SOC 502 - Contemporary Sociological Theory

Spring l995

Office hours: by appointment.

Green Hall 2-C-8

This seminar provides an introduction to American and European sociological theory for graduate students. It explores the most significant developments since WWII, using seminal theoretical work and empirical studies they have generated. The relationship between contemporary theories and classical sociological theory will be examined. The course also provides background information on the intellectual, cultural, and intellectual contexts in which theories were developed, drawing on the sociology of knowledge tradition.

Requirements:

1. Five memos on the group of weekly readings of your choice. These memos, of a maximum lenght of four pages, should be deposited in my mail box at least 24 hours before our meetings. They should raise substantive and critical issues to be discussed in class.
2. A review of a recent theory book of your choice (800 words maximum).
3. Final exam in class (open books).

Readings:

• Collins, Randall. l994. Four Sociological Traditions. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Foucault, Michel. l979. Discipline and Punish. New York: Vintage.
• Fraser, Nancy. l989. Unruly Practices. Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
• Goffman, Erving. l959. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Anchor/Doubleday.
• Ritzer, George, ed. l990. Frontiers of Social Theory. New York: Columbia University Press.
• Seidman, Steven, ed. l994. The Postmodern Turn: New Perspectives on Social Theory. New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Snow, David A. and Leon Anderson. l993. Down on their Luck: A Study of Homeless Street People. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Week 1: Introduction

• Alford, Robert R. l994. "Research Questions and the Construction of Arguments." Unpublished manuscript, Department of Sociology, CUNY- Graduate Center.
• Alexander, Jeffrey. l988. "The New Theoretical Movement." in Handbook of Sociology, edited by Neil Smelser. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, pp. 77-101.
• Ritzer, George. l988. "Sociological Metatheory: A Defense of a Subfield by a Delineation of its Parameters." Sociological Theory. 6 (2): 187-200.
• Calhoun, Craig. l992. "Sociology, Other Disciplines, and the Project of a General Understanding of Social Life." in Sociology and Its Publics, edited by Terence C. Halliday and Morris Janowitz. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 137-195.
• Clemens, E. , W.W. Powell, K. McIlwaine and D. Okamoto. forthcoming. "Careers in Print: Books, Journals, and Scholarly Reputation." American Journal of Sociology.

  Optional:

• Wiley, Norbert. l979. "The Rise and Fall of Dominating Theories in American Sociology." in Contemporary Issues in Theory and Research: A Metasociological Perspective, ed. by W.E. Snizek et al. Pp. 47-79..
• Turner, Jonathan. l990. "The Past, Present, and Future of Theory in American Sociology." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, ppp. 371-391.
• Wiley, Norbert. l990. "The History and Politcs of Recent Sociology Theory, in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press. pp. 392-415.
• Crane, Diana and Henry Small. l992. "American Sociology Since the Seventies: The Emerging Identity Crisis in the Discipline." in Sociology and Its Publics, edited by Terence Halliday and Morris Janowitz. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Week 2: Functionalism, Conflict Theory, Neo-Functionalism

• Turner, Jonathan, H. l991. The Structure of Sociological Theory. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth. Chapters 3 and 4.
• Camic, Charles. l992. "Reputation and Predecessor Selection: Parsons and the Institutionalists." American Sociological Review. 57: 421-445.
• Collins, Randall. l994. "The Conflict Tradition." in Four Sociological Traditions. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 47-120.
• Valenzuela, J. Samuel and Arturo Valenzuela. l978. "Modernization and Dependency: Alternative Perspectives in the Study of Latin American Underdevelopment." Comparative Politics. (July): 535-557.

  Optional:

• Scuilli, David and Dean Gernstein. l985. "Social Theory and Talcott Parsons in the 1980s" Annual Review of Sociology 11: 369-787.
• Alexander, Jeffrey and Paul Colomy. l990. "Neofunctionalism Today: Reconstructing a Theoretical Tradition." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 33-67.
• Turner, Jonathan and Alexandra R. Maryanski. l988. "Is Neofunctionalism really Functional?" Sociological Theory. 6:110-121.
• Collins, Randall. l993. "What Does Conflict Theory Predict About America's Future?" Sociological Perspectives. 36: 289-313.

Week 3: Rational Choice, Exchange Theory, and Network Theory

• Collins, Randall. l994. "The Rational/Utilitarian Tradition." in Four Sociological Traditions. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 121-180.
• Favell. Adrian. l993. "James Coleman: Social Theorist and Moral Philosopher?" American Journal of Sociology. 99 (3): 590-613.
• Cook Karen et al. l990. "Exchange Theory: A Blueprint for Structure and Process." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 158-184.
• Emirbayer, Mustapha, and Jeff Goodwin. l994. "Network Analysis, Culture, and the Problem of Agency." American Journal of Sociology. 99 (6): 1411-1454.

  Optional:

• Hechter, Michael. l992. "Should Values be Written out of the Social Scientist' Lexicon." Sociological Theory. 10: 214-230.
• Goldstone, Jack. A. l994. "Is Revolution Individually Rational?" Rationality and Society. 6: 139-166.
• Wellman, Bary. l983. "Network Analysis: Some Basic Principles." Sociological Theory. 1:155-200.
• Brint, Steven. l992. "Hidden Meaning: Culture and Context in Harrison White's Structural Sociology". Sociological Theory, 10: 194-213.

Week 4 and 5 : Pragmatism, Symbolic Interactionism, and Ethnomethodology

Week 4:

• Joas, Hans. l993. "Pragmatism in American Sociology." in Pragmatism and Social Theory, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 14-54.
• Goffman, Erving. l959. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Anchor/Doubleday.
• Fine, Gary Alan. l990. "Symbolic Interactionism in the Post-Blumerian Age." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 117-157.
• Fine, Gary Alan. l993. "The Sad Demise, Mysterious Disappearnce, and Glorious Triumph of Symbolic Interactionism." Annual Review of Sociology. 19: 61-87.

  Week 5:

• Snow, David A. and Leon Anderson. l993. Down on their Luck: A Study of Homeless Street People. Berkeley: University of California Press. Selections.
• Garfinkel, Harold. l967. "Studies of the Routine Grounds of Everyday Activities." in Studies in Ethnomethodology. New York: Prentice Hall, pp. 35-75.
• Molotch, Harvey L. and Deirdre Boden. l985. " Talking Social Structure: Discourse, Dominance, and the Watergate Hearings." American Sociological Review. 50: 273-88.

  Optional:

• Gallant, M. J. and S. Kleinman. l983. "Symbolic Interactionism versus Ethnomethodology." Symbolic Interaction. 6: 1-18.
• Heritage, John. l984. Garfinkel and Ethnomethodology. London: Polity.
• Boden, Deirdre, "People are Talking: Conversation Analysis and Symbolic Interaction." in Michael McCall and Howard Becker, eds. Symbolic Interaction and Cultural Studies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 244-274.
• Maynard, D. W and S. E. Clayman. l991. "The Diversity of Ethnomethodology." Annual Review of Sociology, 17: 385-418.

Week 6: Structuralism, Semiotics, and Post-Structuralism

• Foucault, Michel. l979. Discipline and Punish, New York: Vintage. Selections.
• Gorski, Philip S. l993. "The Protestant Ethic Revisited: Disciplinary Revolution and State Formation in Holland and Prussia." American Journal of Sociology. 99 (2): 265-316.
• Schneider, Mark. l993. Culture and Enchantment. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Chapter 4.
• Gottdiener, M. l985. "Hegemony and Mass Culture: A Semiotic Approach." American Journal of Sociology 90: 979-1001.

  Optional:

• Levi Strauss, Claude. l976. Structural Anthropology, New York: Basic, pp. 31-54 and 206-231.
• Kurzweil, Edith. l980. "Claude Levi-Strauss: The Father of Structuralism." in The Age of Structuralism. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 13-34.
• Lamont, Michele and Robert Wuthnow. l990. "Betwixt and Between: Recent Cultural Sociology in Europe and the United States." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 287-315.

Week 7: American and European Marxism and Critical Theory

• Antonio, Robert J. l990. "The Decline of the Grand Narrative of Emancipatory Modernity: Crisis or Renewal in Neo-Marxian Theory" in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 88-116.
• McRobbi, Angela. l992. "Post-Marxism and Cultural Studies: a Post-Script." in Cultural Studies, edited by Lawrence Grossberg, Cary Nelson and Paul Treichler, London: Routledge, pp. 719-730
• Bauman, Zygmunt. l991. "Critical Theory." in The Renascence of Sociological Theory, edited by Henry Etzkowitz and Ronald M. Glassman. Itasca, Ill: F. E. Peacock Publishers, pp. 277-303.
• Bernstein, Richard. l976. "The Critical Theory of Society." in The Restructuring of Social and Political Theory. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 179-225.

  Optional:

• Althusser, Louis. l984. "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses." in Essays on Ideology. London: Verso, pp. 1-60.
• Judt, Tony. l986. Marxism and the French Left. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Craib, Ian. l984. "Structuralist Marxism: The World as a Puppet Theater" in Modern Social Theory, New York: St-Martins Press, pp. 123-146.
• Bernstein, Richard J. l988. Habermas and Modernity. Cambridge The MIT Press.
• Levine, R. F. and J. Lembcke, l987. "Introduction: Marxism, Neo-Marxism and U.S. Sociology" in Recapturing Marxism: An Appraisal of Recent Trends in Sociological Theory.
• Wright, Eric Olin. l994. Interrogating Inequality. Essays on Class Analysis, Socialism, and Marxism. London: Verso.

Week 8: Feminist Theory

• Bart, Pauline B. 1991. "Feminist Theories." in The Renascence of Sociological Theory, edited by Henry Etzkowitz and Ronald M. Glassman. Itasca, Ill: F. E. Peacock Publishers, pp. 277-303.
• Fraser, Nancy. l989. Unruly Practices. Power, Discourse, and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Selection.
• Scott, Joan. l988. "Gender as a Useful Category in Historical Analysis." in Gender and the Politics of History. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 28-52.

  Optional:

• Stacey, Judith and Barrie Thorne. l985. "The Missing Feminist Revolution in Sociology" Social Problems. 32 (4): 301-316.
• Szymanski, A. l987. "Feminism: A Marxist Critique." in Recapturing Marxism: An Appraisal of Recent Trends in Sociological Theory. pp. 194-222.
• Davis, Kathy and Sue Fisher. l993. "Power and The Female Subject." in Negotiating at the Margins. The Gendered Discourse of Power and Resistance, edited by Sue Fisher and Kathy Davis. London: Routledge, pp. 3-22.
• Butler, Judith. l990. Gender Trouble. Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. London: Routledge.
• Collins, Patricia Hill. l991. Black Feminist Thought. Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment. London: Routledge.

Week 9: Contemporary French Theory

• Brubaker, Rogers. l985. "Rethinking Classical Social Theory: The Sociological Vision of Pierre Bourdieu." Theory and Society. 14-6: 745-775.
• Brubaker, Rogers. l993. "Social Theory as Habitus" in Bourdieu: Critical Perspectives, edited by Craig Calhoun, Edward LiPuma and Moishe Postone, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 212-234.
• Wagner, Peter. l994. "Dispute, Uncertainty, and Institution in Recent French Debates." The Journal of Political Philosphy 2 (3): 270-289.
• Ricoeur, Paul. l992. Oneself as Other. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Preface and chapters 1 and 5.

  Optional:

• Lamont, Michele and Annette Lareau. l988. "Cultural Capital: Allusions, Gaps and Glissandos in Recent Theoretical Developments." Sociological Theory. 6 (2): 153-168.
• Calhoun, Craig, Edward LiPuma and Moishe Postone. l993. Bourdieu: Critical Perspectives. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Dodier, Nicolas. l993. "Acting in Several Worlds." Current Sociology.
• Alexander, Jeffrey. forthcoming. "The Reality of Reduction: the Failed Synthesis of Pierre Bourdieu." London: Verso.

Week 10: The Micro-Macro Link

• Bourdieu, Pierre, l977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. New York: Cambridge University Press. Chapters 2 and 4.
• Giddens, Anthony. l984. The Constitution of Society, Berkeley: University of California Press. Introduction and chapter 1.
• Giddens, Anthony. l991. Modernity and Self-Identity. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Chapters 1, 3, and 4.
• Clegg, Stewart. l992. "How to Become an Internationally Famous British Social Theorists?" The Sociological Review. 576-98.
• Hilbert, Richard A. l990. "Ethnomethodology and the Micro-Macro Order." American Sociological Review. 55: 794-808.

  Optional:

• Cohen, Ira. l989. Structuration Theory: Anthony Giddens and the Constitution of Social Life. London: MacMillan.
• Collins, Randall. l981. "The Micro-Foundations of Macro-Sociology." American Journal of Sociology. 86: 998-1014.

Week 11: Postmodernism and Multicultural Perspectives

• Seidman, Steven, ed. l994. The Postmodern Turn: New Perspectives on Social Theory. New York: Cambridge University Press. Selections.
• Agger, Ben. l991. "Critical Theory, Postructuralism, and Postmodernism: Their Sociological Relevance." Annual Review of Sociology. 17: 105-31.
• Lemert, Charles, ed. 1993. Social Theory: Multicultural and Classic Readings. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, pp. 577-626.

  Optional:

• Kellner, Douglas. 1990. "The Postmodern Turn: Positions, Problems, and Prospects." in Frontiers of Social Theory: The New Synthesis, edited by George Ritzer. New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 255-286.
• Denzin, Norman. l992. Symbolic Interactionism and Cultural Studies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Week 12: Conclusion