Review by Choice Review
What price has sociology paid for its efforts to achieve professional status by embracing positivism? Agger's answer is that it has lost an ability to speak to and for the public, while simultaneously losing a sense of being a moral science. To show how this occurred, he focuses on sociology as a literary act. Using the insights of both critical theory and postmodern literary criticism, Agger attempts to unmask the routine practices of sociologists-as-writers as manifestations of a discipline under the influence of the aura of positivist science. Sociological writing gleaned from flagship journals is used to explicate the significance of such facets of article protocol as impersonal writing, article titles, acknowledgments, literature reviews, figures, and methodology in undermining a public sociology. The result is a critical, yet remarkably charitable and often humorous, assessment of the reasons behind sociology's growing insularity. Looking at sociology's varied internal audiences and its fractured character would have been useful. However, despite these lacunae, the book makes a valuable contribution. Agger is clearly "for sociology," and his concluding recommendations are designed to begin the process of reinvigorating rather than abandoning the discipline. Graduate and professional level. P. Kivisto; Augustana College (IL)
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
