Introduction to Contemporary Social Theory by Elliott, Anthony, Lemert, Charles -- Read -- Imperial Library of Trantor

Index

Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents Preface and Acknowledgments 1. The Textures of Society

What is society? Society and social theory Coping with climate change: Anthony Giddens Key themes in contemporary social theory Further questions Further reading

2. The Contemporary Relevance of the Classics

The contradictions of modernity: Marx Modernity as iron cage: Weber Modernity as moral bonds: Durkheim Trauma, tragedy and Thanatos: Freud Summary points Further questions Further reading

3. The Frankfurt School

Horkheimer and Adorno: Dialectic of Enlightenment Freudian revolution: the uses of psychoanalysis Fromm: fear of freedom Adorno: The Authoritarian Personality, anti-Semitism and the psychodynamics of modernity Written in the stars: Adorno on astrology Marcuse: Eros, or one-dimensional futures? Criticisms of Marcuse Summary points Further questions Further reading

4. American Pragmatisms

William James: experience and the social self Pragmatism and Darwin’s The Origin of the Species The foundations of pragmatist social theory today Charles Sanders Peirce: semiotics and the unity of ego The Progressive Era: John Dewey and Jane Addams George Herbert Mead: mind, self and society Herbert Blumer: Symbolic Interactionism Pragmatism’s limits and prospects: Habermas and Rorty Summary points Further questions Further reading

5. Structuralism

Saussure and structural linguistics Criticisms of Saussure The Raw and The Cooked: Lévi-Strauss and structural anthropology Roland Barthes: structuralist semiology and popular culture Foucault: knowledge, social order and power Society and disciplined bodies The limits of structuralism: Foucault’s History of Sexuality Governmentality Criticisms of Foucault Summary points Further questions Further reading

6. Structures, Functions and Culture

Talcott Parsons: The Structure of Social Action The Social System: Parsons and the AGIL paradigm Robert K. Merton: social theory and social structures Jeffery C. Alexander: theoretical logic of cultural sociology Summary points Further questions Further reading

7. Post-structuralism

Lacan: the mirror stage and imaginary Lacan’s reformulation of structuralism: language, symbolic order and the unconscious After Lacan: Althusser and society as interpellation Žižek: beyond interpellation Appraisal of Lacan Derrida: difference and deconstruction Rereading psychoanalysis: Derrida’s critique of Lacan Appraisal of Derrida Post-structuralism and post-colonial theory: Bhabha’s The Location of Culture Summary points Further questions Further reading

8. The Interaction Order

David Riesman: conformity and the American character Erving Goffman: impression management and the interaction order Ethnomethodologies: Aaron Cicourel and Harold Garfinkel Summary points Further questions Further reading

9. Theories of Structuration

Anthony Giddens: structuration and the practical routines of social life Giddens on modernity and the self Criticisms of Giddens Pierre Bourdieu: habitus and practical social life Questions of taste: Bourdieu’s Distinction Criticisms of Bourdieu Summary points Further questions Further reading

10. Variations on the Theory of Power and Knowledge

C. Wright Mills: power as knowledge of structures Alvin W. Gouldner: the culture of critical discourse Dorothy Smith: power and knowledge from the feminist standpoint Donna Haraway and Patricia Hill Collins: the fractured matrix of power Summary points Further questions Further reading

11. Contemporary Critical Theory

Habermas: the democratization of society The early Habermas: development and decline of the public sphere Habermas on capitalism, communication and colonization Emotional imperialism: feminist criticism of Habermas Habermas on globalization and post-national societies Towards deliberative democracy Criticisms of Habermas Honneth: the struggle for recognition Summary points Further questions Further reading

12. Feminism and Post-feminist Theory

Theorizing patriarchy: 1970s feminisms Juliet Mitchell on femininity and sexual difference Dinnerstein: societal nurturing arrangements Chodorow: The Reproduction of Mothering Benjamin: the analysis of love Julia Kristeva: semiotic subversions Kristeva on motherhood and maternal ethics Appraisal of Kristeva Irigaray: the feminine imaginary Judith Butler: scripts of gender performance Appraisal of Butler Queer theory Summary points Further questions Further reading

13. Postmodernity

Deleuze and Guatarri: postmodernity as schizoid desire The postmodern condition: Lyotard Baudrillard: postmodernity as simulated media culture Baudrillard’s non-event: ‘The Gulf War did not take place’ Jameson: postmodernity as global capitalist transformations Bauman: postmodernity as modernity subtract illusions Beyond the postmodern: Bauman’s theory of liquid modernity Criticisms of postmodernism Summary points Further questions Further reading

14. Social Movements, States and the Modern World-system

Charles Tilly: contentious social movements Theda Skocpol: States and Social Revolutions Immanuel Wallerstein and analysis of world-systems Summary points Further questions Further reading

15. Globalization

The globalization debate Manuel Castells: The Network Society Criticisms of Castells Globalization since 9/11 Ulrich Beck: organized lives in a world of risk Criticisms of Beck Criticisms of the globalization debate Globalization, work and the new economy Globalization, communication and culture Globalization and the new individualism Life on the move: Elliott and Urry Summary points Further questions Further reading

Afterword: Social Theory Today and Towards 2025