This entrenched view continues to dominate western ideas and, because it does not allow the East to represent itself, prevents true understanding. Essential, and still eye-opening, Orientalism remains one of the most important books written about our divided world.

    Bruno Latour's contention is that the word "social" as used by Social Scientists has become laden with assumptions to the point where it has become a misnomer. When the adjective is applied to a phenomenon, it is used to indicate a stabilized state of affairs, a bundle of ties that in due course may be used to account for another phenomenon. Latour also finds the word used as if it described a type of material, in a comparable way to an adjective such as "wooden" or "steely".Rather than simply indicating what is already assembled together, it is now used in a way that makes assumptions about the nature of what is assembled. It has become a word that designates two distinct things: a process of assembling: and a type of material, distinct from others. Latour shows why "the social" cannot be thought of as a kind of material or domain, and disputes attempts to provide a "social explanation" of other states of affairs. While these attempts have been productive (and probably necessary) in the past, the very success of the social sciences mean that they are largely no longer so. At the present stage it is no longer possible to inspect the precise constituents entering the social domain. Latour returns to the original meaning of "the social" to redefine the notion and allow it to trace connections again. It will then be possible to resume the traditional goal of the social sciences, but using more refined tools. Drawing on his extensive work examining the "assemblages" of nature, Latour finds it necessary to scrutinize thoroughly the exact content of what is assembled under the umbrella of Society. This approach, a "sociology of associations" has become known as Actor-Network-Theory, and this book is an essential introduction both for those seeking to understand Actor-Network-Theory, or the ideas of one of its most influential proponents.

    The text progresses from a micro- to macro-level of analysis, focusing first on such problems as illness and health care, drugs and alcohol, and family problems and then broadening to the larger issues of poverty and inequality, population growth, environmental problems, and conflict around the world. The social problem in each chapter is framed in a global as well as U.S. context. In every chapter, the three major theoretical perspectives are applied to the social problem under discussion, and the consequences of the problem, as well as alternative solutions, are explored. Pedagogical features such as The Human Side and Self and Society enable students to grasp how social problems affect the lives of individuals and apply their understanding of social problems to their own lives.

    This revised and enlarged edition of the leading anthology provides the essential writings of Marx and Engels--those works necessary for an introduction to Marxist thought and ideology.

    Criminological Theory: Context and Consequences, Fourth Edition shows the real-world relevance of theory by illuminating how ideas about crime play a prominent role in shaping crime-control policies and compelling students to apply theories to the contemporary milieu.

    The gift is a perfect example of what Mauss calls a total social phenomenon, since it involves legal, economic, moral, religious, aesthetic, and other dimensions. He sees the gift exchange as related to individuals and groups as much as to the objects themselves, and his analysis calls into question the social conventions and economic systems that had been taken for granted for so many years. In a modern translation, introduced by distinguished anthropologist Mary Douglas, The Gift is essential reading for students of social anthropology and sociology.

    Myers. Book also includes Social Sense Discovery Channel insert (CD that is sealed)

    This reissue of a classic will reintroduce readers to Lévi-Strauss’s understanding of man and society in terms of individuals—kinship, social organization, religion, mythology, and art.

    Using a variety of examples from everyday experience and from existing research in areas such as personality, sexuality and health, the basic theoretical assumptions of social constructionism are clearly explained. Key debates, such as the nature and status of knowledge, truth, reality and the self are given in-depth analysis in an accessible style. The theoretical and practical issues relevant to social constructionist research are illustrated with examples from real empirical studies, and the different approaches to social constructionist research are clearly defined. While the text is broadly sympathetic to social constructionism, the weaknesses of the approach are also addressed through a critical approach to the material, and in the final chapter the theory is subjected to a more extensive critique. Social Constructionism, Second Edition, extends and updates the material covered in the first edition and will be a useful and informative resource for undergraduate and postgraduate students of psychology, as well as students from related areas such as health, social work and education.

    Professor Douglas makes points which illuminate matters in the philosophy of religion and the philosophy of science and help to show the rest of us just why and how anthropology has become a fundamentally intellectual discipline.

    Some system of authority is a requirement of all communal living, and it is only the man dwelling in isolation who is not forced to respond, through defiance or submission, to the commands of others. Obedience, as a determinant of behavior is of particular relevance to our time. It has been reliably established that from 1933 to 1945 millions of innocent people were systematically slaughtered on command. Gas chambers were built, death camps were guarded, daily quotas of corpses were produced with the same efficiency as the manufacture of appliances. These inhumane policies may have originated in the mind of a single person, but they could only have been carried out on a massive scale if a very large number of people obeyed orders.Obedience is the psychological mechanism that links individual action to political purpose. It is the dispositional cement that binds men to systems of authority. Facts of recent history and observation in daily life suggest that for many people obedience may be a deeply ingrained behavior tendency, indeed, a prepotent impulse overriding training in ethics, sympathy, and moral conduct. C. P. Snow (1961) points to its importance when he writes:When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you will find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion. If you doubt that, read William Sbirer's 'Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.' The German Officer Corps were brought up in the most rigorous code of obedience . . . in the name of obedience they were party to, andassisted in, the most wicked large scale actions in the history of the world. (p. 24)The Nazi extermination of European Jews is the most extremeinstance of abhorrent immoral acts carried out by thousands ofpeople in the name of obedience. Yet in lesser degree this type ofthing is constantly recurring: ordinary citizens are ordered todestroy other people, and they do so because they consider ittheir duty to obey orders. Thus, obedience to authority, longpraised as a virtue, takes on a new aspect when it serves amalevolent cause; far from appearing as a virtue, it is transformedinto a heinous sin. Or is it?The moral question of whether one should obey when commands conflict with conscience was argued by Plato, dramatized in "Antigone," and treated to philosophic analysis in every historical epoch Conservative philosophers argue that the very fabric of society is threatened by disobedience, and even when the act prescribed by an authority is an evil one, it is better to carry out the act than to wrench at the structure of authority. Hobbes stated further that an act so executed is in no sense the responsibility of the person who carries it out but only of the authority that orders it. But humanists argue for the primacy of individual conscience in such matters, insisting that the moral judgments of the individual must override authority when the two are in conflict.The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous import, but an empirically grounded scientist eventually comes to the point where he wishes to move from abstract discourse to the careful observation of concrete instances. In order to take a close look at the act of obeying, I set up a simple experimentat Yale University. Eventually, the experiment was to involve more than a thousand participants and would be repeated at several universities, but at the beginning, the conception was simple. A person comes to a psychological laboratory and is told to carry out a series of acts that come increasingly into conflict with conscience. The main question is how far the participant will comply with the experimenter's instructions before refusing to carry out the actions required of him.But the reader needs to know a little more detail about the experiment. Two people come to a psychology laboratory to take part in a study of memory and learning. One of them is designated as a "teacher" and the other a "learner." The experimenter explains that the study is concerned with the effects of punishment on learning. The learner is conducted into a room, seated in a chair, his arms strapped to prevent excessive movement, and an electrode attached to his wrist. He is told that he is to learn a list of word pairs; whenever he makes an error, be will receive electric shocks of increasing intensity.The real focus of the experiment is the teacher. After watching the learner being strapped into place, he is taken into the main experimental room and seated before an impressive shock generator. Its main feature is a horizontal line of thirty switches, ranging from 15 volts to 450 volts, in 15-volt increments. There are also verbal designations which range from Slight SHOCK to Danger--Severe SHOCK. The teacher is told that he is to administer the learning test to the man in the other room. When the learner responds correctly, the teacher moves on to the next item; when the other man gives an incorrectanswer, the teacher is to give him an electric shock. He is to start at the lowest shock level ( 15 volts) and to increase the level each time the man makes an error, going through 30 volts, 45 volts, and so on.The "teacher" is a genuinely naive subject who has come to the laboratory to participate in an experiment. The learner, or victim, is an actor who actually receives no shock at all. The point of the experiment is to see how far a person will proceed in a concrete and measurable situation in which he is ordered to inflict increasing pain on a protesting victim.

    Of particular importance is the examination of Bayesianism and the new experimentalism, as well as new chapters on the nature of scientific laws and recent trends in the realism versus anti-realism debate."Crisp, lucid and studded with telling examples… As a handy guide to recent alarums and excursions (in the philosophy of science) I find this book vigorous, gallant and useful."New Scientist

    Based on eighteen months of fieldwork in a racially diverse working-class high school, Dude, You're a Fag sheds new light on masculinity both as a field of meaning and as a set of social practices. C. J. Pascoe's unorthodox approach analyzes masculinity as not only a gendered process but also a sexual one. She demonstrates how the "specter of the fag" becomes a disciplinary mechanism for regulating heterosexual as well as homosexual boys and how the "fag discourse" is as much tied to gender as it is to sexuality.

    Macionis', "Society: The Basics, 10th edition "is designed to help students see the relevance of the sociological theories and ideas that inform their own lives. Four main themes are found throughout the text: Seeing Sociology in Everyday LifeSocial DiversityGlobal ComparisonsCritical Thinking The new edition has an innovate new design, contemporary and compelling student applications, plus a wealth of author-written and author-managed supplemental material. This revision elevates "Society's "high standard of excellence, ensuring that it remains one of the foremost introductory sociology resources for students and instructors alike.

    This anthology of almost 70 readings--from contemporary scholarly literature, trade books, popular media, as well as contributed articles-- examines the many ways in which human sexuality is socially constructed and regulated behavior, and how it is studied by social scientists.