“Some+New+Rules+of+Sociological+Method”+and+“Agency,+Structure”


 * Anthony Giddens, “Some New Rules of Sociological Method” and “Agency, Structure.” In The Sociological Theory of Anthony Giddens, Part V.**

Ela Rossmiller

__“Some New Rules of Sociological Method” [1976]__ Here Anthony Giddens prposes a method of interpretive sociology which addresses several key questions: How are we to understand human action and its relationship to intention, motive, and reason? How do we understand action in the context of institutional structures? Finally, how does one do sociological research? 1. Sociology is the study of the socially-produced world as opposed to the natural/biological world. 2. The socially-produced world is the result of a skilled performance by society’s member, not mechanical processes. Such a skilled performance does not necessarily always have to involve awareness, intention and motive.

3. People do have agency, but their agency is limited.

4. Structures can be both constraining and enabling. (Consider by analogy how the rules of grammar constrain speech but also enable intelligible communication.) a. The “duality of structure” refers to these dual roles (constraining //and// enabling) of structure. b. “Structuration” is a “series of reproduced practices” (p. 229)

5. Structuration involves meanings, norms, and power.

6. Sociologists should interpret the social world by drawing on the same schemes that laymen use to make sense of social activity. 7. This can only happen by becoming immersed in a form of life. This doesn’t mean you have to become an insider, but you do have to be able to navigate through that world and employ the categories that its participants employ.

8. Sociology pursues a “double hermeneutic.” This means that 1.) sociologists must “read” events hermeneutically by becoming immersed in them, and 2.) they explain them in terms of sociological theories, conducting a kind of translation between ordinary and technical language. Additionally, concepts coined by sociologists seep into everyday language. 9. “In sum, the primary tasks of sociological analysis are the following: 1.) The hermeneutic explication and mediation of divergent forms of life within descriptive metalanguages of social science, and 2.) explication of production and reproduction of society as the accomplished outcome of human agency” (p. 230)

__“Agency, Structure” [1979]__ Here Anthony Giddens attempts to reconcile notions of human agency to structural/institutional analyses.

Human beings are subjects who are constantly in action. Action is understood as continuous, not a discreet moment in time. People may or may not be aware of their actions. They usually aren’t unless asked about them, and also there is a gray area between absolute consciousness and absolute unconsciousness. We reflexively monitor our actions to act as intended, but not necessarily with a purpose or goal. Nor are people necessarily always able to give an account of their actions. They may operate from a practical consciousness, where tacit knowledge is applied in certain practices, but they isn’t able to explain what they are doing. This is in contrast to the rationalization of action, whereby people are able to explain what they do and why.

Giddens draws distinctions between structure, social systems, and structuration.
 * //Structure:// structuring property, e.g. rules and resources. Rules make sense only in the context of situations and in the context of other rules and practices. Structures are both enabling and constraining. The “duality of structure” means that structures shape people, and people shape structures.
 * //Social systems:// Can be analyzed as recurring social practices.
 * //Structuration:// The conditions by which structures are maintained or transformed in human interaction. There is a mutual interdependence between structure and agency.

Giddens repudiates the notion that people are culture dupes who are socially determined by ideological sign-systems. He insists that we actually know quite a bit about the institutions in which we participate, and that the reasons we give for doing things are generally the “real” reasons. Sociologists need to get off their high horse and listen.

__Discussion points:__ Giddens contends that sociologists should strive to understand events as the lay person does, then translate them into the technical language of sociology. Is sociology merely an exercise in translation? If it is, who is the translation for and what purpose does it serve? If it is not, what added value does sociological analysis offer? Consider Gidden’s notion of the duality of structure, whereby humans shape structures but are simultaneously shaped by structures. In other words, the “causal arrow” points in both directions. KKV’s approach to making causal arguments seems not to accommodate such a model – or does it? Discuss.