Philosophy of Social Science Roundtable Call for Papers

FIFTEENTH ANNUALPHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE ROUNDTABLE22-24 MARCH 2013University of California-Santa Cruz >CALL FOR PAPERS We are organizing the fifteenth annual working conference on topics in philosophy of the social sciences. The 2013 Roundtable will continue a tradition of meetings that brings together philosophers and social scientists to discuss a wide range of philosophical issues raised …

Mayer Zald

I am sorry to share the news with readers that Mayer Zald passed away today in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  Mayer was a brilliant sociologist, a founding contributor to the fields of organizational sociology and social movement theory, and a fertile and stimulating voice in conversation with scholars old and young until the final week of …

Readers’ list of innovative social science writing

Image: graph of relationships among the social sciences, Eigenfactor.org To the readers of UnderstandingSociety, I am writing directly to you to ask your thoughts about innovative work in the social sciences today. What books or new areas of inquiry in the social sciences are you particularly excited about right now? The context -- One of the …

SSHA 2011

As always, the Social Science History Association meeting in Boston is brimming with great sessions across a wide range of topic areas. There is evidence of lots of new thinking about the intersections of the social science disciplines and various fields of historical research. Here is the SSHA's description of its mission: The Social Science History …

Four years of UnderstandingSociety

Today marks the fourth anniversary of UnderstandingSociety. This is the 613th posting since I began in November 2007 and the 135th in the past year.  I continue to find this medium a good way of pushing forward my own learning and thinking about a swirl of topics around the central thrust, making sense of the …

Three years of UnderstandingSociety

Today marks the end of the third year of publication of UnderstandingSociety.  This is the 481st posting, with prior posts covering a range of themes from "social ontology" to "foundations of the social sciences" to "globalization and economic development."  In beginning this effort in 2007 I had envisioned something different from the kinds of blogs …

Three years of UnderstandingSociety

Today marks the end of the third year of publication of UnderstandingSociety. This is the 481st posting, with prior posts covering a range of themes from "social ontology" to "foundations of the social sciences" to "globalization and economic development." In beginning this effort in 2007 I had envisioned something different from the kinds of blogs that …

UnderstandingSociety Facebook page

You are invited to participate in the new UnderstandingSociety Facebook page. The page has links to recent posts on the blog, news items on recent developments in Burma, Thailand, and China, and updates on earlier topics concerning the social sciences in the blog. Best of all, readers can participate by offering their own observations and …

Texts, ideas, and "about"

Harvard philosopher Nelson Goodman wrote a series of articles in the 1970s on the subject of "about" (PROBLEMS AND PROJECTS).  It was an interesting effort by a deeply gifted philosopher to get a handle on what a text is "about", without simply restating the content that the article or text includes.  In hindsight Goodman's interest …