* Your assessment is very important for improving the workof artificial intelligence, which forms the content of this project
Download If Simmel Were A Fieldworker: On Formal
Survey
Document related concepts
Cognitive science wikipedia , lookup
Postdevelopment theory wikipedia , lookup
Unilineal evolution wikipedia , lookup
Social theory wikipedia , lookup
Sociology of terrorism wikipedia , lookup
Ethnography wikipedia , lookup
Sociological theory wikipedia , lookup
Symbolic interactionism wikipedia , lookup
Public sociology wikipedia , lookup
History of the social sciences wikipedia , lookup
Field research wikipedia , lookup
Transcript
If Simmel Were A Fieldworker: On Formal Sociological Theory And Analytical Field Research* Author(s): Eviatar Zerubavel Source: Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 3, No. 2 (Fall 1980), pp. 25-34 Published by: Wiley on behalf of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/si.1980.3.2.25 . Accessed: 15/10/2013 20:21 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction and Wiley are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Symbolic Interaction. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Field Research 25 If Simmel Were A Fieldworker: On Formal Sociological Theory And Analytical Field Research* Eviatar Zerubavel, Columbia University, New York, N. Y 10027 In this paper, an attempt is made to apply the methodological principles of Simmel’s formal sociology to fieldwork and, thus, to lay out systematically the methodological foundations of “analytical field research.” The paper centers around three major methodological principles: (a) shifting the emphasis from actual facts to the particular analytical perspectives from which they are viewed; (b) establishing concern with formal patterns which are abstracted from reality rather than with its concrete contents; (c) studying only selected aspects of concrete phenomena and makinga commitment to particular analytical concerns and foci. Based on these methodological principles, certain guidelines for analytical field researchers are then recommended. ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT branches of sociology is a school generally referred to as “formal sociology.” Unfortunately, this school has not produced yet a substantial body of empirical research. Ever since the days of its founder, Georg Simmel, it has usually been associated with the armchair and the library, generally divorced of any direct contact with social reality. The theoretical work which it has generated has, therefore, generally not been empirically grounded. A number of sociologists have already called for developing empirically grounded formal sociological theories (Glaser and Strauss, 1967; Denzin, 1970; Schwartz and Jacobs, 1979). A most effective way of grounding a theory would be doing fieldwork. Field research is undoubtedly among the most useful avenues for gathering information about social life and acquiring first-hand familiarity with social reality. The present paper aims at laying out the methodological foundations of the kind of field research which would be based on the principles of formal sociology. It may sound ironical, not to mention risky, that one would try to apply the principles of a theorist whose work is usually regarded as the prototype of “armchair theorizing” in sociology to a research tradition as empirically oriented as field research. And yet, the successful combination of the analytical thrust of formal sociology with the empirical vigor of fieldwork ought to ,produce “analytical field research” which would most likely contribute to eliminate the artificial split between “theory” and “research” in sociology. Most of the literature on formal sociology has so far been restricted to discussions of some of Simmel’s classic examples of “forms of sociation” (sociability, domination and subordination, marginality, and so on), as well as to long debates over the ontological status of those “forms.” The present paper aims at shedding some light on one particular aspect of Simmel’s formal sociology which has so far been almost totally neglected; the fact that it actually constitutes a methodology. I shall, *An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the Eastern SociologicalSociety, New York, March 1977.1 am most grateful to Herbert Blumer, Renee Fox, Samuel Heilman, Charles Lidz, Loren Roth, and Yael Zerubavel for some very useful suggestions. This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 26 SYMBOLIC INTERACTION therefore, begin by laying out the methodological principles that are embodied in formal sociology and then try to apply them to actual field research by offering some systematic guidelines for generating sociological theory from it. Let us first examine the methodological foundations of the formal philosophy of science in general and of the formal approach to the sociological enterprise in particular. Though Simmel is by no means the only sociologist to have generated formal theory, he has nevertheless done more than any other sociologist to lay out explicitly the methodological principles which underlie the formal approach. He presented these principles in 1908 in his classic essay “The Problem of Sociology” (Simmel, 1959), and reformulated them nine years later in “The Field of Sociology,” the opening chapter of his Grundfragen der Soziologie (Simmel, 1950:3-25).In these two works one can find the entire methodological spirit of formal sociology. Analy t ical Perspec t ives In its philosophy of science, the formal school is deeply concerned with the epistemological concerns of scientists and much less so with the nature of the reality which they study. Science is characterized not by the actual subject matters that are studied, but, rather, by the particular analytical perspectiveor standpoint from which it views them. Accordingly, the various sciences are distinguished from one another on the basis of the different perspectives from which they view reality. This philosophy of science underlies the formal approach to the sociological enterprise. What distinguishes sociology from the other sciences of man is clearly not a different subject matter, but, rather, the fact that it is guided bya unique “purposeof cognition” (Simmel, 1950:8),1a unique analytical perspective which highlights only particular aspects of man. The actual subject matter with which sociology deals is by no means different from that which is dealt by history, psychology, political science, economics, or even human anatomy, for that matter. The only rationale for distinguishing among those disciplines is the fact that each of them views man from yet a different analytical angle, thus highlighting different aspects of him. In his efforts to justify the claim for a distinct science of sociology, Simmel was clearly far more interested in the novel ways it offers for approaching reality than in its possible contribution to our factual knowledge about man. In fact, he actually claimed that sociology is a standpoint or perspective (Simmel, 1950:7-8),that it is a method for viewing man (Simmel, 1950:13-16). In its relation to the existing sciences, sociology is therefore a new method, an instrument ofinvestigation, a new way of getting a t the subject matters ofall those sciences. . .it contains no subject matter not already treated in one of the existing sciences. I t only proposes a new way for all of them (Simmel, 1959:312). He went to great lengths emphasizing that it cannot be a distinct subject matter that distinguishes sociology from the other sciences of man, since, . . .sociology contains no subject matter that is not already treated in one of the extant sciences.. .[It] is not a science with its own content (Simmel, 1950:14. Emphasis mine). ‘That is Kurt Wolff‘s translation of the German word Erkenntnisabsicht. Rudolf Heberle’s translation is “cognitive intention” (Heberle, 1948:252). This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Field Research 27 He insisted that it is not new facts about man that would justify a distinct disciplineof sociology, but, rather, the development of new ways of viewing him. [Sociology’s] special character derives from the circumstance that it brings a whole realm ofobjects under a specificviewpoint. Not its subject matter but its approachthe specific abstraction which it makes-differentiates it from the other sociohistorical sciences (Simmel, 1959:318). . . .sociology, as a special science, might find its specific subject matter merely by drawing a new line through facts which are quite well known (Simmel, 1959:313). Simmel’s own way of illuminating in the most unusual fashion the most well-known facts about man is an excellent example of the application of the first methodological principle of formal sociology-shifting the emphasis from gathering new facts to developing new analytical perspectives from which to view reality. Abstracted Formal Patterns The way to transcend the concreteness of the reality which one studies is to abstract from it, and it is only through a process of abstracting from concrete reality that scientific topics can evolve. Simmel himself even went as far as to claim that, Abstractions alone produce science out of the complexity or the unity of reality (Simmel, 1959:316). Accordingly, it may very well be argued that each science differs from the other sciences by the fact that it has a uniquely distinct way of abstracting from concrete reality. That is true, of course, of sociology as well, a point which was made quite explicitly by Simmel: The topics of [sociology’s] researchers certainly arise in a process of abstraction . . .Sociology is thus founded upon an abstraction from concrete reality (Simmel, 1950:11). Formal sociology thus regards the abstraction of the basic “forms”of social life as the main concern of the sociologist. According to Simmel, . . .there remains for a sociology in the strictest sense. . .nothing but the treatment of the forms abstracted (Simmel, 1959:319). Sociologists, therefore, ought to transcend the unique peculiarity and idiosyncrasy of actual historical manifestations. Rather than deal with the concrete contents of reality, they must be concerned primarily with abstracting formal patterns from it. As Coser has argued, Simmel insisted that, . . .analysis of the limited number of forms which could be extracted from the bewildering multiplicity of social contents might contribute insights into social life denied to those who would be content with descriptions of the concrete (Coser, 1965:8). Hence the primacy of “forms” and “patterns” in the formal sociologist’s concern. This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 28 SYMBOLIC INTERACTION Given this second methodological principle of formal sociology, the emphasis on abstracting formal patterns from concrete reality, it should come as little surprise that the work of this school has been depicted as “the geometry of social forms” (Levine, 1971:xxv). In abstracting from the variations in content so as to focus only on the constant forms and arrive at “observations the significance of which would extend beyond the range of the particular fact” (Bougle, 1965:58), formal sociology follows the steps of geometry. In reducing an infinite number of actual facts to a minimum of formal patterns, the formal sociologist resembles the geometrician, who deliberately ignores the material contents of actual bodies so as to isolate their spatial forms alone. Sociology, the discipline that deals with the purely social aspects of man. . .is related to the other special sciences of man as geometry is related to the physico-chemical sciences. . . Both geometry and sociology leave to other sciences the investigationof the contents realized in the forms, that is, the total phenomena whose forms they explore (Simmel, 1959:320). Geometrical abstraction investigates only the spatialforms of bodies. . . Similarly, if society is conceived as interaction among individuals, the description of theforms of this interaction is the task of the science of society in its strictest and most essential sense {Simmel, 1950:21-22). In this respect, of course, the formal sociologist also resembles the logician (Simmel, 1959:317), as well as the grammarian, who isolates the pure forms of language from the concrete contents of actual speech (Simmel, 1950:22). Selectivity and Focus In order to be able to abstract from concrete reality, formal sociologists develop and cultivate their analytical selectivity by studying only particular aspects or dimensions of concrete phenomena rather than their totality. In other words, they commit themselves to certain analytical foci. This the fundamental distinction between formal sociology and “general sociology” (Simmel, 1950:16-21, 26-39), or between formal theory and “substantive theory” (Glaser and Strauss, 1967). How do formal sociologists abstract from concrete reality? How do they accomplish the fairly difficult cognitive task of viewing reality only from one particular perspective and of focusing only on particular aspectsof it? The answer lies in the fact that the particular “cognitive purpose” which guides their thinking is formed around particular concepts. As Simmel pointed out, Every science rests upon an abstraction inasmuch as it considers the totality ofsome given thing in one of its aspects and from the viewpoint of a particular conception (Simmel, 1959:313). Under the guidance of its particular conception, any science extracts only onegroup or aspect out of the totality or experienced immediacy of phenomena (Simmel, 195O:l I). This point has since been made even more explicitly by Herbert Blumer: The abstraction of a relation from this worldofparticulars. . .ispossible only through conceptualization and necessitates, ultimately, a concept. That is to say, the very act of abstraction is an act of conception {Blumer, 1931520). This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Field Research 29 This is certainly true of the formal sociological enterprise. . . .sociological phenomena. . .are factored o u t of this living reality by means of an added concept (Simmel, 1950:21). Hence the centrality and indispensability of conceptualization to formal sociology. Let us proceed now to the application of the methodological principles of formal sociology to actual field research and consider the fundamentalguidelines that would help to produce “analytical field research.” The necessary product of the formal sociological approach, such research clearly differs substantially from conventional ethnographicresearch, since the two are based on quite incompatible methodologies, and it would be most useful to consider the former in contrast to the latter. “Intellectual Novelties” The sociocultural, as well as academic, climate within which the ethnographic tradition has developed has advocated a kind of research which is very different from that advocated by formal sociology. To begin with, ethnographers have traditionally studied cultures which have been in the process of dying, and that has made them particularly committed to record, and, thus, preserve for posterity, everything possible from these cultures, before they would disappear forever. In addition to that, having encountered cultures so vastly different from their own, they have tended to become reluctant to say or write anything about them before having grasped the entire cultural context within which any exotic pattern would “make sense.” Finally, they have also been heavily influenced by functionalism, which involves a holistic approach of encompassing social systems as integrated wholes, as well as by cultural relativism, which rejects universals and advocates cautiousness in transcending the cultural context of one’s object of inquiry and in making any generalizations. As a result of all this, ethnographers have traditionally been taught that they should try to encompass the social phenomena which they study in their totality, as unsegmentable wholes, and never to confine their attention to only one particular aspect of them. They have also been trained to provide their readers with a fully detailed contextual background when presenting any of those phenomena. Thus, many ethnographers have come to view their task as covering in encyclopaedic detail every fact which might possibly relate to their object of inquiry, and have developed a professional need to gather factual data, along with an extremely descriptive style of presentation. This has often led to their having developed interests and expertise in particular geographic, rather than analytic, areas. Many ethnographers have become experts in particular societies or communities, and their expertise has often been achieved at the expense of trying to address particular themes which relate to social life in general. The methodological foundations of formal sociology would lead analytical field research to develop in an altogether different direction and fashion. Whereas the ethnographer has been traditionally motivated by the desire to know more about the social world, the analyticalfield researcher would most likely be motivated by the wish to know about it in different ways. Whereas the former has been concerned primarily with the contents of social life, the latter would most likely be concerned mainly with the formal patterns that underlie it. This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 30 SYMBOLIC INTERACTION Analytical field researchers ought to abandon, therefore, the traditional ethnographic search for exotic “factual novelties” to gather. Instead, they should direct their creative efforts toward the development of new analytical perspectives from which to view social life, that is, toward the discovery of “intellectualnovelties.” As far as innovation is concerned, they ought to be challenged by the prospect of illuminating even the most familiar and mundane concrete reality from yet novel analytical viewpoints (consider, for example, the work of Erving Goffman, the prototype of analytical field research). One obvious implication of this is that analytical field researchers must abandon area expertise and concentrate on developing particular analytical perspectives and foci rather than on identifying particular concrete “fields.” As Schwartz and Jacobs have put it, they, . . .are in the business of studying sociological topics, not people. . . Their job is to make a set of integrated observations on a given topic and place them in an analytic framework (Schwartz and Jacobs, 1979:289). If they are to innovate in any significant way, it would not be in their selection of the actual concrete phenomena to be observed, but, rather, in their choice of the particular analytical perspectives from which to observe them. Though their studies have to be carried out in some concrete social settings, communities, or societies, they must not be studies ofthose settings, communities, or societies, since their main focus is, after all, analytical. Focused Observations and Analytical Concerns If analytical field researchers are to be something other than fact gatherers, and if they are to commit themselves to some particular analytical perspectives and foci, they must view reality in a deliberately selective manner. This entails abandoning the canons of holism and giving up the traditional ethnographic efforts to study everything about concrete phenomena so as to encompass them in their totality. Therefore, they should accept the partiality of their studies, which is an inevitable consequence of having committed themselves to particular analytical standpoints and, thus, of having focused only on a few selected aspects of observed phenomena. Rather than regret the fact that they ignore other aspects of the latter as a necessary evil which is an inevitable result of the practical impossibility to observe “everything,” they should regard their deliberate effort to view phenomena in a rather one-sided manner by restricting their concern to-and focusing their observations on-only some aspects of them as a methodological virtue. In short, they ought to commit themselves to making focused observations. This implies a rule of never beginning a study and entering the field before having established some particular analytical concerns. As Blumer has put it, The possession and use of a prior picture o r scheme of the empirical world under study. . .is a n unavoidable prerequisite for any study of the empirical world. One can see the empirical world only through some scheme or image of it. The entire act of scientific study is oriented and shaped by the underlying picture of the empirical world that is used (Blumer, 1969:24-25). This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Field Research 31 It is essential that analytical field researchers impose the particular analyticalfocus of their study on their observations prior to the beginning of the research (and not only in retrospect, for purely “cosmetic” purposes of presentation, as is quite often the case with the act of formulating hypotheses. . .). The act of establishing the particular analytical concerns and focus of the study must precede the act of entering the field, because it is the focus of one’s concerns that determines, to a large extent, the boundaries of one’s perception (Pike, 1967:98-119).Researchers’ particular analytical concerns and foci provide their observations with the particular cognitive orientation that is necessary in order to decide what to regard as “relevant” for their purposes (and, therefore, notable), and what to ignore as “irrelevant.” These concerns and foci must be established prior to the beginning of the study, since they essentially function as sensitizerswhich help researchers “see” patterns which might have never emerged in mere perception. In other words, researchers would have probably missed and ignored many patterns had they not been particularly concerned with particular analytical foci (see, for example, Zerubavel, 1979:xvii-xviii). We have already established that formal sociologists can isolate sociological patterns from their concrete contexts only by abstraction, since that isolation is purely analytical. We have also established that abstraction presupposes conceptualization, since only under the guidance of concepts can the researcher factor out sociological patterns from the actuality of their concrete contexts. Most of the concerns and foci of the analytical field researcher are, therefore, formed around conceptual constructs. Since conception has a most significant role in guiding and fashioning perception, it is hardly surprising that one of the major functions of concepts in analytical field research is to sensitize the researcher’s perception. As Blumer has pointed out, [ A sensitizing concept] gives the user a general sense of reference and guidance in approaching empirical instances. . sensitizing concepts merely suggest directions along which to look (Blumer, 1954:7). Sensitizing concepts are, therefore, indispensable to analytical field research (Blumer, 1954; Denzin, 1970:14-15; Schwartz and Jacobs, 1979:28). In adhering to the methodological principles of formal sociology, analytical field research differs considerably not only from conventional ethnographic research, but, also, from any research which is based on the positivist logic of scientific inquiry. While they must establish certain analytical concerns and foci prior to their entrance to the field, analytical. field researchers need not necessarily formulate any hypotheses. Moreover, they do not even have to operationalize their concepts at that stage. Finally, they should be open not only to new findings, but, also, to dimensionsof their objects of inquiry which they might not have considered before. Thus, they need not necessarily dimensionalize their object of inquiry before they enter the field, and their perception of where its boundaries lie may be quite vague. Recapitulation In this paper, an attempt has been made to apply the methodological principles of formal sociology to fieldwork and, thus, to lay out systematically the methodological foundations of “analytical field research.” Three major methodological principles of formal sociology have been discussed: This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 32 SYMBOLIC INTERACTION a) The shift of emphasis from actual facts to the particular analytical perspective from which they are viewed. b) The primary concern with the formal patterns whichare abstracted from reality, rather than with its concrete contents. c) The researchers’ analytical selectivity, which is manifested in the fact that they study only selected aspects of concrete phenomena and commit themselves to particular analytical concerns and foci. Based on these methodological principles, the followingguidelines for analytical field researchers have been recommended: Rather than be motivated by the desire to know “more,” they should cultivate a wish to know “in different ways.” They must abandon the traditional ethnographic search for “factual novelties” to gather, and direct their efforts toward the development of new analytical perspectives from which to view and illuminate even the most familiar and mundane concrete reality, that is, toward the discovery of “intellectual novelties.” They must give up the traditional ethnographic efforts to study everything about concrete phenomena, and commit themselves to focused observations, since being committed to a particular analytical perspective involves viewing reality in a selective manner and focusing only on a few aspects of observed phenomena. They should enter the field only after having established some particular analytical concerns and having imposed a particular analytical focus on their observations. Since the isolation of sociological patterns from their concrete contexts is possible only through a process of abstraction from reality, which is, in turn, possible only under the guidance of concepts, these concerns and foci ought to be formed around conceptual constructs. They function as sensitizers, enabling researchers to “see” patterns which they would have probably missed without them. They provide their observations with the particular cognitive orientation that is necessary in order to decide what to regard as “relevant” and what to ignore as “irrelevant.” It is suggested here that an analyticallyoriented field research which would follow these fundamental methodological guidelines would most likely generate theoretical insights and contribute to the development of grounded formal theory, as well as to the elimination of the artificial split between “theory” and “research,” in sociology. This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Field Research 33 REFERENCES Blumer, Herbert 1931 “Science without concepts.” American Journal of Sociology 36 (January):513-33. 1954 “What is wrong with social theory?’ American Sociological Review 19 (February):S-lO. 1969 “The methodological position of symbolic interactionism.” Pp. 1-60in Herbert Blumer, Symbolic Interactionism. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. Bougle, Celestin 1965 “The sociology of Georg Simmel.” Pp. 58-63in Lewis A. Coser (ed.),Georg Simmel. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. Coser, Lewis A. 1965 “Introduction.” Pp. 1-26 in Lewis Coser (ed.), Georg Simmel. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall. Denzin, Norman K. 1970 The Research Act. Chicago: Aldine. Glaser, Barney G. and Anselm L. Strauss 1967 The Discovery of Grounded Theory. Chicago: Aldine. Heberle, Rudolf 1948 “The sociology of Georg Simmel: the forms of social interaction.” Pp. 249-73in Harry E. Barnes (ed.), An Introduction to the History of Sociology. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Levine, Donald N. 1971 “Introduction.” Pp. ix-lxv in Donald N. Levine (ed.), On Individuality and Social Forms. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. Pike, Kenneth L. 1967 Language in Relation to a Unified Theory of the Structure of Human Behavior. The Hague: Mouton. Schwartz, Howard and Jerry Jacobs 1979 Qualitative Sociology. New York: The Free Press. Simmel, Georg 1950 The Sociology of Georg Simmel, Kurt H. Wolffe (ed.). New York. The Free Press. 1959 “The problem of sociology.” Pp. 31036 in Kurt H. Wolff (ed.), Georg Simmel, 1858-1918. Columbus: The Ohio State University Press. Zerubavel, Eviatx 1979 Patterns of Time in Hospital Life. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press. This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 34 THIS PAGE LEFT BLANK INTENTIONALLY This content downloaded from 129.74.250.206 on Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:21:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions