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Norbert Elias
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Norbert Elias

Four Volume Set
Edited by:

June 2003 | 1 592 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd
Norbert Elias (1897-1990) is now widely regarded as one of the greatest sociologists of the 20th century. The challenge and profundity of his work are still being assimilated. Some have suggested that in time, he will be regarded as the Copernicus or Darwin of sociology, the man who set the subject on its scientific course.

These four volumes provide a comprehensive and penetrating survey of Elias's life and work. They pinpoint the main fields of research which Elias and his followers have explored: the civilizing process; state-formation; knowledge, religion and science; informalization; power; established-outsider figurations in fields such as class, gender and race; the sociology of the body; the sociology of the emotions; the sociology of leisure, sport and the arts; the sociology of the professions; medicine and psychoanalysis; crime and punishment; drug use and abuse. The collection also explores the various critiques of Elias's `figurational' or `process' sociology and counter-critiques by Elias's followers.

The volumes successfully locate the work of Elias and his followers in the context of modern sociology, especially in relation to writers such as Mannheim, Adorno, Parsons, Goffman, Foucault and Bourdieu. In the penetrating, original and informative Introduction, Eric Dunning and Stephen Mennell elucidate Elias's sociological contributions and the bearing his life experiences had on his work. The collection is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the sociological contribution of Norbert Elias.

The collection is organized in the following 4 volumes:

Volume 1

Focuses on Elias's work in the context of his life and career, and reviews his place in the contemporary social sciences, especially in relation to such figures as Michel Foucault and Pierre Bourdieu. Also discussed in this volume are Elias's pathbreaking contributions to such issues as: the 'agency-structure' dilemma; habitus; power; involvement and detachment; knowledge and the sciences; time; and the relations between history and sociology.

Volume 2

Addresses Elias's major empiricallybased contributions to sociological theory, especially the theories of the civilizing process, state formation and established-outsider figurations. Also discussed are informalization and de-civilizing processes, and the applications of the established-outsider theory to such fields as race, gender and sexuality.

Volume 3

Examines figurational contributions to special areas of sociology such as: the sociology of the body; the sociology of the emotions; the sociology of everyday life, sport, leisure, lifestyles, taste, music and the arts; deviance and crime; the sociology of health and illness; psychiatry, psychoanalysis, and psychology; death and dying; and drugs and tobacco use.

Volume 4

Focuses on criticisms of Elias's work and the responses of Elias and his sociological followers. Key themes are: civilization and the Holocaust; sports violence, especially soccer hooliganism; the meanings and value of concepts like 'development', 'evolution' and 'change'; and the relative merits of long-term and short-term approaches. The end of the volume returns to the issue of Elias's place in contemporary sociology and the growing worldwide recognition of the significance of his contribution.

Eric Dunning is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the University of Leicester; Stephen Mennell is Professor of Sociology, University College Dublin


 
PART ONE: SITUATING ELIAS
Eric R Wolf
Encounter with Norbert Elias
Michael Schroter
Die Harte Arbeit des Kerativen Prozesses
Erfahrugen mit Norbert Elias

 
John Goodwin and Henrietta O'Connor
The `Young Workers Project' Renewed
Artur Bogner
Elias and the Frankfurt School
Eric Dunning
Comments on Elias's Scenes from the Life of a Knight
Johan Goudsblom
Zum Hintergrund der Zivilisationstheorie von Norbert Elias
Ihr Verhaltnis zu Huizinga, Weber und Freud

 
Johan Goudsblom
Norbert Elias and American Sociology
Richard Kilminster
Norbert Elias and Karl Mannheim
Robert van Krieken
The Organization of the Soul
Elias and Foucault on Discipline and the Self

 
Helmut Kuzmics
Embarrassment and Civilization
On Some Similarities and Differences in the Work of Goffman and Elias

 
Stephen Mennell
Parson and Elias
 
PART TWO: GENERAL THEORETICAL-EMPIRICAL ORIENTATIONS
Artur Bogner
The Structure of Social Processes
A Commentary on the Sociology of Norbert Elias

 
Eric Dunning
In Defence of Developmental Sociology
A Critique of Popper's Poverty of Historicism with Special Reference to the Theory of Auguste Comte

 
Roger Chariter
Social Figuation and Habitus
Reading Elias

 
 
PART THREE: THE THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE AND THE SCIENCES
Helmut Kuzmics
On the Relationship between Literature and Sociology in the Work of Norbert Elias
Nico Wilterdink
Norbert Elias's Sociology of Knowledge and Its Significance for the Study of the Sciences
Johan Goudsblom
The Worm and the Clock
On the Genesis of a Global Time Regime

 
 
PART FOUR: LONG-TERM PROCESSES
 
CIVILIZING, DECIVILIZING AND DYSCIVILIZING PROCESSES
Eric Dunning, Patrick Murphy and Ivan Waddington
Violence in the British Civilizing Process
Peter R Gleichmann
Einige Soziale Wandlungen des Schlafers
Eric Dunning
Review of Johan Goudsblom Fire and Civilisation
Godfried van Benthem van den Bergh
Decivilizing Processes
Elcin Kursat-Ahlers
Civilization and Organized Violence in the Ottoman Empire
Stephen Mennell
Decivilizing Processes
Theoretical Significances and Some Lines for Research

 
Stephen Mennell
Asia and Europe
Comparing Civilizing Processes

 
Stephen Mennell
The American Civilizing Process
Abram de Swaan
Dyscivilization, Mass Extermination and the State
Nathan Sznaider
Compassion and Cruelty in Modern Society
Ton Zwaan
Civilisering en Decivilisering
Studies over Staatsvorming en Geweld

 
 
STATE-FORMATION PROCESSES
Gotfried van Benthem van den Bergh
Is a Marxist Theory of the State Possible?
Anton Blok
The Mafia of a Sicilian Village, 1860-1960
Paul Kapteyn
European Intergration and Norbert Elias's Sociology
Reinhard Blomert
The Second Pillar of State Power
Figurational Explorations of the State and Money

 
Johann Arnason
Elias in Japan
State Power, Military Elites and Organized Violence

 
 
INFORMATION PROCESSES
Christien Brinkgreve
On Modern Relationships
The Commandments of the New Freedom

 
Christien Brinkgreve
Feelings, Behaviour and Morals in The Netherlands, 1938-78
Analysis and Interpretation of an Advice Column

 
Cas Wouter
Informationization and the Civilizing Process
Cas Wouter
Social Stratification and Informalization in Global Prespective
 
PART FIVE: ESTABLISHED-OUTSIDER FIGURATIONS/ COMMUNITIES
 
CLASS, ETHNICITY AND `RACE'
Eric Dunning
Power and Authority in the Public Schools
A Case Study and Conceptual Discussion

 
Hermann Korte
Die Etablierten Deutschen und ihre Auslandischen Ausenseiter
Stephen Mennell
The Formation of We-Images
A Process Theory

 
Eric Dunning
The Figurational Dynamics of Racial Stratification
A Conceptual Discussion and Developmental Analysis of Black-White Relations in the United States

 
 
GENDER
Annette Treibel
The Changing Balance of Power between Men and Women
A Figurational Study of the Public and Private Spheres in Western Societies

 
Michael Schroter
Marriage
A van Stolk and Cas Wouter
Power Changes and Self-Respect
A Comparison of Two Cases of Established - Outsider Relations

 
Abram de Swaan
The Politics of Agoraphobia
 
PART SIX: CONTRIBUTIONS TO `SPECIAL' SOCIOLOGIES
 
SOCIOLOGY OF THE BODY AND EMOTIONS
Stephen Mennell
On Civilizing of Appetite
Joseph Maguire
Towards a Sociological Theory of Sport and the Emotions
A Process-Sociological Perspective

 
Cas Wouter
Balancing Sex and Love since the 1960s Sexual Revolution
Cas Wouter
The Quest for New Rituals in Dying and Mourning
Changes in the We-I Balance

 
 
LEISURE, SPORT AND THE ARTS
Eric Dunning
Towards a Sociological Understanding of Football Hooliganism as a World Phenomenon
Adrian Franklin
On Fox-Hunting and Angling
Norbert Elias and the `Sportization' Process

 
Ken Sheard
Aspects of Boxing in the Western `Civilizing Process'
Keith Tester
The Pleasure of the Rich Is the Labour of the Poor
Some Comments on Norbert Elias's An Essay on Sport and Violence

 
Eric Dunning
Sociological Reflections on Sport, Violence and Civilization
Joseph Maguire
Globalization and Sportization
A Figurational/Process-Sociological Perspective

 
Dominic Malcolm
Cricket and Civilizing Processes
Bram Kempers
Painting, Power and Patronage
A Sociological Approach to Art History

 
 
SOCIOLOGY OF RELIGION
Mart Bax
Religious Regimes and State Formation
Towards a Research Perspective

 
Johan Goudsblom
Beschaving en Godsdienst
Over de Plaats van de religie in Norbert Elias's Civilisation Theory

 
 
PROFESSIONS AND ORGANIZATIONS
Eric Phelippeau
Sociogenese de la Profession Politique
Sue Dopson
Applying an Eliasian Approach to Organizational Analysis
Wilbert van Vree
Epilogue
Changing Meeting Behaviour as an Aspect of Civilizing Processes

 
 
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT
John Pratt
Norbert Elias and the Civilized Prison
Pieter Spierenburg
Violence and the Civilizing Process
Does it Work?

 
Cas Wouter
Changing Patterns of Social Controls and Self-Controls
On the Rise of Crime since the 1950s and the Sociogenesis of a `Third Nature'

 
 
MEDICNE AND PSYCHOANALYSIS
Johan Goudsblom
Public Health and the Civilizing Process
Patrice Pinell
Modern Medicine and the Civilizing Process
Abram de Swaan
The Sociogenesis of the Psychoanalytic Setting
 
DRUGS, ALCOHOL AND TOBACCO USE
Johan Goudsblom
Review of Jan-Willem Gerritsen `The Control of Fuddle and Flash: A Sociological History of the Regulation of Alcohol and Opiates'
Jason Hughes
La Consommation de tabac dans le Processus de Civilisation
Eric Dunning and Ivan Waddington
Drugs in Sport
Some Neglected Issues

 
 
PART SEVEN: CRITIQUES AND COUNTER-CRITIQUES
Raymond Aron
Review of the 1939 edition of Uber den Prozess der Zivilisation
Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie
Review of the 1973 French edition of The Civilising Process
W G Runciman
Review of The Established and the Outsider
Johan Goudsblom and Stephen Mennell
Civilizing Processes - Myth or Reality?
Daniel Gordon
The Civilizing Process Revisited
Roger Chartier
Emmanuel Le Roy Laudrie, Daniel Gordon and The Second Death of Norbert Elias
Derek Layder
Social Reality as Figuration
A Critique of Elias's Conception of Sociological Analysis

 
Eric Dunning
`Agency' and `Structure' in the Work of Norbert Elias
Richard Kilminster
Structuration Theory as a World View
Nicos Mouzelis
On Figurational Sociology
Eric Dunning
Goldthorpe's View of Sociology

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Hardcover
ISBN: 9780761974574
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