UCD Social Science Research Centre

Masterclass

Society: Rest in Peace?

Professor Anthony Elliott

Visiting Professor
School of Sociology
and Visiting Fellow
Social Science Research Centre
University College Dublin

9 November 2010
 MASTERCLASS INFORMATION

The Masterclass is scheduled for Tuesday 9 November at the Social Science

Research Centre, University College Dublin. The programme consists of the
following:

9:15 Masterclass Welcome - Robert van Krieken

9:30 Society: Rest in Peace? Introduction
10:45 Morning Tea
11:15 Society as Structure
12:45 Lunch
1:45 Society as Solidarity
3:00 Afternoon Tea
3:30 Society as Creation
4:30 Conclusions
5:00 Masterclass concludes

INTRODUCTION

SOCIETY: REST IN PEACE?

'Society' is one of the most fundamental words in politics and public life; it
is also a term foundational to the social sciences in general and sociology in
particular. Yet, in our own time, society has never been so much in
dispute and so little understood. For some critics, the notion of 'society'
appears too consensual and collective for a world of intensive individualism.
For others, the idea of society is oppressive the very notion, so some
argue, is dismissive of the infinite social differences that shape todays
global realities.
In this intensive Masterclass - organized by the UCD Social Science
Research Centre - Visiting Professor Anthony Elliott will focus on unraveling
the different meanings of society as a way of introducing students to
contemporary debates about it in the social sciences and humanities. In an
ambitious mapping of classical and contemporary theories of society, the
Masterclass will appraise the strengths and weaknesses of different ways in
which sociology has deployed analytical categories and concepts for
analyzing the social. From conceptions of society as providing systems,
structures and security to conceptions that privilege creativity, difference
and the aesthetic, participants in the Masterclass will demonstrate that the
social is always implicated in multiple, diverse transformations.
"Society: Rest in Peace?" will provide students with interactive
interpretations of key traditions in classical social theory, including the
writings of Durkheim, Freud, Marx and Simmel, as well as clarifying how the
idea of the social has been deconstructed by such thinkers as Bauman,
Castoriadis and Kristeva. The Masterclass also questions recent fashionable
viewpoints, drawing attention to the deficiencies of recent social theories
that equate the demise of society with forces such as globalization, the
communications revolution and multiculturalism.

AGENDA and READINGS

9:15 Welcome and Introduction Robert van Krieken

9:30 Society: Rest in Peace.
10:45 Morning Tea

Readings:
Outhwaite, W. (2000) The Future of Society. Oxford: Blackwell.
Introduction & Chapter 1.
Frisby, D. & Sayer, D. (1986) ch 3 Society as Absent Concept in Society,
New York: Ellis Horwood/ Travistock Publications
Touraine, A. (2007) Sociology after Sociology European Journal of Social
Theory: 10 (2): 184-193

11:15 Society as Structure

12:45 Lunch

Readings:
Castoriadis, Cornelius (1987) The Imaginary Institution of Society, Polity
Durkheim, Emile (1964) The Division of Labor in Society, trans. George
Simpson, New York: Free Press
Parsons, Talcott (1967) The Social System, London: Routledge
Durkheim, E. (1992) Professional Ethics and Civic Morals, Bryan S. Tuner
(ed.), London: Routledge
Watts Miller, W. (2002) Morality and Ethics in W.S.F. Pickering (ed),
Durkheim Today, New York: Berghahn Books

1:45 Society As Solidarity

3:00 Afternoon Tea
Readings:
Tonnies, Ferdinand (1963) Community and Society, New York: Harper and
Row.
Habermas, Jrgen (2001) The Postnational Constellation: Political Essays,
M. Pensky (ed. & trans.), Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001
Alexander, Jeffrey (2006) The Civil Sphere, Oxford, University Press: New
York
Putnam, P. (2000) Bowling Alone, Simon & Schuster: New York.

3:30 Society as Creation

4:30 Conclusions
5:00 Masterclass concludes

Readings:
Simmel, Georg (1992)Sociology Lectures 1899, in D. Frisby, Simmel and
Since, London: Routledge.
Nietzsche, Friedrich (any edition), On The Genealogy of Morals.
Castoriadis, Cornelius (1991) Philosophy, Politics, Autonomy, Oxford:
Oxford University Press.