Date:         Thu, 11 Jul 96 21:14:19 EDT
From: Alan Davidson <DAVIDSON@UCONNVM.UCONN.EDU>
Subject:      THE NEW SOCIOLOGY
To: <socgrad@CSF.COLORADO.EDU>
Message-Id:   <960711.211434.EDT.DAVIDSON@UConnVM.UConn.Edu>

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Date:         Thu, 11 Jul 96 20:54:22 EDT
From:         Alan Davidson <DAVIDSON@UConnVM.UConn.Edu>
Subject:      THE NEW SOCIOLOGY
To:           psn-cafe@csf.colorado.edu
Message-Id:   <960711.210834.EDT.DAVIDSON@UConnVM.UConn.Edu>

I applaud Ray Cuzzort's proposal for what sociology needs to do.  What I
am most amazed with (perhaps being one of the few graduate students still
left -- definitely in my department who read Parsons, etc.) is that in our
attempts to be scientific, especially after the "demise" of functionalism,
is we rejected all that was probably worth saving, and saved what was
worth trashing.  Instead of grand theory which, although pretentious held
the promise of linking micro and middle range social phenomena to broader
structures, thereby telling us a thing or two about society and the place of
institutions in it, we, in our research factory mentality, adopted paradigm-
based toolbook sociology which offered very little critical potential at all.
At least if you root particular phenomena within a broader notion of society,
we can attempt to transform society.

The other issue which needs to be dealt with is sociology's public image, and
utility.  Not only is this an issue, as Ray suggests, of ways we can be
useful, although that is important (one of my undergraduate theory profs
used to warn us about the discussions over Durkheim and Weber taking place
in the unemployment line), but 35 years ago, your "average" college educated
person likely knew who Dave Riesman or C. Wright Mills were, and they might
have known who Lew Coser was.  How many sociologists might be placed into
this category now -- at most, Herb Gans, and perhaps Stanley Aronowitz and
Todd Gitlin.  It is instructive to examine why this was the case, and what
immediately comes to mind is folks like Riesman, Mills, and Gans wrote and
write books that non-sociologists might find interestingly and useful.
Furthermore, while they do make reference to empirical findings, they
don't let their arguments rise and fall solely on the basis of whatever
truth pops out in a regression source table or whatever hits them in the
eye in a field setting.  Their task was to understand society in order to
change it, and not to regularly publish in ASR or AJS.
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