COLL 320: Scholarly Project #2

This is the first book to connect digital media technologies in digital sociology to traditional sociological and offers a much needed overview of it. It includes problems of the digital age in relation to inequality and identity, making it suitable for use for a global audience on a variety of courses.

Sociology is the systematic study of the taken-for-granted assumptions that people make about everyday life. This book explores a triumvirate of important concepts in sociology: power, trust and globalization. These concepts and examples need to be studied so assumptions masquerading as “fact” can be debunked by critical sociological questioning. We explore domains such as politics and government, health and community care as well as global financial issues, which are all centrally relevant issues in modern Sociology.

Sociology of Discourse takes the perspective that collective actors like social movements are capable of creating social change from below by creating new institutions through alternative discourses. Institutionalization becomes a process of moving away from existing institutions towards creating new ones. While discourses entail openness and enable the questioning of what is instituted, institutions offer continuity and stability to social mobilizations. This dual movement of openness and stabilization explains how social struggles ensure their continuity, without completely assuming the logic of the dominant order. The book proposes an analytical model of social change, which is unfolded through three intertwined areas: discourse, communication, and institution. Collective experiences of social change, from the anti-globalization movement to Occupy, illustrate the main theoretical points and concepts. Through the example of the Platform for People Affected by Mortgages, the book concludes by analyzing how social change from below is possible.

This timely resource, written by a team of authors who are working at the forefront of the public sociology movement, provides a contemporary analysis of public sociology. The book highlights a variety of ways in which sociology brings about social change in community settings, assists nonprofit and social service organizations in their work, and influences policy at the local, regional, and national levels. The book also spotlights sociology that informs the general public on key policy issues through media and creates research centers that develop and carry out collaborative research.