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beautiful
fuck gender norms, fuck sexuality norms, fuck predefined cookie-cutter roles of existence
be who you want to be, be with who you want to be with, and be it how you want to be it
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sociologically imaginative: Sociology
I think if you look outside of academia, you will find good sociology everywhere. Take examples from popular culture. The Matrix is a radical social critique built almost entirely on the scholarly work of Jean Baudrillard. Blindness by Jose Saramago is profoundly sociological and Adbusters is a mainstream sociology-infused publication which has had a radical effect on modern radicals. None of these are confined to academia. Want something even more hardcore? Pick up a copy of The Coming Insurrection. More radical still? Fly to one of the world’s many hotspots and invest yourself. The discipline is only as sanitary and you want it to be.
Sociology is a license to bridge academia with popular culture, the only limiting factor is within the sociologist herself. All disciplines are defined not by their textbook definitions but by the individuals who identify with them. Chomsky is a linguist by trade, yet he is the most widely cited living intellectual - not all linguists are widely cited but he redefined the field and redefined what a linguist could be.
Sociology is a blank check, it is a means by which you get to study whatever interests and motivates you, it is one of the few disciplines with such a wide spectrum of legitimate fields of study. Academia is only an element of sociology.
I don’t really know what else to say… if you feel limited or confined it is a self-imposed limitation and not an affect of the discipline.
The approach of the Critical Thinkers of the Frankfurt School is precisely the approach you so bemoan, so I find it interesting you identify with them: what is the point of pontificating in the ivory towers of academia, using dense language to obscure simple concepts, if you’re not willing to get involved? “Critical critics,” Marx wrote of The Young Hegelians, and so he would write of the Adorno et al.
Good sociology is radical, it is the conscious of academia, it is the stoic struggle against domination, it is a voice for those who have been rendered mute, it is sight for those blinded by forces beyond their vision, it is a call to arms, it is inclusive, it…
Where is the public discourse for sociological topics and critiques? I understand it is a discipline meant to question, to critique, to make society more just and fair. And it’s perfectly fine to rework, re-read previous academic work and critique it—-but outside of academia where is this being transmitted? How is sociology changing the average person’s life, how is it improving it?
It is the love of power, of the fascism in people’s minds that trap us all, but how is this going to be changes when it remains in an academic setting? Most people will not have much exposure to sociological critiques or examining of cultural customs, practices, social institutions and all that forms “the social”.
I guess what I was thinking when I first posted that, was beyond my own circles how can one help to work to change society. Outside of academic and advocacy work? How can we achieve real, measured progress in one’s lifetime? Even radical social progress?
Particularly when the culture one lives in pushes conformity, and the infamous values of greed and individualism? Perhaps I have more of the critical theorists’ outlook on society? By many sociology is not a field that is well known, or appreciated, and that lends to not give it credibility in the public’s eye—-which in my opinion doesn’t make the critiques sociology pushes any more perceivable?
Was it not Marx that said that philosophers have interpreted the world, but the point is to change it?
salientverses asked: I understand where it comes from in terms of theoretical origins. I understand it's purpose in academia, at critiquing everything else. My complaint was more at what do you do beyond this, beyond critiquing how can you can society to be more just?
Aut inveniam viam aut faciam
I wrote an unsolicited and somewhat manic letter to Noam Chomsky last year, asking him the same thing. Incredibly, he took the time to reply. Condensed, he told me that there are no universal answers to academia and that I should make my own path. And really, that is the most legitimate and sincere answer.
Get involved, give your time, spread your skills, there is so much going on and so much to be involved with. I have no idea what your field of interest is and how best to get involved but once you make the decision to not just join the conversation, but to reshape it, you become an unstoppable force.
We who have had the good fortune to be exposed to higher education are the embodiment of so much capital and knowledge, our participation in community projects infuses them with fresh, fiery, focused energy. Simply by participating, we become activists, because what is activism if not concious act of calculated participation?
I think if you look around, you will find that the question isn’t what can you do… but rather, how can you possibly choose from all the available options. Write for a local newspaper, teach English in your community, get involved in tutoring high-school kids… spread your knowledge and your insight and in doing so change the world one person at a time. Thought must be spread, critiques must be repackaged from the esoteric concepts and jargon of academia into accessible language suitable for non sociologists. Be that translator.
We are all so consumed with finding something big, something huge, but really, change is more complicated than that, more difficult than that, more subtle than that. Change is not an acute event it is a longitudinal process. Begin with your circle of friends or family. Help them in some way, foster a relationship that you feel could be better… for what is society if not the totality of human relationships?
PS. I am in no way qualified to give you or anybody else any advice, but in my defence, you asked ;)
And I’d love to chat specifics.
// Friendship Dilemmas //
The problem with overachieving friends is that either you secretly (or openly) hate them or they secretly (or openly) hate you; however, who else are you going to complain to about your 88% paper?
I mean denied a letter grade by 2%? That is such BS.
This kind of conversation doesn’t go well with normal humans.
// Sociology//
Good sociology is radical, it is the conscious of academia, it is the stoic struggle against domination, it is a voice for those who have been rendered mute, it is sight for those blinded by forces beyond their vision, it is a call to arms, it is inclusive, it is the tradition of a fiery young Marx as well as a compassionate but subdued Weber, it is the piercing poetry of W. E. B. Du Bois as well as the razor sharp wit of C. Wright Mills, it is the shadow fighting to escape the Yellow Wallpaper, it is the fight against institutional domination lead by Dorothy Smith, it is the liberating anonymous sex of Foucault as well as the sweaters of Chomsky, sociology is labour, sociology is justice, sociology is a tradition, a baton, a torch handed down by generations of academics who refused to colour within the lines, for every asshole like Parsons there have been plenty of Meads and Goffmans, for every airmchair sociologist like Durkheim there have been many Garfinkels and Zizeks, sociology is the infiltration of the resistance into the mainstream of academic thought.
If all you’re getting from sociology is hate, #YoureDoingItWrong. If it is broken, then bend the motherfucker into what you want it to be - that is sociology: a weapon for people just like you.
/rant
Making you hate people’s stupidity and dominance. And making you hate most of tv and the media circus.
Also making relating to people awkward and difficult.
Basically making you feel hopeless a lot.
But it also gives you the tools to understand as well. Actor/observer bias, fundamental attribution error, and the dominant stratification ideology have been vital in my understanding of social life.
Tell this to the millions of African children born to AIDS.
There is a point at which this type of pseudo-spiritual rhetoric retards social progress.
No, we are not all born with a basic equality of our human nature. A person born into a lower caste in India - yes, modern India - does not receive his or her basic equality of human nature. That some guy wrote in a book that we are all equal doesn’t really mean shit to the millions of people who are still being treated as subhuman.
Potential is nothing without opportunity, cognitive faculties are nothing if the body is malnourished and the brain is obsessed with the next meal, and physical abilities can be severely disturbed in the absence of clean water and atmosphere.
It’s time not just to ignore this kind of empty bullshit rhetoric, not just to cast it aside, but to shine a light on it and call it out for the problematic bullshit that it is.
This is the stuff of popcorn and lolilops, junk food for the soul. We need fucking solutions, not more asshole preachers.
(yes,yes,yes!) The 14th Dalai Lama, 2005
(via sociologicalimagination)
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