American Society: Toward a Theory of Societal Community / Edition 1

by Talcott Parsons, Giuseppe Sciortino, Jeffrey C. Alexander

Overview

Never before published, American Society is the product of Talcott Parsons's last major theory-building project. During the 1970s, Parsons worked persistently to fulfill his earlier promise to produce "a general book on American society". The surviving manuscript, completed just a few weeks before his death, is just such a book. Beyond its rich reading of American society, it offers a systematic presentation and major revisions of his previous landmark theoretical positions: the attempt to elaborate a non-nostalgic theory of modernity, to link macro and micro perspectives, to defend the possibility of objective sociological knowledge, to analyze national specificities within the context of worldwide trends, to develop an adequate conception of societal integration grounded in fully pluralistic premises. Even after the passage of many years, the book imparts a remarkably provocative interpretation of US society and a creative approach to social theory.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781594512278
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	12/15/2006
Series:	The Yale Cultural Sociology Series
Pages:	542
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Parsons, Talcott; Sciortino, Giuseppe

Table of Contents

Preface, by Giuseppe Sciortino, Foreword, by Jeffrey C. Alexander, Introduction: The Action of Social Structure, by Giuseppe Sciortino, Chapter 1 Introduction, Chapter 2 The Societal Community and Its Environments, Chapter 3 Some Highlights of the Historical Background, Chapter 4 Values and Other Structural Features of the Societal Community, Chapter 5 Some Substantive Structures of the Emerging Societal Community, Chapter 6 Social Class as Axis of Cleavage-Integration, Chapter 7 The Gemeinschaft Complex in American Society I: Ethnicity, Chapter 8 The Gemeinschaft Complex II: Kinship, Religion, Style of Life, Education, Chapter 9 Communication and Collective Decision Making: The Mass Media and the Political Process (Three Fragments), Chapter 10 Individuality and Institutionalized Individualism, Notes, Bibliography, Index, About the Editor

Editorial Reviews

This book demonstrates how Parsons attempted to develop a framework applicable to concrete situations. … [American Society] helps remind readers how Parsonian structural functional can be used to illuminate how social crisis can be overcome. Recommended.”
—CHOICE

From the Publisher