George Herbert Mead Lecture Series: Symbolic Interactionism and Communication

Session Submission Type: Paper Session

Abstract

Sociology requires a robust theory of how local circumstances create the conditions of social order. If we analyze social structures not realizing that they depend on groups with shared pasts and futures, that are spatially situated, and that depend on common references, we avoid a core dimension of social life: the importance of group context. Building on theories of action, small group dynamics, and micro-cultures, I argue for a sociology of the local. I claim that the local should be viewed as both a stage on which social order gets produced and as a lens for understanding how particular forms of social order are selected. Relying on a set of ethnographic examinations of social worlds, I describe four core constructs and analytic tools of a local sociology: arenas, relations, shared pasts and action.

Sub Unit

• Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction

Chair

• William Rawlins, Ohio University

Individual Presentations

• The Sociology of the Local: Action and Its Publics - Gary Allan Fine, Northwestern University

Respondent

• Gerard Hauser, University of Colorado, Boulder

Session Organizer

• Mark Johns, Luther College