Preface p. vii Part I. Structural Analysis: Past, Present, and Future 1. History of Social Structural Analysis Charles Crothers p. 3 2. Social Structure: The Future of a Concept Douglas V. Porpora p. 43 Part II. Culture and Social Structure 3. How Are Structures Meaningful? Cultural Sociology and Theories of Structure Lyn Spillman p. 63 4. Agency, Structure, and Deritualization: A Comparative Investigation of Extreme Disruptions of Social Order J. David Knottnerus p. 85 5. Global Power, Hegemonic Decline, and Culture Narratives Albert J. Bergesen p. 107 6. Situating Hybridity: The Positional Logics of a Discourse Jonathan Friedman p. 125 Part III. History and Social Structure 7. A Structural Theory of the Five Thousand Year World System Barry K. Gills and Andre Gunder Frank p. 151 8. Evolutionary Pulsations in the World System George Modelski and William R. Thompson p. 177 9. Paradigms Bridged: Institutional Materialism and World-Systemic Evolution Christopher Chase-Dunn and Thomas D. Hall p. 197 10. Ecology in Command Sing C. Chew p. 217 11. Applications of Elementary Theory to Social Structures of Antiquity Brent Simpson and David Willer p. 231 Part IV. Micro and Macro Structures: Interactions and Organizations 12. Gender, Institutions, and Difference: The Continuing Importance of Social Structure in Understanding Gender Inequality in Organizations Amy S. Wharton p. 257 13. Social Structure and Social Exchange Joseph Whitmeyer and Karen S. Cook p. 271 14. Social Organizations across Space and Time: The Policy Process, Mesodomain Analysis, and Breadth of Perspective Peter M. Hall and Patrick J.W. McGinty p. 303 15. Acts, Persons, Positions, and Institutions: Legitimating Multiple Objects and Compliance with Authority Henry A. Walker and Larry Rogers and Morris Zelditch p. 323 Index p. 341 Contributor Affiliations p. 343.

While social scientists and historians have been exchanging ideas for a long time, they have never developed a proper dialogue about social theory. William H. Sewell Jr. observes that on questions of theory the communication has been mostly one way: from social science to history. Logics of History argues that both history and the social sciences have something crucial to offer each other. While historians do not think of themselves as theorists, they know something social scientists do not: how to think about the temporalities of social life. On the other hand, while social scientists’ treatments of temporality are usually clumsy, their theoretical sophistication and penchant for structural accounts of social life could offer much to historians. Renowned for his work at the crossroads of history, sociology, political science, and anthropology, Sewell argues that only by combining a more sophisticated understanding of historical time with a concern for larger theoretical questions can a satisfying social theory emerge. In Logics of History, he reveals the shape such an engagement could take, some of the topics it could illuminate, and how it might affect both sides of the disciplinary divide.

In this major, paradigm-shifting work, Kojin Karatani systematically re-reads Marx's version of world history, shifting the focus of critique from modes of production to modes of exchange. Karatani seeks to understand both Capital-Nation-State, the interlocking system that is the dominant form of modern global society, and the possibilities for superseding it. In The Structure of World History, he traces different modes of exchange, including the pooling of resources that characterizes nomadic tribes, the gift exchange systems developed after the adoption of fixed-settlement agriculture, the exchange of obedience for protection that arises with the emergence of the state, the commodity exchanges that characterize capitalism, and, finally, a future mode of exchange based on the return of gift exchange, albeit modified for the contemporary moment. He argues that this final stage—marking the overcoming of capital, nation, and state—is best understood in light of Kant's writings on eternal peace. The Structure of World History is in many ways the capstone of Karatani's brilliant career, yet it also signals new directions in his thought.

An account of one of the most dominant trends in recent historical writing, this book takes stock of the field even as it showcases exemplars of its practice. Taken together, the essays present a broad picture of the state of American cultural-historical scholarship.

In 930, Iceland first established a common law for the island and became an autonomous republic, which lasted until it came under the sovereignty of the Norwegian king nearly three and a half centuries later. This volume is a two-part analysis of that society, known as the Icelandic "commonwealth" or "Freestate." The first section examines how medieval Icelanders classified and perceived such domains as time, space, kinship, political organization, and cosmology, linking together these various realms to present an integrated picture of the society's world-view. The second section focuses on the changes that took place during the period in the fields of ecology, demography, religion, property relations, and the law, and explains how and why these changes, interacting with more fundamental social structures and beliefs, undermined--and ultimately destroyed--the society.

The result of thirty-five years of thought and research on culture by one of the best and most literate writers in sociology, this wide-ranging review of the meaning and study of culture is Bennett Berger at his best. Drawing on his unsurpassed knowledge of the scholarly literature and on his wealth of personal experience, Berger reviews and synthesizes recent work in cultural sociology from a materialist perspective. An Essay on Culture culminates in a call for an empirical research program focused on the relation between symbolic choices and social locations, rather than on interpretive accounts of the meanings of texts or performances. Among his unusual insights are a defense of reductionism, sympathetic accounts of peer pressure and special interests, an attempt to restore some dignity to the word “ideology,” and a fresh perspective on conspiracy theory. Scholars and students of culture will find here stunning discussions and theoretical insights on ideological work, morality and culture, and on the relations between social structure and cultural structure. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1995.