Sociological Theory in the Contemporary Era: Text and Readings 2Ed (Edles, Appelrouth, 2011)

Sociological Theory in the Contemporary Era: Text and Readings 2Ed (Edles, Appelrouth, 2011)

Sociological Theory in the Contemporary Era, Second Edition, combines well-edited, important original writings from sociology’s core contemporary theorists with introductory text that provides a historical and theoretical framework for understanding them. Authors Scott Appelrouth and Laura Desfor Edles use this unique text/reader approach to introduce students to contemporary sociological theory in a lively and engaging fashion.

The text/reader provides not only a biographical and theoretical summary of each theorist’s works but also an overarching scaffolding that students can use to examine, compare, and contrast each theorist’s major themes and concepts.

The book also offers discussions of past social and intellectual milieus to provide a holistic picture of the development of the theories discussed.

p.191 It is evident that the domain of the social scientist is constituted precisely by the study of joint action and of the collectivities that engage in joint action... the joint action of the collectivity is an interlinkage of the separate acts of the participants... joint action always has to undergo a process of formation... each instance of it has to be formed anew.

p.193 any instance of joint action, whether newly formed or long established, has necessarily arisen out of a background of previous actions of the participants. A new kind of joint action never comes into existence apart from such a background. The participants involved in the formation of the new joint action always bring to that formation the world of objects, the sets of meanings, and the schemes of interpretation that they already possess. Thus, the new form of joint action always emerges out of and is connected with a context of previous joint action. It cannot be understood apart from that context, one has to bring into one's consideration this linkage with preceding forms of joint action. One is on treacherous and empirically invalid grounds if he thinks that any given form of joint action can be sliced off from its historical linkage... instead of growing out of what went before... Joint action not only represents a horizontal linkage, so to speak, of the activities of the participants, but also a vertical linkage with previous joint action.