Communal Forms

Communal Forms
Author: Aksel Tjora
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 186
Release: 2020-03-25
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1000048284

Drawing on a wide range of social theory, as well as empirical inputs from studies of work, neighbourhoods, events, meeting places and online self-help groups, this book suggests that communal forms are constructed on the basis of communicative, material, biographic-cultural, practice-based, and situational layers. The concept of community has long provided an important point of departure for the discipline of sociology, with the conflicting conceptions of community before and into modernity embodied in Ferdinand Tönnies’ Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft and in Emile Dürkheim’s Mechanical and Organic Solidarity, providing the focus for debate. Other contributors have maintained an interest in communities as communions, interactional competencies, symbolic identification, tribal connection, and more recently communication. Drawing on such theoretical contributions, as well as empirical inputs, the authors develop a more nuanced concept of community, based on the notion that it is constructed from several different layers. This concept is then presented as a sociological toolbox with which to fuel approaches to examining societal challenges and change. Providing a fresh approach to a core sociological question that also has a wider societal relevance, Communal Forms will be of interest to scholars and students concerned with social issues, and for those with a more general interest in community, society and its development over time.

Communal Forms

Communal Forms
Author: Aksel Tjora
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 164
Release: 2020
Genre: Communities
ISBN: 9780367438920

Drawing on a wide range of social theory, as well as empirical inputs from studies of work, neighbourhoods, events, meeting places and online self-help groups, this book suggests that communal forms are constructed on the basis of communicative, material, biographic-cultural, practice-based, and situational layers. The concept of community has long provided an important point of departure for the discipline of sociology, with the conflicting conceptions of community before and into modernity embodied in Ferdinand Tönnies' Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft and in Emile Dürkheim's Mechanical and Organic Solidarity, providing the focus for debate. Other contributors have maintained an interest in communities as communions, interactional competencies, symbolic identification, tribal connection, and more recently communication. Drawing on such theoretical contributions, as well as empirical inputs, the authors develop a more nuanced concept of community, based on the notion that it is constructed from several different layers. This concept is then presented as a sociological toolbox with which to fuel approaches to examining societal challenges and change. Providing a fresh approach to a core sociological question that also has a wider societal relevance, Communal Forms will be of interest to scholars and students concerned with social issues, and for those with a more general interest in community, society and its development over time.

Critique of Authenticity

Critique of Authenticity
Author: Thomas Claviez
Publisher: Vernon Press
Total Pages: 329
Release: 2020-01-10
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1622738640

The volume provides a critical assessment of the concept of authenticity and gauges its role, significance and shortcomings in a variety of disciplinary contexts. Many of the contributions communicate with each other and thus acknowledge the enormous significance of this politically, morally, philosophically and economically-charged concept that at the same time harbors dangerous implications and has been critically deconstructed. The volume shows that the alleged need or desire for authenticity is alive and kicking but oftentimes comes at a high price, connected to a culture of experts, authority and exclusionary strategies.

The Global Convergence Of Vocational and Special Education

The Global Convergence Of Vocational and Special Education
Author: John G. Richardson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 221
Release: 2016-12-01
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1135055491

The global trend in educational participation has brought with it a cross-national consequence: the expansion of students with "special needs" (SEN) placed in special education and the growth of "low achieving" students diverted to vocational tracks. This book explores the global expansion of special and vocational education as a highly variable event, not only across nations of considerable economic, political and cultural difference, but between nations with evident similarities as well. The Global Convergence of Vocational and Special Education analyzes how the concept of secular benevolence underscores the divergent and convergent trajectories that vocational and special education have taken across the globe. The authors embrace national differences as the means to observe two dicta of comparative research: similar origins can result in very different outcomes, and similar outcomes can be the result of very different origins.

Comparative Social Evolution

Comparative Social Evolution
Author: Dustin R. Rubenstein
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 479
Release: 2017-03-24
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 1108132634

Darwin famously described special difficulties in explaining social evolution in insects. More than a century later, the evolution of sociality - defined broadly as cooperative group living - remains one of the most intriguing problems in biology. Providing a unique perspective on the study of social evolution, this volume synthesizes the features of animal social life across the principle taxonomic groups in which sociality has evolved. The chapters explore sociality in a range of species, from ants to primates, highlighting key natural and life history data and providing a comparative view across animal societies. In establishing a single framework for a common, trait-based approach towards social synthesis, this volume will enable graduate students and investigators new to the field to systematically compare taxonomic groups and reinvigorate comparative approaches to studying animal social evolution.

Marx at the Margins

Marx at the Margins
Author: Kevin B. Anderson
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 342
Release: 2016-02-12
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 022634570X

In Marx at the Margins, Kevin Anderson uncovers a variety of extensive but neglected texts by Marx that cast what we thought we knew about his work in a startlingly different light. Analyzing a variety of Marx’s writings, including journalistic work written for the New York Tribune, Anderson presents us with a Marx quite at odds with conventional interpretations. Rather than providing us with an account of Marx as an exclusively class-based thinker, Anderson here offers a portrait of Marx for the twenty-first century: a global theorist whose social critique was sensitive to the varieties of human social and historical development, including not just class, but nationalism, race, and ethnicity, as well. Through highly informed readings of work ranging from Marx’s unpublished 1879–82 notebooks to his passionate writings about the antislavery cause in the United States, this volume delivers a groundbreaking and canon-changing vision of Karl Marx that is sure to provoke lively debate in Marxist scholarship and beyond. For this expanded edition, Anderson has written a new preface that discusses the additional 1879–82 notebook material, as well as the influence of the Russian-American philosopher Raya Dunayevskaya on his thinking.

In the Presence of the Past

In the Presence of the Past
Author: R.T. Bienvenu
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 298
Release: 2013-03-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 9401137641

The broad canvas covered by the articles in the present volume celebrates the diversity and richness of the writings of Frank Manuel during a scholarly career that spans over five decades. The subjects of the articles - ranging from science to utopia, from theology to political thought - mirror many of the themes Manuel has written about with erudition, flair and uncommon perception. It is only fitting that in paying tribute to such a defiant intellect each author brings to his treatment a distinct perspective and texture, the result of his own original forays into the history of ideas. Yet underlying all the essays is the conviction that the study of the intersection of individuals and ideas still yields a rich harvest. Presented to Frank on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, In the Presence o/the Past honors a teacher, a friend and, above all, a scholar. R. T. Bienvenu and M. Feingold (eds). ln the presence of the past. vii. MARTIN PERETZ Frank Manuel: An Appreciation It was finally because of Frank Edward Manuel that I decided (however belatedly) to forgo a proper academic career. Since I had not left so much as a leafscar on the tree of the scholarly culture this is not a fact which anyone else would have reason to notice. It is also not, I am happy to add, something for which Manuel will be especially remembered.

The Saffron Wave

The Saffron Wave
Author: Thomas Blom Hansen
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 300
Release: 1999-04-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0691006717

The text goes on to argue that the Hindu nationalist movement has successfully articulated the anxieties and desires of the large and amorphous Indian middle class. Consequently, the movement has attracted privileged groups fearing encroachment on their dominant positions but also "plebian" and impoversihed groups seeking recognition around a majoritarian rhetoric of cultural pride, order, and national strength.

Common

Common
Author: Pierre Dardot
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 497
Release: 2019-01-24
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1474238610

Around the globe, contemporary protest movements are contesting the oligarchic appropriation of natural resources, public services, and shared networks of knowledge and communication. These struggles raise the same fundamental demand and rest on the same irreducible principle: the common. In this exhaustive account, Pierre Dardot and Christian Laval show how the common has become the defining principle of alternative political movements in the 21st century. In societies deeply shaped by neoliberal rationality, the common is increasingly invoked as the operative concept of practical struggles creating new forms of democratic governance. In a feat of analytic clarity, Dardot and Laval dissect and synthesize a vast repository on the concept of the commons, from the fields of philosophy, political theory, economics, legal theory, history, theology, and sociology. Instead of conceptualizing the common as an essence of man or as inherent in nature, the thread developed by Dardot and Laval traces the active lives of human beings: only a practical activity of commoning can decide what will be shared in common and what rules will govern the common's citizen-subjects. This re-articulation of the common calls for nothing less than the institutional transformation of society by society: it calls for a revolution.

Social Capital and Poor Communities

Social Capital and Poor Communities
Author: Susan Saegert
Publisher: Russell Sage Foundation
Total Pages: 353
Release: 2002-01-10
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1610444825

Neighborhood support groups have always played a key role in helping the poor survive, but combating poverty requires more than simply meeting the needs of day-to-day subsistence. Social Capital and Poor Communities shows the significant achievements that can be made through collective strategies, which empower the poor to become active partners in revitalizing their neighborhoods. Trust and cooperation among residents and local organizations such as churches, small businesses, and unions form the basis of social capital, which provides access to resources that would otherwise be out of reach to poor families. Social Capital and Poor Communities examines civic initiatives that have built affordable housing, fostered small businesses, promoted neighborhood safety, and increased political participation. At the core of each initiative lie local institutions—church congregations, parent-teacher groups, tenant associations, and community improvement alliances. The contributors explore how such groups build networks of leaders and followers and how the social power they cultivate can be successfully transferred from smaller goals to broader political advocacy. For example, community-based groups often become platforms for leaders hoping to run for local office. Church-based groups and interfaith organizations can lobby for affordable housing, job training programs, and school improvement. Social Capital and Poor Communities convincingly demonstrates why building social capital is so important in enabling the poor to seek greater access to financial resources and public services. As the contributors make clear, this task is neither automatic nor easy. The book's frank discussions of both successes and failures illustrate the pitfalls—conflicts of interest, resistance from power elites, and racial exclusion—that can threaten even the most promising initiatives. The impressive evidence in this volume offers valuable insights into how goal formation, leadership, and cooperation can be effectively cultivated, resulting in a remarkable force for change and a rich public life even for those communities mired in seemingly hopeless poverty. A Volume in the Ford Foundation Series on Asset Building