Sociology in France after 1945

Masson, Philippe; Schrecker, Cherry

doi:10.1057/9781137450548

Cited by 10 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…This said, it is important to underscore that the social sciences in general developed institutionally much later in France than in the United States. 7 In the often told saga of the rise and fall of the first Durkheimians, the latter managed to introduce sociology into the university curriculum only under the banner of philosophy; when the Second World War broke out, Émile Durkheim's heirs were dispersed and struggling to recruit a new generation of followers, since they could not create jobs for themselves in what remained a marginal field of enquiry (Heilbron 2015;Masson and Schrecker 2016). Only with the creation of the VIe Section of the École Pratique des Hautes Études in 1947, a post-war increase in enrolments across all university disciplines, and the development of a policy of bourses to bring large numbers of African students to France, did the number of both French and Francophone sociologists begin to grow (Marcel 2011;Steinmetz 2017;Tournès 2011).…”

Section: Social Science and Race In Francementioning

confidence: 99%

‘Nothing Is Less Universal than the Idea of Race’

2021

Durkheimian Studies

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In 1950, the cultural anthropologist Alfred Métraux, a student of Marcel Mauss, was appointed to head a new Race Bureau at UNESCO in Paris whose mission was to combat racism with the tools of social science. Métraux had worked in the Americas since the 1930s, and his appointment allowed French social scientists to join the global struggle to remove prejudice ‘from the minds of men’. To what extent did French scholars help shape Métraux’s efforts, given that at the time American sociologists and social psychologists dominated the study of race relations? Booklets commissioned by UNESCO and authored by French and American scientists in the early 1950s suggest that linguistic and conceptual barriers made cross-national discussions of race difficult, but not impossible. Thanks in part to Métraux’s campaign, the social scientific study of race relations in post-war France began earlier than is typically remembered.

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Section: Social Science and Race In Francementioning

confidence: 99%

‘Nothing Is Less Universal than the Idea of Race’

2021

Durkheimian Studies

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“…), Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), the universities (the Sorbonne, then Lille, Avignon, Vincennes, etc.) and scientific reviews, at the same time as the 'survey' emerged as the paradigmatic instrument and as a condition for academic validation (Masson, 2016).…”

Section: The French Model Hypothesismentioning

confidence: 99%

What does ‘Culture’ Mean in French? A Theoretical Mapping and Fractal Analysis of the Sociology of Culture in France

Alexandre

2018

Cultural Sociology

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This article charts the development of the sociology of culture in France. First, it examines the hypothesis of a French model, putting into perspective the correlation between cultural policies and dedicated sociological inquiries at the end of the 1950s. 'Culture' is one of the oldest fields of research in France, and current research still derives from the same anthropological matrix. Yet French sociologists present themselves as part of a divided and competitive academic domain. This article, based on an encompassing review of the literature as well as on in-depth interviews, accordingly distinguishes eight different 'schools'-organized around pre-eminent academics, concept producers and resource providers-as well as circles of collaboration. Whilst these circles organize their theoretical activity around emblems (with the word 'culture' referring to different conceptual sets) the social relations in their midst are organized around dyads, which usually transition from positive collaboration to rivalry. The article highlights the importance of these divisions as a fractal process and as boundary work for scientific production. From this perspective, the sociology of culture in France could be described as a large and extensive system of concepts and collaborations developed within small groups, within and between which, as with all 'cultural' matters, symbolic activity is the key basis for social status.

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“… 11 Together with John Holmwood, Stephen Turner is in the process of editing a series of national histories published by Palgrave MacMillan, called “Sociology Transformed” ( http://www.palgrave.com/in/series/14477 , last visited August 31, 2017). At the moment, there exist volumes on Australia (Harley and Wickham 2014 ); Austria (Fleck 2016 ); Belgium (Vanderstraeten and Loucks 2018 ); China (Chen 2018 ); the Czech Republic (Skovasja and Balon 2017 ); Denmark (Kropp 2015 ); France (Masson and Schrecker 2016 ); Ireland (Fanning and Hess 2015 ); Israel (Ram 2018 ); Italy (Cossu and Bortolini 2017 ); New Zealand (Crothers 2018 ); Poland (Bucholc 2016 ); Portugal (da Silva 2016 ); Russia (Titarenko and Zdravomyslova 2017 ); South Africa (Sooryamoorthy 2016 ); Sweden (Larsson and Magdalenić 2015 ); and the United States (Turner 2014 ). Further books are in preparation.…”

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confidence: 99%

A Systematic View on the Use of History for Current Debates in Sociology, and on the Potential and Problems of a Historical Epistemology of Sociology

Dayé

2018

Am Soc

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For various reasons, among them changes in the global higher education regime and competitive knowledge claims from other disciplines, the field of the history of sociology (HoS) has experienced an increased pressure to justify its own existence during the last decade. Positing that the best approach to justify the existence of a thing is to show its usefulness, the article discusses four types of claims to usefulness made by historians of sociology. The history of sociology can be said to be relevant in (I) shaping and maintaining the discipline’s identity; (II) in providing a rich fund of teaching future sociologists; (III) in informing current research and theorizing; and (IV) in reflecting more broadly on the cultural status of sociology in modern societies. The article then assesses the potential and problems of aspiring a historical epistemology of sociology, a proposal made recently especially in German and Anglophone contexts to link the history of science with its philosophy in the sense described as type III. It concludes that selected principles or ideas of historical epistemology can be very fruitfully applied in HoS. However, the project of transferring the whole program of historical epistemology into HoS is bound to fail. Nonetheless, there is plenty of reason to continue conceiving of HoS as an integral part of sociology.

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Sociology in France after 1945

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

‘Nothing Is Less Universal than the Idea of Race’

‘Nothing Is Less Universal than the Idea of Race’

What does ‘Culture’ Mean in French? A Theoretical Mapping and Fractal Analysis of the Sociology of Culture in France

A Systematic View on the Use of History for Current Debates in Sociology, and on the Potential and Problems of a Historical Epistemology of Sociology

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