I’ve been reading a bit of books that I guess could be classified as “pop psychology” and “pop economics” lately. (In this concept I include books like Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow. Hence what I mean is by “pop” is not that it’s shallow but rather that it has a wide lay audience.) Now I’d like to turn to sociology—arguably the most general and allencompassing of the social sciences. But when I google “pop sociology”, all the books seem to have been written by economists or psychologists or non-academics such as Malcolm Gladwell. For instance, see here:
Are there no well-known pop-sociological books written by sociologists and, if so, what does this say about sociology as a discipline? You very seldom hear about sociological research in the media if you compare with economics and psychology, and surely there has to be an explanation of this?
You can try Everything Is Obvious by Duncan Watts. He’s a multi-disciplinary type, but he is at least partially a sociologist. He also discusses a lot in there about sociology as a discipline.
Erving Goffman is said to be accessible and said to be a sociologist. One issue is that “sociology” has several meanings. His version shades into psychology.
I’ve been reading a bit of books that I guess could be classified as “pop psychology” and “pop economics” lately. (In this concept I include books like Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow. Hence what I mean is by “pop” is not that it’s shallow but rather that it has a wide lay audience.) Now I’d like to turn to sociology—arguably the most general and allencompassing of the social sciences. But when I google “pop sociology”, all the books seem to have been written by economists or psychologists or non-academics such as Malcolm Gladwell. For instance, see here:
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/pop-sociology
Are there no well-known pop-sociological books written by sociologists and, if so, what does this say about sociology as a discipline? You very seldom hear about sociological research in the media if you compare with economics and psychology, and surely there has to be an explanation of this?
Sociology: A Very Short Introduction (published Oxfrod University Press)
You can try Everything Is Obvious by Duncan Watts. He’s a multi-disciplinary type, but he is at least partially a sociologist. He also discusses a lot in there about sociology as a discipline.
Erving Goffman is said to be accessible and said to be a sociologist. One issue is that “sociology” has several meanings. His version shades into psychology.
The sociologist Charles Murray) says interesting things. I don’t usually agree with them, but they make me think.