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Discourse and ideology are interrelated concepts in social sciences and the humanities and are even occasionally employed interchangeably. This paper sheds light on their relationship in academic discourse and examines the role of sociology as a scientific field in its conceptualization. Using bibliometric analysis, we examined 15,716 academic publications mentioning "discourse" or "ideology" in their title and written in English by American and British scholars between 1966 and 2015. The investigation focused on the two terms' conceptual environment, areas of usage, journals, and the organizations to which the authors were affiliated. First, we conclude that although some sociology researchers have attempted to create a sociological definition for the concept of discourse, sociologists are not its most active users. The same is true for ideology. These concepts have established niches in other disciplines (political science and history for "ideology," and educational science and linguistics for "discourse"). Second, throughout the years, the field of discourse studies has become more diversified and fragmented than that of ideology. Third, the leading organizations in both fields are prestigious American and British universities, which indicates that discourse and ideology are elements of the intellectual elites' language. Fourth, the concept of discourse was more frequently applied than that of ideology in the years 2010–2015, and we expect that it will remain popular among scholars in the next decade. As for ideology, we believe that new social challenges could foster the rediscovery of this concept in the near future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper by Houmanfar, Rodrigues, & Ward (2010) puts behavioral contingencies in the realm of psychology and metacontingencies (recurrent interlocked behavioral contingencies which result in aggregate products) in the field of sociology. The present work sees the metacontingency as a new behavior analytic concept, not as a matter belonging to a different discipline. It opens a completely new area of research and application not explored by the social sciences. Some examples are presented to exemplify a new area, the schedules of cultural selection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Changes in research production precipitated by the globalization have generally been theorized as applying across nations and disciplinary projects. This article examines the relation of discipline to research production from the situational vantage point of the developing world, specifically the Southern African country of Malawi, and from the empirical perspective of the social sciences. Evidence derives from eight months of ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Malawi in 2003 and 2004, drawing specifically from over 100 formal interviews and from analysis of historical and contemporary documents. The article finds that against depictions of academic disciplines as inflexible, arbitrary, and in need of restructuring, the case of the social sciences in Malawi demonstrates the value of distinctly disciplined expertise in problem-oriented research. This efficacy is, however, precariously dependent on the capacity of local disciplinary communities to regenerate and reproduce their expertise and compete effectively in the increasingly competitive knowledge market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interpretative qualitative social science has attempted to distinguish itself from quantitative social science by rejecting traditional or ‘received’ notions of generalization. Traditional concepts of scientific generalization it is claimed are based on a misguided objectivism as to the mechanisms operating in the social world, and particularly the ability of statements to capture such mechanisms in any abstract sense. Instead they propose new versions of the generalizability concept e.g. ‘transferability’, which relies on the context dependent judgement of ‘fit’ between two or more cases instances made by a researcher. This paper argues that the transferability concept, as outlined and argued by interpretativist methodologists, is thoroughly coextensive with notions of generalizability formalized for natural science and naturalistic social science by philosophers and methodologists of science. Therefore, it may be concluded that the interpretativist claim to a break with received scientific traditions is a premature one, at least with regard to the issue of generalization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Haven been placed in the unique position of teaching high school sociology at the same time when a renewed interest from professional sociological associations led to a revival of scholarly research on the topic, a commitment from professional sociological associations, my insiders view from the high school classroom and from various professional sociological association committees, I offer my insights as well as the direction future research on high school sociology might take to enhance the efficacy of teaching at that level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates recent data on the prevalence of women in the field of sociology in order to understand whether or not the discipline has become a female preserve. Data on the top sociology departments in the USA were collected in 2007. For each university, we document the number of full time, tenured and tenure-track faculty members and present the gendered makeup of the department. Our data present mixed findings with regard to the question of whether the field is tipping toward female. Women, overall, are underrepresented in the sociology programs sampled, but a larger percentage of women occupy tenured positions within the top liberal arts programs than at the top graduate programs. And, women occupy a slim majority of assistant professor positions but have lower numbers at higher academic ranks. We can say with reasonable certainty that, while the proportion of women doctorates and assistant professors indicate a feminization of sociology, the entire discipline has not yet tipped toward female. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lying is a ubiquitous feature of everyday social convention and also permeates the intimate bonds of romantic and family life. This article reviews the research literature on the gender-based motivations for lying and the contexts in which it occurs, along with relevant psychoanalytic perspectives, which help to explain how lying is related to one's experience of self. Emphasis will be placed on contemporary psychoanalytic formulations, which emphasize the subjective nature of truth and the multiplicity of self-experience. A case illustration is offered to demonstrate the applicability and complementarity of various viewpoints on the topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers an evaluation of the implementation of the American Sociological Association's Integrating Data Analysis Project in a large introductory sociology course. This project was designed following an examination of the curricula of 13 disciplines that revealed that sociology failed to integrate empirical, quantitative literacy components throughout the undergraduate curriculum. Thus, efforts to introduce students to data analysis early and often were established as a best practice in the discipline. Results revealed that the students found the modules helped them understand the empirical nature of sociology. The students expressed an interest in participating in future research projects in sociology and/or other disciplines. They were not overly anxious about the quantitative literacy components of the course. Including on-line data analysis strategies using publicly available data and complimentary software represent cost and time-effective methods of introducing quantitative literacy into the social science classroom. Many social and behavioral sciences other than sociology have also discovered that their students lack a clear understanding of the relationship between empirical research and substantive topics within the discipline. Consequently, the lessons learned from the efforts of the ASA could be applied across many disciplines to form a more cohesive curriculum for many disciplines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How has sociology evolved over the last 40 years? In this paper, we examine networks built on thousands of sociology-relevant papers to map sociology's position in the wider social sciences and identify changes in the most prominent research fronts in the discipline. We find first that sociology seems to have traded centrality in the field of social sciences for internal cohesion: sociology is central, but not nearly as well bounded as neighboring disciplines such as economics or law. Internally, sociology appears to have moved away from research topics associated with fundamental social processes and toward social-problems research. We end by discussing strategies for extending this work to wider science production networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a sociology of knowledge framing, this essay highlights how and why the sociological imagination presented by leading European and American scholars showcased in this special issue offers a relatively hopeful assessment of recent transformations. It then questions the extent to which the same optimism prevails for scholars – and citizens – of the poorer, less advanced countries of the world. It not only suggests that many of the fundamental sociological transformations associated with the contemporary era – ranging from globalization of economy, the rise of internet technology, the decline of the nation state, and the rise of more cosmopolitan identities – are unevenly distributed around the world. It also argues that their political, social, and economic impact will vary, depending on history and developmental context. The essay further suggests that precisely because of the statist and protectionist legacies of late development, many of the same transformations that bring positive gains in the advanced capitalist world, signal troubles ahead for the developing world and its future. The essay draws to a close with a more focused examination of the dark side of recent transformations, evident in such problems as unchecked violence and regional or ethnic fragmentation across major swathes of the global south. Such developments, the essay concludes, should sustain the call for a more “pluralist” sociological imagination for the new millennium, one that can take into account differences within and between various countries around the globe, while also advancing our normative understanding of what it would take to make “global society” possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Journal of Public Health is the property of Springer Nature and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This essay describes institutional ethnography as a method of inquiry pioneered by Dorothy E. Smith, and introduces a collection of papers which make distinctive contributions to the development of this novel form of investigation. Institutional ethnography is presented as a research strategy which emerges from Smith‘s wide-ranging explorations of the problematic of the everyday world. Smith‘s conception of the everyday world as problematic involves a critical departure from the concepts and procedures of more conventional sociologies. She argues for an alternative sociology which begins with the standpoint of the actor in everyday life, rather than from within a professional sociological discourse aligned with the society‘s ruling institutions. The familiar sociologies of everyday life do not suffice for this purpose, since they deal with local settings and social worlds, but stop short of examining how these are knitted into broader forms of social organization. In contrast, institutional ethnography examines how the scenes of everyday life are shaped by forms of social organization which cannot be fully grasped from within those scenes. The principal tasks of institutional ethnography include describing the coordination of activities in the everyday world, discovering how ideological accounts define those activities in relation to institutional imperatives, and examining the broader social relations in which local sites of activity are embedded. The four papers which follow demonstrate that specific contributions to institutional ethnography can be made in relation to a wide array of topics, methods, and interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The argument is made that the relation between theory and research has become tenuous in American sociology during the recent past, and that during the earlier decades of this century the nature of that relationship was different. A suggestion is made for the reacquaintance of empirical research and its theoretical underpinning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines a variety of technologies and the nature of sociological work. One way to understand how technology may influence sociological work is through Charles Ragin's distinction between case-oriented and variable-oriented research. This distinction identifies two poles of a continuum on which most research may be arranged. Case-oriented research focuses on understanding the specific characteristics of individual cases. Cases are treated as wholes and the distinctive combination of characteristics in each case is used to understand the context in which events occur. Technology in general and computer hardware and software in particular are usually designed for business, not academic needs. As such, their justification is that, through reducing costs or saving time, they can make a business more profitable. But the viability of sociology as a profession will not be enhanced by cost reductions. Whether technology will change the actual content of sociological work is a difficult and politically sensitive question, because it touches the status and centrality of different kids of research within sociology, and thus influences careers and prestige. We approached the idea of content, using distinction between variable- and case-oriented research strategies.

This article is an overview of the contributions of photography to sociology and a discussion of potential uses of photography in sociological research. Visual sociology, after contributing to several studies in the early decades of American sociology, disappeared to reemerge during the 1960s. In the meantime, the use of visual methods in ethnographic description, the stud), of social processes in the laboratory, in studies of social change, as a key to interviewing grounded in the perspective of the subject and as a means through which phenomenological sociology may be constructed and communicated. Visual sociology, with increasing organizational success and emerging electronic aids, appears to be on the verge of greater recognition and use within mainstream sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I argue that the selection of appropriate statistical procedures is at best haphazard without a careful consideration of the consequences of one's research, and that significant distortions often will result when applied concerns are ignored. I advance the hypothesis that typical conceptions of basic research in sociology preclude the proper use of statistics. From this it follows that mainstream, quantitative sociology can begin to save itself only by taking seriously the question of applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article comments on trends in sociology as a profession and as a discipline. Many young scholars have been led to view the Ph.D., the first job, and even tenure, as part of their academic birthright--a function of perseverance as much as excellence. As the market contracts and is complicated further by such factors such as affirmative action, pressures toward unionization are understandable, as are pressures for increased involvement of the American Sociological Association (ASA). The most successful venture undertaken by the ASA in the 1970s concern teaching sociology--a program that may be single-handedly responsible for keeping the membership and coffers from plummeting. Teaching may become not only the bottom line, but the only line of academic performance. Again there are implications and parallels for the ASA. Originally founded to promote research, a major part of the budget is devoted to research journals in which there is declining membership interest. As the example of new programs for improving teaching attest, professional pressures and disciplinary needs can be symbiotic. Another example is sociology's shift in the direction of applied sociology and social policy. There is no doubt that applying sociology offers major intellectual benefits. In 75 years, as of 1891 the ASA has changed considerably, but in the next 75 years, it may change even more.

The crucial importance of concepts for sociology needs no emphasis then. Then evaluation depends on considerations of theoretical and empirical impact that have been widely discussed in the context of the philosophy of science to identify concepts explicit and contextual definitions are essential. But once identified the frequent use of a concept requires that it's designated by simple terms that are easy to remember and as as possible. This means of course that in special contexts sample, abbreviated or technical terms even code alphanumerical symbols can be used constituting a specialized . By contrast in general contexts complicated but widely understood ordinary language terms often have to be used in order to assure good communication.
There is a field of study which focuses on the problems of how to designate concepts unambiguously. Pioneered by technologists and to a lesser degree by this field is almost unknown in the social sciences. It is called terminology, this is the original and basic meaning of the word terminology, but a derivative meaning sets of terms on nomenclature has become more salient in everyday usage. Some thoughts on the applicability of terminology not nomenclature to sociology form the subject of this .
The occasion for the essay arises from an initiative of UNLSCO whose social science programs have confronted serious problems of communication because of terminological barriers to the exchange of information between scholars using not only different ordinary languages (French, German, Russian, Japanese, etc.) but also and between scholars using different specialized jargons within a single ordinary language like English. UNFSCO's efforts to do something about solving this problem have involved chance upon procedures of Terminology established through the International Standards Organization for work primarily in the diverse fields of technology and national science. Their appl... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The "protection of human subjects" sounds as neutral and virtuous as "the law of the land." But just as the law favors some groups more than others (as social and political analysts have pointed out), so do consent forms The implication is not to get rid of laws, but to change them, likewise, the implications is not to get rid of informed consent, but to increase the area of judgment about conditions of use An uncritical across-the-board application unwittingly favors certain human subjects. This discussion has particular relevance to research tn the natural setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the emergence of social science in the agenda of the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF). The invisibility via emergence of the 1950s gave way to the emergence of a distinct social science identity in the decade of the 1960s. Organizationally, social science was transformed from being listed under Other Sciences, to becoming a Program, then an Office and finally in 1969 as full-fledged Division. As NSF social science moved into the decade of the seventies, new directions were signaled, new clouds on the horizon. The record of accomplishment is vital and strong, but rarely has it been able to penetrate and modify stereotyped conceptions of social science as soft or as being some form of ideological advocacy.

In this article, the author talks about her experience in the field of sociology. When she started college in 1970 she thought she would become a psychologist. She was, after all, interested in how people thought and felt about things. She learned that talking to people about things that interested her was called "research" and she could get course credit for doing it. For instance, she thought she was the only woman missing out on the sexual revolution, so she did interviews with female undergraduates on "premarital sex." The author talks about the best way to communicate sociological analyses to those outside sociology circle. Storytelling, whether in fiction or nonfiction, is a time-tested way to get readers to care. As she has learned in teaching courses in race, class, and gender, writings that "show" more than "tell" a story of interaction, inequality, and power get students to listen and then to understand that life is more than a drama of personalities. In the author's experience, field work is done best when one knows who he is and what he feels throughout the research.

It is informed that since the end of World War II, American sociology has increasingly been divided into two camps. One side has been mainstream positivistic research typified by large survey research studies but including various studies of pre-existing data bases compiled by government agencies and other formal organizations. The second type of research has consisted typically of one or two person studies with little or no funding and minimal resources. Ethnographic and in depth interview studies are the prototypes of this sort of research. These qualitative studies have typically lacked very explicit and highly standardized methodologies and have been based on more theoretical than methodological planning. Although theoretical studies have some enormous advantages, even those who are most committed to them must recognize that, as typically conducted, they have important theoretical and practical limitations. One common problem is the difficulty in knowing whether one's findings are universal to the types of settings or groups studied or whether they are particular to the occasion under study, i.e., whether or not the results are representative.

The article focuses on the field research as asymmetrical relation. In this paper, sociology is viewed as an undertaking concerned with the rational and systematic study of social life in all its manifestations. This is a statement of methodological principle, that is, it pertains to the reasoning and the procedures of sociologists. It should be read neither as an ontological statement, asserting that social conduct is rational, nor as the claim that sociology is a science in the traditional sense. Within the framework of the subjective approach to sociology, the first of the three conditions is met, basically, by the methodological device of the ideal type as introduced by Max Weber and developed by Alfred Schutz. This formulation of the preconditions of research in the vein of a sociology of understanding has brought into the open an usually hidden and ignored characteristic of the subjective sociological approach: the subjectivity involved is not merely that of motives and objectives, and knowledge of pertinent conditions and the command of interactional skills on the part of the observed actors; it is as much the subjectivity of the researcher.

This article discusses various research papers regarding occupational mobility. There has been a resurgence of interest in the analysis of occupational mobility tables. One of the more exciting models which has been proposed is the structural model of researcher R.M. Hauser. Two research papers acknowledging Hauser's work have sought to develop such models further. The argument of this article, however, is that the interpretative claims made for Hauser's structural model cannot be sustained, and that accordingly analyses based upon it are misleading. The argument proceeds by initially accepting the proferred interpretation and applying the model to a set of data. This application generates a conflict. Various resolutions are explored. It is argued that were there a resolution it would have to lie with the substantive interpretability of the model, but it is further argued that the model cannot support such interpretations. The article ends by discussing the source of the indeterminacy, and suggesting an analysis strategy which would retain the odds-ratio structure of the table, as the structural model also does, but would avoid fraught decompositions.

The article presents information on primary schools. The complexity of sociological phenomena creates a perpetual problem in the conceptualization and analysis of sociological variables. Here, an example will be given illustrating the importance of using simple well-defined variables, which have a clear interpretation. The necessity of studying the structure of each variable, especially how the values of the variable are distributed through the population, will be emphasized. To this end, simple statistical models should initially be constructed using few variables at a time, say two or three, and all of the implications of such models drawn before proceeding to develop more complicated models. Since the more complex models usually employed almost invariably are based upon the normal distribution, it is important, while still working with the simple models, to explore the possibility that the assumptions of the normal model are not justified. Although this paper will be essentially methodological, the analysis of the example chosen to illustrate the three points just outlined will lead to interesting sociological conclusions. One important factor, which appears to increase the cost of education in underdeveloped countries, is that children do not proceed through school even approximately as a cohort. In every grade, one finds many children well over the age, which would be considered normal. This may arise from three principal factors: late entrance to schooling, high absentee rates producing missed years, and an inability to fulfill the requirements to pass from one grade to another, even given satisfactory attendance.

To do or not to do a test of significance that is a question that divides men of good will and sound competence. Only if the sociologist can apply experimental treatments independently of prior states of his units of observation is he able to conduct a true experiment. Because of democratic ideology and a host of other considerations, true experimentation is unusual in sociology. The inability to use true experimentation results in a lack of control over a wide variety of largely unknown and un-numerable potential influences. These uncontrolled variables throw doubt on any finding that a difference observed between two sub samples results from the variable used by the researcher in classifying his sample of observations into one or the other of the two sub samples. Accordingly, the empirical sociologist is confronted with the necessity to identify and to find justification for rejecting as many of these potential influences as he can. The effect of a pre-test in increasing or decreasing the respondent's sensitivity or responsiveness to the experimental variable, thus making the results obtained for a pre-tested population unrepresentative of the effects of the experimental variable for the pre-tested universe from which the experimental respondents were selected.

This survey makes quite explicit the willingness of the social sciences and demography to initiate or expand teaching, research, and training on population policy. The disciplines now differ greatly in these activities. Of the 117 suggestions for research on policy, 41 are related to policy content; 16 to policy initiative and implementation; 47 to policy evaluation; and 13 to policy philosophy. The social scientists identified thirteen barriers which obstruct them from undertaking the needed research. Nine of the same barriers were named by the demographers. Barriers associated with the academic profession itself include expertise or technical competence, data limitations, ideology, professional identification, intellectual priorities, and role strains. The remaining barriers are associated with the organization of the university or the larger society rather than the academic profession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information about a statistic for random model testing. Very often testing for the random model becomes important in the social sciences. For instance, if one has three categories of classification, he would be interested to know whether the chance of an individual falling into these categories is the same. Conventionally the test statistic used for this type of analysis is the contingency x2. Authors show here that the notion of variance, if applied to relative frequencies, yields a simple statistic for random model testing. Further-more, it is shown that the few statistic, viz. variance of relative frequencies, is related to the contingency x2. As indicated, the social scientist frequently encounters in his research the problem of testing for the random model as well as for the degree of dispersion of responses or other attributes of individuals and aggregates involving nominal data. The variance of relative frequencies can be of significant aid to the researcher in reducing his data to a convenient single measure expressing dispersion and a test for randomness. The following case should exemplify the utility of the statistic. One of the important dimensions of the division of labor in science including the social sciences, is the pattern of scientific foci or interest within different scientific disciplines.

The article presents selected bibliography of works published in the 1985 issue of the journal "Human Studies." The list includes a list of articles published, books edited, books published and others. The articles include Mannheim's Historicism. Social Research, The Scope of Mannheim's Thinking. Social Research, A new generation of German Labor. Social Research, The Cultural Sovietization of East Germany. Social Research and others. The list of books edited include Alfred Schutz on Phenomenology and Social Relations. Selected Writings. The Heritage of Sociology edited by Morris Janowitz, Alfred Schutz, Life Forms and Meaning Structure by Routledge and Kegan Paul. The list of books published include A Memorial Volume by James Mickel Williams, Alfred Schutz: An Intellectual Biography, Phenomenology of Consciousness and Sociology of the Life-World: An Introductory Study, A Bergsonian Bridge to Phenomenological Psychology. A list of forthcoming books include Alfred Schutz: Life and Work of a Scholar, vol.1.

This article discusses the measurement of sociological productivity. One of the focuses of empirical investigations in the sociology of sociology has been publication output. In reading the literature on the productivity of sociologists, however, one becomes aware of a lack of research continuity. While numerous data have been reported, they have been not cumulative but, rather, ambiguous and often contradictory. One of the major obstacles to linking the results of the various studies together is the disparate procedures that have been employed to measure productivity. One measure with potential as an index of publication quantity was developed by Glenn and Villemez in research concerned with the productivity of American Graduate departments of sociology. The Glenn-Villemez Comprehensive Index (GVCI) was designed to cover a wider range of publications than most previously published indexes had covered. As originally formulated, the GVCI included all articles in twenty-two journals of sociology and allied fields. By means of a mailed questionnaire to a sample of professors of sociology Glenn and Villemez derived a system of weighting the various types of publications. A number of arguments can be made for the use of the GVCI as a measure of productivity. One is that it is composed of a broad range of journals and circumscribes most general sociological work as well as important specialty areas within discipline.

Presents news briefs on several social science and sociology organizations in the U.S., as of April 1972. Information on a workshop sponsored by the Committee on Basic Research in Education of the National Research Council; Discussion on the collaboration between the National Opinion Research at the University of Chicago and the Roper Public Opinion Research Center at Williams College for a social science project; Details of the support of the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration on research projects dealing with crime and delinquency prevention and rehabilitation.

This article presents an abstract of the research paper "On the Interpretation of a Structural Model of the Mobility Table," published in the June 1983 issue of the journal "Quality and Quantity." This paper argues that the structural model of the mobility table as proposed by researcher R.M. Hauser is strictly uninterpretable. If accepted, the argument has serious repercussions for analyses based on this model. The writer suggests an alternative approach based upon analysis of the odds ratio without decomposition.

The article features the Urban Institute, a research institution responsible for policy analysis of issues involving sociology and social science in the U.S. One of the favorite topics of the U.S. administration is the extent to which economists have begun to supplant the lawyers at the right-hand of power. While many sociologists may yet aspire to the left-hand, it may be useful to consider some of the signs in the economists' favor. These include not only the extent to which economists are involved in government itself, but also the degree to which the economists have encircled the government with independent research institutes providing policy analysis. The Urban Institute represents a distinctive new genre on the social science scene and it is now beginning to seek out supplementary sociologists for its staff and projects. Founded in 1968 as one of the last domestic initiatives of the administration of President Lyndon Johnson. The institute is involved in research on income maintenance, income distribution, and housing. Other current research concerns of the institute include, forecasting demand for urban transportation systems, evaluating alternatives in generating and allocating public school revenue.