A Wittgenstein-inspired approach to sociological theorizing: Bringing “normativity” back in

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Abstract

This paper argues for a Wittgenstein-inspired approach and method to conducting sociological theorizing, focusing specifically on three main themes: normativity, skepticism and diagnosis. By “normativity,” I refer to the areas of social life that are oriented by criteria, rules, authority and public assessments. And by “skepticism,” I refer to those experiences of crisis, disputes and/or normative indeterminacy, when social practices are no longer experienced as meaningful, intuitive or motivating. And “diagnosis” is the logic through which social theorizing gives an account of this skepticism, especially the skepticism that it itself engenders and encourages. Together, those three thematics constitute a “therapeutic logic” or a “therapeutic method” to thinking about the social world. I conduct a reading of Erik Olin Wright and Michael Burawoy using those rubrics, arguing that Wright’s “real utopias project” and Burawoy’s “public sociology” can be read along those Wittgenstein-ian lines, as a kind of therapeutic intervention into the social world.

Author

• Nader Andrawos, Brandeis University