimony to Bauman's belief in the enduring relevance of sociology. But it is also a call to us all to start questioning the world in which we live and to transform ourselves from being the victims of circumstance into the makers of our own history. For that, at the end of the day, is the use of sociology.

Leseprobe

What Use Is Sociology?

What Use IsSociology?

Zygmunt Bauman

Conversations withMichael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester

polity

Copyright © Zygmunt Bauman, Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester

2014

The right of Zygmunt Bauman, Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester to be identified as Authors of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2014 by Polity Press

Polity Press65 Bridge StreetCambridge CB2 1UR, UK

Polity Press 350 Main StreetMalden, MA 02148, USA

All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-0-7456-7988-4

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

The publisher has used its best endeavours to ensure that the URLs for external websites referred to in this book are correct and active at the time of going to press. However, the publisher has no responsibility for the websites and can make no guarantee that a site will remain live or that the content is or will remain appropriate.

Every effort has been made to trace all copyright holders, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publisher will be pleased to include any necessary credits in any subsequent reprint or edition.

For further information on Polity, visit our website: www.politybooks.com

Contents

Preface

Introduction

1  What is sociology?

2  Why do sociology?

3  How to do sociology?

4  What does sociology achieve?

Preface

This little book seeks to encourage sociologists to identify themselves as the active subjects of a way of addressing the world rather than the value-free technicians of an alleged science. The text consists of four conversations with Zygmunt Bauman, carried out between January 2012 and March 2013, combined with responses to questions, recordings of personal meetings between the three of us, letters and fragments from a couple of texts Bauman has published in less accessible outlets. The material has been arranged into loosely thematic strands in order to establish continuities, resonances and, sometimes, to leave threads deliberately dangling. We have tidied up the grammar where necessary (written English is, we noticed, often very different from spoken English and the latter sometimes looks extremely clumsy on the page) but deliberately done little else to the material. The aim has been to inspire a conversation going beyond the conversations in the book.

The intention is that the book will be used by current and future sociologists to encourage fresh reflection about what we do, why, how and who it is for. It is also an example of a possible different way of writing sociology. The form and content of the book go together. Throughout the aim is to encourage sociologists to apply to our own practice the moral and political message of Bauman’s work: there is an alternative but it is up to us to make it.

Michael Hviid Jacobsen and Keith Tester

the less managerial, even anti-managerial, more traditional, humanistic variation of sociology … aims at making human behaviour less predictable by activating inner, motivational sources of decision – supplying human beings with ampler knowledge of their situation and so enlarging the sphere of their freedom of choice.

Zygmunt Bauman in the Polish Sociological Bulletin, 1967

more than ever we must beware of falling into the traps of fashions which may well prove more detrimental than the malaise they claim to cure. Well, our vocation, after all these unromantic years, may become again a testfield of courage, consistency, and loyalty to human values.

We would be well advised if we carved on the walls of our sociological lecture rooms what Max Weber said more than half a century ago: ‘If the professional thinker has an immediate obligation at all, it is to keep a cool head in the face of the idols prevailing at the time, and if necessary to swim against the stream.’

Zygmunt Bauman, Inaugural Lecture, Universityof Leeds, 1972

Introduction

The raw stuff processed by the sociological imagination is human experience. The end-product of the sociological imagination called ‘social reality’ is cast of the metal smelted from the ore of experience. Though its chemical substance cannot but reflect the composition of the ore, the product’s content also bears the mark of the smelting process which divides the ore’s ingredients into useful product and waste, while its shape depends on the mould (that is, the cognitive frame) into which the melted metal has been poured.

Zygmunt Bauman, Society under Siege, 2002

There are many different, constantly changing, ever expanding and mutually conflicting uses of sociology. This makes the question of the ‘use of sociology’ continuously relevant and pertinent.1 Moreover, the question ‘What use is sociology?’ is particularly worth asking because sociology is different from almost any other area of intellectual work. Whereas most can identify an object ‘out there’ which it is their concern to investigate, sociology cannot. Sociology is itself part and parcel of the social world it seeks to explore. It is part of a social world in truth capable of carrying on without the insights of sociology.