On social construction of sociological knowledge. The case of a Polish sociology of education (original) (raw)
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Sociology of education, comparative education and social problems: A Polish comment
International Review of Education, 1981
The interaction and co-operation between the sociology of education and comparative education may lead to the realisation of the three basic functions of science: descriptive, explanatory and operative. A presentation of these issues is difficult because of the blurring of lines of division between related scientific disciplines. In the past two decades, Polish sociology has developed without experiencing any serious inner conflicts. Two basic orientations — empirical and humanistic — have co-existed, and the Marxist approach has gradually become more firmly established. The sociological approach applied to the sciences can be viewed as first, the adoption of sociological concepts and theories; and secondly, the application of the methods and techniques used in sociological research. The history of the relationship between the sociology of education and comparative education goes back to the works of J. Chałasiński in the 'thirties: he approached the school as a social institution functioning in a system of social relations and social groups, such as classes, vocational groups, nations and states. The application and impact of the sociological approach is evident in the methodological foundations of pedagogy — as e.g., in the work of Muszyński in 1975 — and also in many specific fields of comparative education. The so-called humanistic orientation and the descriptive function have predominated over empirical studies and the explanatory function in these areas. The 1973 Report of the Committee of Experts, on the state of education in Poland, was the result of co-operation between sociologists end educationists. This enterprise brought about the actualisation of the operative function of both scientific disciplines. However, the situation in Poland today raises new questions needing to be answered. L'interaction et la coopération entre la sociologie de l'éducation et de l'éducation comparée peut conduire à la réalisation des trois fonctions fondamentales de la science: descriptive, explicative et opérative. Il est difficile de présenter ces trois disciplines scientifiques car elles ne sont pas nettement délimitées. Au cours de ces deux dernières décennies, la sociologie polonaise s'est développée sans connaître de sérieux conflits intérieurs. Deux orientations fondamentales — empirique et humaniste — y coexistaient. La méthode marxiste s'est enracinée progressivement. La démarche sociologique appliquée aux sciences peut être regardée comme d'abord, l'adoption des concepts et théories sociologiques; et ensuite l'application des méthodes et techniques employées dans la recherche sociologique. L'histoire des relations entre la sociologie de l'éducation et l'éducation comparée remonte aux années '30, avec les travaux de J. Chałasiński qui a regardé l'école comme une institution sociale fonctionnant dans un système de relations sociales et de groupes sociaux, tels que: classes, groupes professionnels, nations et états. L'application et l'importance de l'approche sociologique sont évidentes dans les fondements méthodologiques de la pédagogie — comme p.e. le montre le travail de Muszyński en 1975 — ainsi que dans de nombreux domaines de l'éducation comparée. L'orientation dite humaniste et la fonction descriptive prédominent ici sur les études empiriques et la fonction explicative. Le Rapport de 1973 du Comité des Experts, sur l'état de l'éducation en Pologne, est le résultat de la coopération entre sociologues et théoriciens de l'éducation. Cette entreprise a déterminé l'actualisation de la fonction opérative de ces deux disciplines scientifiques. Toutefois, la situation présente soulève de nouvelles questions auxquelles il faudra trouver des réponses. Die Wechselwirkung und Zusammenarbeit der Bildungs-Soziologie mit der vergleichenden Erziehungswissenschaft kann zur Verwirklichung der drei fundamentalen Funktionen der Wissenschaft führen: Beschreibung, Erklärung und Operationalisierung. Wegen der verwischten Grenzlinien zwischen verwandten wissenschaftlichen Disziplinen ist eine Darstellung dieser Fragen schwierig. In den letzten beiden Jahrzehnten hat sich die Soziologie in Polen ohne wesentliche innere Konflikte entwickelt. Die Grundrichtungen — empirisch und humanistisch — bestanden nebeneinander, und der marxistische Ansatz setzte sich stärker durch. Der in den Wissenschaften angewandte soziologische Ansatz kann erstens als Übernahme soziologischer Konzepte und Theorien gesehen werden, und zweitens als Anwendung der in der soziologischen Forschung gebrauchten Methoden und Techniken. Die Geschichte des Verhältnisses zwischen Bildungs-Soziologie und vergleichender Erziehungswissenschaft geht auf die 30er Jahre zurück, und zwar auf die Arbeiten von J. Chałasiński, der die Schule als eine soziale, innerhalb eines Systems sozialer Beziehungen und Gruppen, wie Klassen, Berufsgruppen, Völker und Staaten funktionierende Einrichtung betrachtete. Deutlich wird die Anwendung und Auswirkung des soziologischen Ansatzes in den methodischen Grundlagen der Pädagogik — z.B. in dem Werk von Muszyński von 1975 — sowie auf vielen spezifischen Gebieten der vergleichenden Erziehungswissenschaft, wo die sogenannte humanistische Richtung und die beschreibende Funktion den Vorrang vor empirischen Studien und der erklärenden Funktion erlangten. Der Bericht des Sachverständigen-Ausschusses von 1973 über den Stand der Pädagogik in Polen entstand durch Zusammenarbeit von Soziologen und Pädagogen. Durch dieses Unternehmen wurde die operative Funktion der beiden Wissenschaften aktualisiert. Jedoch wirft die heutige Situation in Polen neue Probleme auf, die es zu lösen gilt.
Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology, edit Geo Ritzer, 2016
The sociology of knowledge examines the social and group origin of ideas, arguing that the entire "ideational realm" (ideas, ideologies, mentalities) develops within the context of a society's groups and institutions. Its ideas address broad sociological questions about the extent and limits of social and group influence through an examination of the social and cultural foundations of cognition and perception. Despite significant changes over time, classical and contemporary studies in the sociology of knowledge share a common theme: the social foundations of thought. Ideas, concepts, belief systems, and entire worldviews share an intrinsic sociality explained by the social contexts in which they emerge. From its origins in German sociology in the 1920s, the sociology of knowledge has assumed that ideas (knowledge) emerge out of and are determined by the social contexts and positions (structural locations) of their proponents. Its major premise is that the entire ideational realm is functionally related to sociohistorical reality. According to its framers, Wissenssoziologie was developed as an empirical and historical method for resolving the conflicts of ideologies in Weimar Germany that followed the political and social revolutions of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, conflicts grounded in competing worldviews (Weltanschauungen) and directed by intellectual and political elites. Outlined in early statements by Max Scheler and Karl Mannheim, the new discipline reflected the intellectual needs of an era, to bring both ratio-nality and objectivity to bear on the problems of intellectual and ideological confusion. It was in this sense that the sociology of knowledge has been described as a discipline that reflected a new way of understanding "knowledge" within a modern and ideologically pluralistic setting. The approach defines a new "situation."
In the context of most social theories, perhaps with the exemption of variants of Marxism, the matter of knowledge has not been treated as problematic. The central hypothesis of this paper, and thus of a theory of modern society as a knowledge society, however is that knowledge, and not nature, accidents, violence, catastrophes, power, etc., is more than ever the basis and guide of human action in all areas of contemporary society. The study of knowledge societies is a response to the fundamental observation that modern science is by no means, as is still often assumed, only the key and access to the mysteries of nature and human behavior, but above all the becoming of a world: Knowledge as a motor, not just a camera (cf. MacKenzie, 2006). The extraordinary importance of scientific knowledge in particular does not mean, however, that it will succeed in simply overrunning traditional ways of life and attitudes, as has been hoped or feared time and again.
APORTES DE LA SOCIOLOGÍA AL ESTUDIO DE LA CIENCIA COMO PROCESO SOCIAL Y COMO PRODUCTO CULTURAL
This paper deals with the social role of science within a sociological perspective. Reference is made to the diverse positions concerning such role: in one hand, American structural-functionalist current, on the other, sociology of knowledge and its debate on considering science as a sociological entity. As a completion, some general theoretical points about the scientific domain are put forward, as well as a sketch of the basic axis of social interpretation, based on critical sociology of science, as a process and cultural object.
Sociological Struggles for Shattered Mirror of Knowledge [transl. by Monika Boruta-Żywiczyńska]
2018
The attempts that I and Julita Pieńkosz made in our paper which appeared in the first volume of Roczniki Historii Socjologii [Yearbooks of the History of Sociology], and which aimed at evaluating the condition and possibilities of the history of sociology in Poland, sparked off a debate whose subject was not intended. Radosław Sojak, the author of the first polemical reply, changed the direction of the debate by rephrasing the initial question from "how should the history of sociology be done?" to "what type of history of sociology does sociology under reformation need?," assuming that selected research methods applied in the sociology of scientific knowledge would remedy the situation (Sojak 2012). We do not see any arguments against using the achievements and guidelines from other sub-disciplines; however, we cannot agree with the statement that the history of sociology is only a type of meta-sociology: a genre of philosophical and social considerations, which does not make any meaningful contributions to advancing the development of research in sociology. Our 2011 text aimed at showing methods which were in use in the history of sociology for some time, notwithstanding its theoretical, mythological, or ideological involvement. We argued that "making the subject-Perhaps the sociology of scientific knowledge and the history of sociology, with different conceptual framework and theoretical tradition, are not predestined to form a common sub-discipline. Perhaps they are just competing disciplines, as in the history of science competition is a completely normal phenomenon. There are many indications that the sociology of scientific knowledge has more sophisticated theoretical models which, being developed on the basis of methods of sciences, are inadequate to the subject of research of scholars both working in social sciences and in humanities. Translated by Monika Boruta-Żywiczyńska.
Construction of scientific knowledge Some reflections on a cultural process
Diego Gonçalves, Carmen, 2023
Within the scope of the sociology of science, it is proposed to promote the interest in understanding, to describe, analytically, a scientific work group, as a unit of investigation and production of scientific knowledge, proposing that research based on observation methodology, allows for investigation in depth, seeking to access some of the dimensions that are part of the process of construction, production and reproduction of knowledge around a cultural standard.
An analytical study of knowledge ought to acknowledge that the word “knowledge” is significantly ambiguous—as are its equivalents in other languages, such as the Greek Epistêmê, from which “epistemology” is derived. Knowledge evolves. Knowledge defined as a "structure of ideas" [Feibleman 1976], can be divided into two types. First is the familiar "knowledge-at-hand" [Schutz 1967] in everyday use. Second is theoretical, abstract knowledge, somewhat more remote from one's daily experience. We refer to the first type as "tacit knowledge" [Polanyi 1966]; the second is "abstract knowledge." So far we may understand it as accumulated external and explicit information belonging to the community, being leveraged by tacit intrinsic insights which originate within individuals who then may act alone or cooperatively in order to control or integrate with their environment.
Knowledge-sociological and information-sociological aspects of knowledge organization (1)
2013
years ago knowledge organization, the develop- ment of scientific concepts and arrangements, has been seen as a logical and thus universal problem. Older approaches accordingly see areas of knowledge as naturally given and organically grown. At latest with the constructivism has entered a 'turn', which sees knowledge organization as a social con- vention and accordingly regards universal standards skeptical. Simultaneously in the sciences came up a stronger concern with historical and sociological stud- ies of its foundations and in philosophy of science the return to different kinds of relativizations has gained more importance. In this paper, some single classical sociological positions are discussed, conclusions are drawn for knowledge and information as well as for science and knowledge organization and objections are designated.