When Is Morality Not Cultural? When Is Culture Not Moral? (Co-sponsored by Sociology of Culture Section)

Session Submission Type: Invited Session (90 minute)

Description

Since its beginning, the sociology of culture has been dominated by two strands, both marked by differing definitions of the word culture. In the first strand, culture (Culture1) is identified in practices or material artifacts often though not always related to art. Sociologists of culture in this strand employ various methods and theories to study music, books, dance, painting, film, or similar phenomena. The other strand identifies culture (Culture2) in the broadly anthropological sense of meaning-making, thereby engaging nearly every element of social life, either avoiding art entirely or examining it as one of many potential cultural locations. In a different way, the sociology of morality is sometimes described as a relatively new sub-discipline, yet most of the key works in Culture2--Durkheim, Goffman, Garfinkel, Bellah, Lamont, Swidler, to name a few—put moral distinctions at the very center of cultural life. Nonetheless, there are non-cultural studies of morality--from more philosophically formal questions about altruism and moral realism to more biologically grounded questions about solidarity—that do not necessarily require Culture2. This panel interrogates these intersections of the moral and the cultural in our separate subdisciplines and beyond them. What is gained and what is lost when the moral is cultural and the cultural is moral?

Sub Unit

• Altruism, Morality, and Social Solidarity Section / When Is Morality Not Cultural? When Is Culture Not Moral? (Co-sponsored by Sociology of Culture Section)

Cosponsor

• Sociology of Culture Section

Presider

• Jeffrey Guhin, University of California-Los Angeles

Panelists

• Fabien Accominotti, University of Wisconsin-Madison

• Paul J. DiMaggio, New York University

• Hannah Wohl, University of California-Santa Barbara

• Bin Xu, Emory University

Session Organizer

• Jeffrey Guhin, University of California-Los Angeles