A Treatise in Phenomenological Sociology: Object, Method, Findings, and Applications

(Hardback)

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A Treatise in Phenomenological Sociology: Object, Method, Findings, and Applications provides the first systematic approach to phenomenological sociology. Carlos Belvedere claims that phenomenological sociology is a distinctive paradigm endowed with its peculiar object, method, and stock of knowledge. He defines phenomenological sociology as a science dealing with the natural attitude of groups. When it comes to its method, he describes the actual, centenary use of the epoch, the eidetic variation, and constitutional analysis in the practice of classical and contemporary social thinkers. Finally, he collects a wealth of precious findings in the history of phenomenological sociology, which starts with the ego agens as the substratum of social life, then goes on to consider intermediate stages such as pragmata, habitualities, social personalities, and institutions. He argues that social behavior can take different forms, subjective as well as objective, because it can experience a wide range of transformations thanks to specific qualities of pragmata, such as reiterableness and transferability.

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Carlos Belvedere's wonderful book A Treatise in Phenomenological Sociology develops a careful and creative response to the widely-debated question of whether there is a phenomenological sociology. Belvedere answers affirmatively by articulating what such a sociology is: a science that examines the natural attitude of groups whose actions exhibit processes analogous to those of phenomenology itself and that can ultimately account for the realm of the social in general.

In this innovative book Belvedere outlines a systematic program of phenomenological sociology by clarifying its philosophical basis, its subject matter, its method as well as its major findings. It is an encompassing and well-argued account of this approach which hitherto has remained rather vague. And it represents a substantial and seminal contribution to a debate in which the very concept of a phenomenological sociology has been contested--a most welcome contribution that no one involved can ignore.

Author Bio

Carlos Belvedere is associate professor at the University of Buenos Aires.