Mauss’s lectures to psychologists: A case for holistic sociology

Abstract

In lectures delivered to psychologists in the 1920s and 1930s, Marcel Mauss argued for a rapprochement between sociology and psychology. His goal was not disciplinary unification, but rather a more holistic sociology that recognized the mutual constitution of the body and mind, and the effects of society on the embodied person. Following a review of main points from Mauss's lectures, I critically review several research programs that are advancing in directions similar to those Mauss advocated: cognitive science research on embodied cognition; psychology studies of cross-cultural differences in perception and emotional expression; and sociological studies of moral cultures. I argue that these research programs provide firm support for positions developed in Mauss's lectures, and that, therefore, Mauss's ideas provide a useful template on which future sociological studies of culture, mind, and body can be built.

Embodiment and Culture

“…Drawing from the French strand of practice theory represented by Marcel Mauss (Mauss, 1979(Mauss, /1935(Mauss, , 2006Ignatow, 2012), Pierre Bourdieu, and Loic Wacquant (Lizardo and Strand, 2010), as well as from cognitive neuroscience research on 'mirror neurons' that shows that people have a capacity to understand the meaning and intended purpose of others' actions "at an implicit, bodily level, without recourse to an explicit 'theory of mind' of other agents" (Lizardo, 2009). Drawing from the French strand of practice theory represented by Marcel Mauss (Mauss, 1979(Mauss, /1935(Mauss, , 2006Ignatow, 2012), Pierre Bourdieu, and Loic Wacquant (Lizardo and Strand, 2010), as well as from cognitive neuroscience research on 'mirror neurons' that shows that people have a capacity to understand the meaning and intended purpose of others' actions "at an implicit, bodily level, without recourse to an explicit 'theory of mind' of other agents" (Lizardo, 2009).…”

Embodied Cognition, Representationalism, and Mechanism: A Review and Analysis

“…An important shift away from classic western dualism and representationalism, outside of psychology, concerns what has been termed the “bodily turn” (Ignatow, , p. 116) in anthropology and sociology. Led chiefly by theoretical work that treats the human body as much more than a “marginal social fact” (Van Wolputte, )—that is, as something more than a vehicle of communication or a repository of internal representations—work in this area has highlighted the ways in which skillful human participation in everyday life is inextricably tied to corporeality, with the fully‐embodied, cultural self‐viewed as an agent of social practice, reproduction, demarcation, and transformation (for examples of this theorizing, see Bourdieu, ; Comaroff, ; Csordas, , ; Ignatow, ; Ingold, , ; Mauss, ; Van Wolputte, ; Bourdieu & Wacquant, ). From this perspective, there is a fundamental relationship between embodiment and cultural life, in that one's bodily involvement in the world might be thematically described as the “existential condition in which culture and self are grounded” (Csordas, , p. 136).…”

“…From this perspective, there is a fundamental relationship between embodiment and cultural life, in that one's bodily involvement in the world might be thematically described as the “existential condition in which culture and self are grounded” (Csordas, , p. 136). As a turn away from classic western dualism and representationslism, these theorists have put to use well‐known concepts such as Bourdieu's () habitus, Merleau‐Ponty's () pre‐reflective consciousness, and a fundamental holism (Bourdieu, ; Ingold, ; Ignatow, , ; see also essays in Csordas, ) that treats the embodied agent as an ontologically unitary participant, engaged, coping, and becoming skillful in cultural forms of life via one's fully‐embodied practical involvement.…”

“…While embodied cognition and work within the “bodily turn” overlap in several important respects, due to their simultaneous interest in the body's role in social life and cognition, it also seems clear that embodied cognition has not fully embraced the more holistic thrust of “bodily turn” theorizing. As Ignatow (, ) has argued, experimental work within embodied cognition has offered growing evidence for what both they and embodiment‐oriented theorists in anthropology and sociology have emphasized. At the same time, embodied cognition research and theorizing—taking place mostly within psychology and cognitive science research programs—have not identified with or assimilated many of the non‐representationalist arguments of “bodily turn” anthropologists and sociologists and continue to treat cognitive phenomena in ways that presuppose the necessity of representations in some form.…”

What can cognitive neuroscience do for cultural sociology?

“…For instance, throughout their careers, Durkheim and Mauss were interested in the relationship between the social and the cognitive (Ignatow, 2012;Lizardo, 2009b). Tarde used insights from psychology to understand how beliefs, desires, and practices propagated in society (Turner, 2007).…”