Sociological Self Images

Sociological Self-Images: A Collective Portrait is a collection of papers on the self-images of different sociologists regarding their work, their profession, and their contributions to the social sciences. The book is comprised of 14 papers contributed by different experts in sociology, each of whom seeks to answer the following questions: 1. What do you consider the most unique characteristics of your way of defining sociology? 2. What is your view of the current relationship between sociological theory and social application? 3. Which sociologists influenced you or do you most respect? Are they the same now as in your formative years? 4. Which of your writings do you like best and why? 5. What impact would you say your sociological efforts have had on reshaping the field? The book is an excellent resource for those who study sociology and wish to know and be inspired by the views, opinions, and works of other sociologists.

A notable contribution to our understanding of ourselves. This book explores the realm of human behavior in social situations and the way that we appear to others. Dr. Goffman uses the metaphor of theatrical performance as a framework. Each person in everyday social intercourse presents himself and his activity to others, attempts to guide and cotnrol the impressions they form of him, and employs certain techniques in order to sustain his performance, just as an actor presents a character to an audience. The discussions of these social techniques offered here are based upon detailed research and observation of social customs in many regions.

'Identity' and 'selfhood' are terms routinely used throughout the human sciences that seek to analyze and describe the character of everyday life and experience. Yet these terms are seldom defined or used with any precision, and scant regard is paid to the historical and cultural context in which they arose, or to which they are applied. This innovative book provides fresh historical insights in terms of the emergence, development, and interrelationship of specific and varied notions of identity and selfhood, and outlines a new sociological framework for analyzing it. This is the first historical/sociological framework for discussion of issues which have until now, generally been treated as 'philosophy' or 'psychology', and as such it is essential reading for those undergraduates and postgraduates of sociology, philosophy and history and cultural studies interested in the concepts of identity and self. It covers a broader range of material than is usual in this style of text, and includes a survey of relevant literature and precise analysis of key concepts written in a student-friendly style.

This volume of papers from the distinguished sociologist Anselm Strauss reflects his self-professed lifelong intention to create sociological awareness in his readers and students. As Irving Louis Horowitz notes in his foreword to the book, at the center of Strauss's effort has been the democratization of sociology. He has achieved this goal by making sure that relativities of status, power, and wealth are acknowledged in the conduct of everyday life, and by recognition that all collective life is subject to negotiation, rearrangement and reconstruction. Represented here is some of the work for which Strauss is best known, and the principal themes that have captured his imagination throughout his productive career. These include work, leisure, culture, illness, identity, and policy. All are linked by Strauss's "web of negotiation" by which organizational arrangements can be changed. The volume concludes with a selection of his work in problems of method, consultation, and teaching, affirming Strauss's commitment to passing along the sociological awareness reflected in this volume to a next generation. Squarely in the long tradition of the Chicago School of sociology, the work of Anselm Strauss represents the very best thinking in modem sociological and psychological analysis. Those interested in the development of his major conceptual frameworks, as well as those interested in the development of the specific subject areas to which Anselm Strauss has devoted his career will find this an essential volume. Professionals in the history of sociology, the sociology of knowledge, or medical sociology will find the book of particular interest.

Questions about who we are, who we can be, and who is like and unlike us underpin a vast range of contemporary social issues. What makes our families so important to us? What do the often stark differences between how we self-identify and the way others see and define us reveal about our social world? Why do we attach such significance to 'being ourselves'? In this new edition of her popular and inviting introduction, Steph Lawler examines a range of important debates about identity. Taking a sociological perspective, she shows how identity is produced and embedded in social relationships, and worked out in the practice of people's everyday lives. She challenges the perception of identity as belonging within the person, arguing instead that it is produced and negotiated between persons. Chapter-by-chapter her book explores topics such as the relationships between lives and life-stories, the continuing significance of kinship in the face of social change, and how taste works to define identity. In particular, the updated edition has a new chapter on identity politics, as well as carefully compiled guides for further reading that reflect the broad importance and impact of these ideas, and the fact that, without understanding identity, we can't adequately begin to understand the social world. This book is essential reading for upper-level courses across the social sciences that focus on the compelling issues surrounding identity.

The thesis of this work is that in both modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism there has been a paradigm shift from a monological concept of self as an isolated "I" to a dialogical concept of the social self as an "I-Thou relation," including a communication model of self as individual-society interaction. It is also shown for both traditions all aesthetic, moral, and religious values are a function of the social self arising through communicative interaction between the individual and society. However, at the same time this work critically examines major ideological conflicts arising between the social self theories of modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism with respect to such problems as individualism versus collectivism, freedom versus determinism, liberalism versus communitarianism, and relativism versus objectivism.

More than ten years on from its original publication, Concepts of the Self still mesmerizes with its insight, comprehensiveness and critique of debates over the self in the social sciences and humanities. Anthony Elliott has written a new preface to this third edition to address some of the most recent developments in the field, and offers a powerful challenge to what he describes as ‘the emergence of anti-theories of the self’. The first two editions have proven exceptionally popular among students and teachers worldwide. Anthony Elliott provides a scintillating introduction to the major accounts of the self from symbolic interactionism and psychoanalysis to post-feminism and postmodernism. This new edition has been extensively revised and updated to take account of more recent theoretical developments, and a new chapter has been added on individualization which focuses on how the self becomes an agent of ‘do-it-yourself’ autobiographical reconstruction in an age of intensive globalization. Concepts of the Self remains the most lively, lucid and compelling introduction to contemporary controversies over the self and self-identity in the social sciences and humanities. Written by an author of international reputation, it connects debates about the self directly to identity politics, the sociology of personal relationships and intimacy, and the politics of sexuality, and will continue to be an invaluable introductory text for students in of social and political theory, sociology, social psychology, cultural studies, and gender studies.