Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory,

Biography and Autobiography

Charles Crothers, School of Social Sciences and Public Policy, AUT University, Auckland, New Zealand
2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Abstract

As they develop, academic disciplines (and their constituent specialties) generate research outputs, theoretical and meth-
odological commentaries, and collective perspectives (particularly disciplinary histories and other collective memories). In
addition, there are backstories of how the research outputs are produced from the underlying infrastructure of the discipline
and the personal efforts of its members. The production of personal documents (e.g., autobiographies/biographies) is an
increasingly important way in which the personal is fruitfully linked up with the collective. But disciplines, while being
relatively self-conscious, still lack in collective direction over their operations and trajectories.

Introduction l Providing sensitizing methodological reection which can

affect the validity and reliability of the elds ndings.
Academic (science, social science, and also humanities)
In addition, since research work and writing share some of
disciplines, and their constituent specialties, reveal a variety of
the commonalities of all social reality, and given the privileged
patterns of change over time. For convenience, the discipline
internal access, it can be argued that they can also provide a site
level is assumed in this article but the same points apply to
for the development of generalized social science knowledge
both lower-level entities (e.g., elds or specialties) and to the
which is just as valid as that obtainable from any other site.
broader (e.g., social sciences as a whole). A common pattern is
for initial discoveries and slow early growth accompanied by
some resistance from other specialties, which then escalates
The BackStories: Infrastructure and Also Personal
into a growth phase in which publications pour out and the
Experiences
intellectual cognitive structure framing these is institutional-
ized. A nal phase can be a slower growth once major inno-
The scaffolding supporting the work of a discipline often
vations in the area have been exhausted, and perhaps
remains in the shadows. The infrastructure of a discipline (its
a continuing after life in which the reigning intellectual para-
institutions, organizations, funding, techniques, etc.) is
digm continues to have some relevance as well as contributing
a necessary, yet seldom foregrounded, aspect of knowledge
to applications as the cognitive basis for (social) engineering
production. The ways in which these structures support or
interventions. However, along this common path there are
hinder research effort is important, but seldom assessed.
many variations (see Abbott, 2001). Alongside the main
Moreover, at a personal level the scholars in a discipline each
theoretical and substantive literature in a discipline there also
have their own experiences of being involved in knowledge
other literature such as that on methodology, which provides
production. And some of these experiences are selectively
guidance about appropriate methods.
documented in informal, and sometimes formal ways (e.g.,
There is also a more subjective side of research and publi-
eld notes, diaries).
cations in which the various disciplines construct socially
Yet, most of these backstories remain hidden. A sharp line
meaningful cultural frameworks which they then espouse to
tends to be drawn between the public and the private. More
themselves, their students, scientists in other areas, and the
intimate details of the social production of scientic knowledge
wider community. These can broadly be referred to as disci-
tend to be suppressed since their exposure might be seen to
pline building. Such cultural accompaniments construct
detract from the ideal of the production of the pure truth that
a possible future and retrieve a plausible past together with
many scientists see as their goal or as relatively uninteresting.
providing a working model, providing a shared understanding
After ndings are obtained the scaffolding is disassembled,
of how the discipline operates in the present. Such visions
and even hidden. Public documents tend to produce only the
indicate what the boundaries of the eld are, and in what ways
nal version of the study and mask the process of attaining this,
the eld differs from any rivals. Such disciplinary cultures also
thus suppressing the .intuitive leaps, false starts, mistakes,
localize a particular version of the overall culture of science
loose ends and happy accidents that actually cluttered up the
and there are also differences in a range of other characteristics,
inquiry (Merton, 1967, p. 4). Michael Polanyis concept of
including e.g., preferences between book and journal article
tacit knowledge is a more positive version of this idea, which
publications.
calls attention to the role of unstated (background) knowledge
There are two quite separate functions of these articulations
in getting experiments to work.
of subjective disciplinary cultures:
Academics are motivated by strongly held scholarly norms
l Assisting in constructing the history or the contemporary to keep the public and private spheres of their activities separate
culture of the discipline for its own sake and as an ideal held and the latter hidden. Moreover, undue attention to the self is
out to motivate adherents and neophytes to the discipline. seen as self-indulgent. However, a contrasting value motivating

International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 2nd edition, Volume 6 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.03002-6 491
492 Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory, Biography and Autobiography

the revelation of backstories can be that of informing and of archive and then rendered accessible varies enormously.
educating the public about academic efforts by allowing them Some correspondence which has survived sits in well-cata-
to see the human endeavor required in the production of loged, well-housed accommodations, whereas others are
scholarly knowledge. merely dumped without any nding mechanisms and in
premises which are not hospitable to the subsequent researcher
who might wish to consult them. And (as Fleck, 2011 points
Task of Article out) for those who fail to be appointed to an ofcial position
there is usually not the slightest trace since any records of them
In constructing disciplinary collective memories and histories, are ephemeral.
both objective but also subjective collective and personal There is a hierarchy of those who are preferred spokes-
sources are drawn upon. Various activities, including devel- people; mainly the disciplines elders and ofcial leaders. After
oping disciplinary histories, put some of the more private all, they are drawing on experience and the authority of their
component of knowledge production back out into public pronouncements comes from their ofcial or unofcial posi-
view. But accessing the latter requires effort. This article reviews tions. As a result, it is likely that disciplinary histories will be at
how private but also public personal documents are drawn on least partially shaped by the interests of such spokespeople.
in establishing disciplinary histories (of a variety of forms). In For example, to maintain a thoroughly scientic image, some
particular, there is an interest in understanding whether categories of potential contributors to an emergent discipline
developing collective memory leads to disciplinary self- are read out of the picture such as those considered not to
consciousness and some ability for its members to guide the have made proper scientic contributions or possibly those
future of their discipline. from less-valued social backgrounds. Resisting this, other
Unfortunately, there is little systematic work on this whole historians may endeavor to counter with alternative histories
wider discipline-building area of scientic activity so the which reinstate such excluded gures and which (often vigor-
references are limited, and mainly found in chapters or journal ously) outline alternative conceptions of the history of the
articles (an interesting exception is Popkin, 2005 on the auto- discipline (e.g., Deegan, 1991). And in turn, more orthodox
biographies of historians). Much of the literature is reection historians may defend their original conguration (e.g.,
(including debate) arising from the publication of particular Hamilton, 2003).
biographical materials. Studies of discipline building in other
than social science disciplines are also pertinent (e.g.,
Sderqvist, 1996; Shortland and Yeo, 2008). Disciplinary Differences in Disciplinary Histories

The natural sciences are most resistant to revelation of their

Disciplinary Collective Memories in construction systems because these are seen as almost entirely
Discipline Building irrelevant in the advance of scientic activity, and at best
tolerated as public relations exercises. At the other pole, the
A major component of discipline-building processes is to humanities which are largely concerned with the preserva-
reect on and construct that disciplines history and this tion, articulation, and development of culture tend to be very
historical image is usually implicitly built into the disciplines historically orientated disciplines. (However, more recently,
images of its own trajectory (the present and future as well as cultural theory across a range of humanities disciplines has
the past). In more recent decades, efforts have been made to perhaps focused more on structural features without such
develop contemporary pictures of a discipline, such as by a concentration on heritage). The social sciences fall in
monitoring research outputs and visualizing citation networks between, with disciplinary histories playing a substantial, but
or collaboration patterns. Other efforts such as the famous not necessarily major role in their intellectual activities.
Foresight programs in several countries have endeavored to The major social sciences disciplines began to become
extrapolate or project into the future that topics of scientic institutionalized from North America and Europe in the 1880s
knowledge should be focused on. Occasionally, specially and 1890s although taking much longer to be properly
constituted commissions to develop research agendas which established in many countries and only becoming common
will guide future research funding and research efforts are across the world over the last half-century at most. When
appointed. However, largely because many of the necessary established they were in the shadow of several centuries of
facts lie comfortably at hand, construction of backward- earlier intellectual developments which they had to come to
looking disciplinary histories is a more usual mode of disci- some terms with. And so, there was considerable interest in this
pline building. prehistory by early writers in each disciplinary area.
Apart from textbook coverage and occasional historical Many of the newly forming disciplines developed founding
tomes, disciplinary historical material can be developed in myths, although this varied in importance. Donald Levine
a variety of ways and on a variety of occasions including proclaimed, for example, that Sociology was born with
particularly presidential addresses, commemorations cele- a ready-made history (1995, p. 13) since one of the founding
brating turning points (e.g., anniversaries, centenaries). Corre- fathers Comte included an historical sweep of previous
spondence between scholars is of major importance as letters writers in his dening of the discipline he was helping to create
(and now e-mails) will reveal much about scholars concerns, (also see, e.g., Helm, 1967).
motivations, strategies, and experiences. In turn, the extent to Some common characteristics shared by disciplinary histo-
which stock of a scholars correspondence is kept in some form ries may vary by phase of development, e.g., Merton cites Alfred
 Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory, Biography and Autobiography 493

N. Whiteheads it is characteristic of a science in its earlier a sequence or series of such Schools. Such idealized disci-
stages . to be both ambitiously profound in its aims and plinary histories are ideal for more or less simultaneously
trivial in its handling of details (1967, p. 49). Merton argues teaching students the history of the discipline at the same time
that grandiose images of the scientic status of a discipline are as the range of theoretical and methodological options avail-
often produced because of perceived public demand for able within it.
successful explanatory capabilities. However, the public erro- In his fecund (if problematic) model of scientic develop-
neously judges all disciplines (including the social sciences) in ments, Thomas S. Kuhn pointed out the importance of text-
terms of the same standard, ignorant that some disciplines books in indoctrinating new recruits into the mysteries of their
stand at a different phase in terms of development sequences discipline and indeed, the packaged histories often included in
and therefore have more limited current explanatory capacities. textbooks can be important for inductees. Although they are
Spokespeople for disciplines may need to point out their not produced to have high standards of historical validity, such
disciplines limitations to the public. versions of history become authorized versions by being
A common ordering of phases in disciplinary histories produced in textbook accounts.
involves those of forerunners, founding fathers (few founding Levine nicely sums up some more general effects of disci-
mothers tend to be identied), and those responsible for the plinary histories (1995, p. 10) .Collective memories recall
further development of the discipline. For example, Merton great events of the past, which form a focus for group soli-
suggested that (1967, p. 2) .Sociologists retain a most darity. They also keep alive the sense of afliation with the
parochial, almost Pickwickian conception of the history of group and its purposes during periods of routine activity
sociological theory as a collection of critical summaries of past between times when the group assembles to reafrm its
theories spiced with short biographies of major theorists and collective existence. They can also be defensive, as in
arranged in chronological order. Often such disciplinary remembrance of guilt and difculty, hopefully overcome by
histories are couched as heroic tales, which valorize particular subsequent striving. They can give a sense of duration:
individuals who are thus created as founding fathers or more extrapolating from past trends or moving forward or backward
generally as classic gures. to some shared history or future history, so they can valorize
Not all disciplinary histories tell a simple story of progress. particular historical directions. They can demarcate bound-
Rather, Levine presents a typology of narratives (1995, pp. 96, aries, celebrate the emergence of a new formation or trace its
97) which points to a far wider range of alternative images: connections/disconnections to others (see also Graham et al.,
1983).
l Positivist: history .does exhibit a progressive renement
Writings from the past of a discipline can also contribute
of observational and analytical capabilities and a cumula-
more directly to its present academic work, rather than only its
tively developed body of ndings;
history. Merton has commented on the functions that are
l Pluralist: .the universe of viable. approaches consists of
served by social science scholars working through earlier
an irreducible multiplicity of perspectives, principles,
material in their discipline (1967, p. 37). Motivations for
methods, denitions of subject matter, and statements of
considering earlier writings
aims;
l Synthetic: .agreement has been reached and can be
reached on the relevance of certain basic terms, conceptions
.range from the direct pleasure of coming upon an aesthetically
and generalizations; pleasing and more cogent version of ones own ideas, through the
l Humanistic: .that the heritage.contains more than satisfaction of independent conrmation of these ideas by a power-
a body of replicable techniques, substantive ndings and ful mind, and the educative function of developing high standards of
theoretical analyses; taste for [.] work, to the interactive effect of developing new ideas
by turning to older writing within the context of contemporary
l Contextualist: that historical contexts have shaped the
knowledge.
character of .concepts and problems in profound, often
subtle, ways.
l Dialogical: .each type arose through critical engagements
with the others and .each continues to occupy a place in
Merton (1967) has also developed a typology of different
the broader tapestry. And the trajectory takes the shape of
ways in which earlier and later work might be related. However,
a spiral.
disciplinary histories draw more broadly on the stock of past
Which trope is used to model the trajectory varies between work than only those elements where there are intellectual
historians: Levine advocates the dialogical approach which he connections over time.
also claims best represents large portions of sociologys history. Because of the poor quality of many disciplinary histories,
For many social science disciplines, there is a tendency for there have long been calls for more adequate sociological
the systematics of theory and the history of theory to merge and disciplinary histories in all social science disciplines (e.g., in
to be conated when employed in teaching. Theoretical ideas Sociology, Cosers, 2003 more sociological treatment of the
are portrayed as comprising packages which tend to belong to history of sociology represents an advance over alternative
a particular era, although several may be seen as coexisting in histories which convey less about the social contexts of the
the same period. Often such packages are labeled as Schools writers covered). Mertons sketch of the expertise needed is still
although these are constructed after the event rather than pertinent: .a new breed of specialized historian of science is
necessarily being social communities linking a group of drawing widely and deeply upon sociology, psychology and
colleagues. The history of a discipline is often told as tools of science for theoretical guides to their interpretations of
494 Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory, Biography and Autobiography

the development of science (Merton, 1967, p. 3). Better personal information. Some genres focus almost entirely on
histories subject matter whereas some barely mention this in favor of
more extensive biographical coverage. Some genres are partic-
ular to some time periods: for example, the biographical
.would take up such matters as the complex liation of sociological eulogies of scholars common in Medieval times.
ideas, the ways in which they developed, the connections of theory
with the changing social origins and subsequent social statuses of its
As well as providing useful descriptive contextualizing, some
exponents, the interaction of theory with the changing social orga- writing (such as prefaces or introductions) whether written by
nization of sociology, the diffusion of theory from centers of the autobiographer/biographer or an editor can be important
sociological thought and its modication in the course of diffusion in providing a framing for the material: indicating to the reader
and the ways in which it was inuenced by changes in the environing
what sort of lessons they might gain from reading the material
culture and social structure.
Merton, 1967, p. 2 and more generally, how to read it. Finally, information about
the construction of social science knowledge can contribute to
understandings within the sociology of knowledge, such as
The purpose of these more sophisticated accounts is to constructing models of the processes of discipline building.
achieve better understanding of how things came to be, which Development of personal documents (and also collective
is more usually censored from Whiggish disciplinary history memories) can include people (social scientists), institutions
accounts which favor a more linear construction of disciplinary and organizations or social science outputs (ideas, research),
progress. So, in the more extended versions of disciplinary although the rst-mentioned predominates. A particular
histories the material to be included covers subgenre is sometimes named research chronicles (e.g.,
Hammond, 1967) or more colloquially tales from the eld
(e.g., Van Maanen, 2011) as they provide a depiction of the
.conceptions which made good sense at the time of their formu- development of a particular research project, which is often
lation but were later shattered by compelling empirical tests or
replaced by conceptions more adequate to the enlarged facts of the
collective and relatively short term in contrast with writing
case. It also includes the false starts, the now archaic doctrines and about more individualistic and life-long intellectual careers.
both the fruitless and fruitful errors of the past. Paradoxically, many personal documents have little personal
Merton, 1967, p. 3 information, certainly about scholars private lives. Personal
documents tend to suppress awkward, too personally revealing,
details. Some are highly formulaic revealing little more than an
In constructing more sound disciplinary histories, it is
orthodox curriculum vitae. For example, Fleck (2011) points
necessary to draw on biographical and other personal docu-
out that whereas the emigration of the academic social scientist
ments and experiences.
migrants he studied is well documented, their (less renowned)
return home is somewhat shrouded in silence. Published biog-
raphies may admit to occasional shortcomings but major secrets
Personal Documents in Academic Disciplines and deciencies usually remain hidden. The extent of what is
hidden, though, may be disguised by limited revelations of some
This section is organized around asking: who writes what (i.e., safe secrets. There clearly is some temptation to present the story
content) about whom, where, is published where, and with of a scholarly life as being more coherent that it really has been,
what effects? although very often the scholar is represented as being, rather, at
There are several different genres of personal documents: the mercy of the fates. Charles Tilly complained that when
forced to confront their own lives, sociologys practitioners .
l Entries in biographical dictionaries
tidy them up, mute their passions, avoid vivisection of their
l Obituaries
motives, portray themselves as bemused players in a game they
l Diaries and autobiographical accounts, memoires
do not run, treat their own careers as a series of breaks, lucky or
l Amateur histories
otherwise (1993, p. 497).
l Sociological histories
Some personal documents, though, are written in styles
l Professional histories (including those which are theory
which reveal more conicts, emotions, and struggles. Such
based)
accounts to some extent are indeed written to pay accounts
l Development of more systematic historical studies (e.g.,
and document experienced difculties. Often such accounts are
Paul Lazarsfelds research program on the early develop-
written by disciplinary outsiders or scholars who came from
ment of social research).
unusual backgrounds.
This list is organized in terms of a descending continuum of Biographical work tends to focus on particular targets, with
increasing interpretation those genres listed earlier contain a strong tendency to concentrate on high-status targets.
only fairly raw material from a subjective standpoint whereas However, there may be more complex patterns in biographical
those listed further down have a higher component of inter- work: for example, a rst generation may be subject to much
pretation. Also, validity and reliability of information tends to biographical writing since they are the founders, which may
increase as one goes down the list. However, it is not that then leave less central precursors, and perhaps the second
simple. Each of the genres has different characteristics, and generation of followers, not adequately treated autobiograph-
prescribed lengths of treatment which control the extent of ically/biographically (see Scarborough and Furumoto, 1989).
reportage. A major axis lies in terms of the extent of intellectual Biographies also require motivated others to write about the
subject matter versus extra-intellectual coverage of more targets, e.g., spouses, disciples, and professional historians.
 Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory, Biography and Autobiography 495

More detailed kinds of source material include (Merton, 1967, separately published autobiographies. To some extent, a degree
p. 6) scientic notebooks and personal journals and correspon- of uniformity in style appears, possibly imposed or encouraged
dence. The introductions/prefaces in reissued editions of books by the editor(s). Certainly, in comparison to autobiographical
are frequently informative as they provide an opportunity for the accounts which are pursued at much greater length, there is far
author to review the original circumstances of the books less eshed-out detail.
production and also on how the original work ts in with Collective biographies (prosopography) involve secondary
subsequent developments. Similarly, some authors issue analysis of primary sources of biographical material. The
collected volume(s) of their writings which provide opportunities amount of interpretation which can be extracted depends on
to sketch in the personal strategies lying behind their writing. the quantity/quality of the underlying data sources. Collective
Rather than only relying on the somewhat accidental biographies allow (once coded) the distillation of patterns
production of public or private documents, more systematic (such as careers) and provide some ways of answering ques-
effort can be important. One stimulus is collective biographical tions about how social contexts shape disciplinary develop-
exercises where entries are canvassed by an organizer. In many ments. Fleck (2011) argues that collective biographies ll
countries, there are state-sponsored national biographies of a particular gap in the sociological study of disciplines between
important people, which very likely will include some social the units of generations and of institutions and their patterns of
scientists. In particular, there is a need to actively solicit oral changes, i.e., statistics concerning the present versus the long
histories. Again, systemic programs have occasionally been term.
launched (especially by professional scholarly associations) to However collective biographies have difculties, especially,
endeavor to cover a considerable number of oral histories or where insufcient data are available; it is best where the group
indeed more up-market biographical accounts. Surveys of the studied is from a common occupational or similar group.
views, careers, and material circumstances of contemporary Difculties also arise when different information about a target
social scientists are seldom used, but there are some examples. is yielded from different sources; so rules to adjudicate on
conicting data are needed.
Biographical and other personal document practices in the
Methodology of Constructing Personal Documents: social sciences follow (and possibly in some parts lead) more
Autobiographies. Coordinated and Collective general societal developments on such matters. The volume of
Autobiographies, etc. biographies and the amount of biographical (versus academic)
material in them is also affected by academic ideologies.
Autobiographies include objective information: Already, science biographies have been hailed by some
commentators as producing particularly powerful studies,
Like biographers, autobiographers can use personal documents,
although few social science biographies have yet scaled these
public documents, the testimony of relevant others and so forth, to heights of acclaim (see also Sderqvist, 1996).
compare and contrast these different accounts so that advantages of The extent of biographical writings has followed the general
each is maximized and the disadvantages minimized. turn to biography noticeable from the late 1970s (e.g., Stanley,
Stanley, 1993, p. 43
1993). Postmodernism as an approach has very strongly
emphasized the personal factor, whereas highly positivist
Pierre Bourdieu (2008), too, endeavored to avoid his endeavors tend to sweep the personal element from the scene
autobiography being seen as falling into a preexisting genre although this has not prevented (as in natural science) histor-
and insisted on it being seen as a socio-analysis of his career ical writings.
in which social contexts were particularly emphasized. Meth- Particular trends within biographical writing will also affect
odologically, autobiographers stand in a unique relationship to content, such as the French genre of lhistoire des intelectuels
their material. Merton lays out the methodology of autobiog- which has been continued over the last century.
raphy in more detail (see also Oakley, 2010):

It claims we should know specically about writers, university

The constructed personal text of the interplay between the active lecturers, scientists, journalists of the past: their social origins, their
agent and the social structure, the interplay between ones sequences educational background, how much they earned, their clubs, their
of status-sets and role-sets on the one hand and ones intellectual habits, whom they married (as marriage as a means of social
development on the other, with its succession of theoretical mobility) how their progeny fared, where they lived (rive droite? rive
commitments, foci of scientic attention, planned or serendipitous gauche?) where they spent their holidays, whether they were believers
choices of problems and choices of strategic research sites for their or agnostics, monarchists or republicans, pacists or interventionists,
investigation. Fully-edged sociological autobiographers relate their in the resistance or collaborationists and so forth. Their theories
intellectual development both to changing social and cognitive insofar as they formulated any are of minor interest for two reasons.
micro-environments close at hand and to the encompassing macro- The rst because they are the subject to other scholars . and
environments provided by the larger society and culture. second because these theories reect the context in which they
Merton, 1988, pp. 19, 20 took shape.
Borlandi, 2014, p. 164

Popkin (2001) has particularly commented on the features

of coordinated biographies where an array of scholars are Autoethnography takes reexivity to its ultimate level.
invited to contribute to a collection. Appearing in a collected Biography is no longer showing how the researcher obtains
volume can reduce the anxieties of self-indulgence that attends data from their research site but focuses on the researchers
496 Discipline-Building in the Social Sciences: Collective Memory, Biography and Autobiography

personal reactions to the research site the means has become within. This is particularly evident in applied disciplines where
an end. The researcher becomes his/her research subject. The clearly education studies, academics, and classroom teachers
research site being studied either evaporates or is reduced to share common, overlapping interests and biographies. Link-
somewhat unimportant background. ages to social context can go far deeper. For example, in the
This approach links to the old standard psychological process of migrating from Europe to the United States, Fleck
methodology of introspection (cf Lyons, 1986). While argues:
introspection is not a term much valued in contemporary
times the method is still widely used in social science, although
the terminology has changed and the term repressed . the Europeans focus, methods, and frames of scholarly reference
became markedly inuenced by American approaches to the social
introspection now emerges in the forms of self-report surveys, sciences, including adequate external funding, empirical methods,
interviews, etc. scholarly teamwork, a limited time-frame for projects, and he
The particular UK research method of mass observation expansion of the relevant professional disciplines themselves.
(e.g., Chaney and Pickering, 1986) could be seen as a collective McClelland (2012, p. 1554)
autoethnography since a wide-ung corpus of observers
reported on themselves and their immediate social surrounds.
Autobiographical/biographical writing has been encour-
Conclusions
aged by publishing enterprises such as Die Wissenschaft der
The reexivity brought about through publishing disciplinary
Gegenwart in Selbstdarstellungen in the 1930s period (Schmidt,
histories allows disciplines to reect and adjust to their
1922) and A History of Psychology in Autobiography (American
circumstances. Experiences are described and their meanings
Psychological Association, 1930) from 1930 on. More
established, and this allows the discipline to attempt to
recently, various Essais dego-histoire came out in the leading
ameliorate difculties and to take advantage of opportunities.
publisher Gallimards prestigious Bibliothque des histoires
However, disciplinary histories can help to cement in place
series (e.g., Nora, 1987).
ossied bodies of knowledge.
The potential for developing more sophisticated disci-
Behind these concerns about the social context effect on
plinary histories in part relies on vehicles which encourage their
disciplines lies a theory of the sociology of knowledge, which is
publication. One example is the biobibliographical series
that social location (at least partially) together with institu-
sponsored by Greenwood Press (e.g., Deegan, 1991) which
tional arrangements (e.g., funding) affects which research
provides reviews of a scholars oeuvre. Some disciplines
problems are addressed and shapes the theoretical and meth-
have established journal(s) whose focus is the history of that
odological approaches taken.
discipline. Methodologies and Practices.
The organization of the social science disciplines may be
The backstory of some research projects has been told and
consequential for the knowledge produced in them. In the Gul-
this experience can feed into methodology texts and standards/
benkian report, Immanuel Wallerstein et al. (1996) argued that
advice which is toned by the realism of what is possible in the
the ossied structure of disciplines reduced the capacity of the
eld (see, e.g., Meneley and Young, 2005).
social sciences to provide adequate explanations. Social science
How the scientists interrelate with other stakeholders in
needs to achieve an appropriate mix between pure and applied
their research site will also have major implications for the
work and to be assemble a range of disciplinary/knowledge
knowledge which might be drawn, types of access, biases,
expertise that covers the full array of phenomena which need to be
enforced limitations, etc. Field research is an inherently social
described and explained. But, there are few mechanisms to ensure
process.
that this happens optimally. Hopefully, disciplinary histories,
Sociobiographical characteristics can have effects on the
which are in part constructed from personal biographical mate-
scientic process.
rial, may usefully feed into the needed disciplinary identity and
A full-scale social determinism is unwarranted: social
reexivity that might begin to achieve this.
science publications very largely correctly reect what
researchers nd. However, biographical data can be drawn
upon to reveal some patterns between social characteristics of
See also: Autobiographical Memory; Biography and Society;
researchers and their research topics. Biographical material is
Collective Identity; Collective Memory, Social Psychology of;
particularly pertinent in explaining the psychological and
Collective Memory, Sociology of; Discipline Formation in the
social inuences on how problems are selected, theories
Social Sciences; Encyclopedias, Handbooks, and Dictionaries;
chosen, and particular methodologies pursued.
History and the Social Sciences; Life Course in History;
Some of the links are obvious, although there are more
Prosopography (Collective Biography); Scholars, Private Lives
tendencies than determinants: women scholars are more
of; Scientic Disciplines, History of; Specialization and
inclined toward research issues involving women, families, Recombination of Specialties in the Social Sciences.
and the private rather than the public sphere. Scholars with
ethnic or other marked backgrounds are more inclined to
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