Toward a Sociological Imagination: Bridging Specialized Fields

Toward A Sociological Imagination builds on the ideas C. Wright Mills expressed in The Sociological Imagination for an approach to the scientific method broad enough to open up to the full range of knowledge within the sociology discipline. In this book, nine sociologists and one philosopher provide detailed tests of the utility of the approach within diverse substantive sociological areas. These areas include, deviance and anomie, stratification and occupational mobility, the origins of capitalism, combining narrative sociology with modeling, racial and ethnic relations, unacknowledged emotions within the psychiatric interview, the genesis of violence, and the impact of moving from a vernacular to a theoretical approach to language.

Collecting revisions of papers from August of 2000 research conferences associated with the American Sociological Association, this volume is presented in the hopes of building on the ideas of an approach to a scientific sociological method presented in C. Wright Mills' The Sociological Imagination. Introductory chapters review Mills' philosophy of sociology and incorporate his ideas with the theoretical contributions of Alvin Gouldner. The constructed framework is then applied to nine different sociological problems, including economic stratification, the origins of capitalism, the origins of violence, and racial and ethnic relations. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

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Collecting revisions of papers from August of 2000 research conferences associated with the American Sociological Association, this volume is presented in the hopes of building on the ideas of an approach to a scientific sociological method presented in C. Wright Mills' . Introductory chapters review Mills' philosophy of sociology and incorporate his ideas with the theoretical contributions of Alvin Gouldner. The constructed framework is then applied to nine different sociological problems, including economic stratification, the origins of capitalism, the origins of violence, and racial and ethnic relations. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Bernard Phillips is Founder and informal director of the Sociological Imagination Group. Harold Kincaid is Chair, Department of Philosophy, University of Alabama, Birmingham. Thomas Scheff is Adjunct Professor, Gothenburg University, Karlsbad, Sweden.