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Contemporary Sociology and the Challenge of Descriptive Assemblage

UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER, UK, mike.savage{at}manchester.ac.uk

This article argues that the descriptive turn evident in contemporary capitalism challenges orthodox sociological emphases on the central importance of causality and the denigration of descriptive methods. The article reviews the different evocations of descriptive sociology pronounced by three very different contemporary sociologists: Andrew Abbott, John Goldthorpe, and Bruno Latour, and lays out their different approaches to the role of the `sociological descriptive'. It is argued that their apparent differences need to be placed in a broader re-orientation of sociology away from its historical interface with the humanities and towards the natural sciences. How this reorientation involves a new role for visual methods which have traditionally been decried in orthodox sociology is examined, and the article concludes with suggestions for how sociology might best orient itself to the descriptive turn.

Key Words: causality • description • methodology

European Journal of Social Theory, Vol. 12, No. 1, 155-174 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1368431008099650


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