Description:
This book seeks to re-establish the credentials of sociology as the science of society. While championing interdisciplinarity in recognising the capacity of converging perspectives to yield more interesting general theories of social life, the author defends disciplinarity in maintaining sociology's achievements as a discipline.
With chapters on the sociological world view, imagining society, the self, love, education, mathematics and religion, The Age of the Social re-states the importance of sociology as the source of robust ideas about the social in an age in which this notion has grown in importance. As such, it will appeal to scholars across the social sciences, with interests in method and philosophy in the social disciplines.
Review Quotes:
"Restivo asks us to take seriously the discovery of the social, developed by sociologists and now beginning to permeate the biological, cognitive and engineering sciences. Doing this will require us to unmask the idols of science and religion, and to (really!) educate people to think and act critically. A powerful and challenging book."
Lawrence Busch, Michigan State University, USA.