(THE3) Sociological Metatheory & The Philosophy of Social Science

This session invites papers focusing on sociological metatheory and the philosophy of social science, broadly understood. This area generally concerns debates about the fundamental assumptions in sociology covering a wide range of areas, including: epistemology and methodology; ontology and the nature of social reality; axiology and normative commitments, and aesthetics (e.g., the forms sociology takes; different ways it is conveyed, etc.), to name a few. The field has been recently re-energized by Critical Realism, contemporary nominalism, decolonizing scholars, new materialism, among more conventional discussions of materialism, idealism, positivism, vitalism, constructivism, and nominalism, among others. Tags: Connaissances, Théorie

Organizer: Reiss Kruger, York University; Chair: Reiss Kruger, York University; Discussant: Mario Marotta, Université du Québec à Montréal

Presentations

Jean Louis Fabiani, Central European University (Vienna)

Making religions equal in dignity: Durkheim's anthropological endeavor

Over the past fifty years or so, Émile Durkheims work has been extensively revisited, not only for historiographical and scholarly reasons, and its potential rehabilitated. Erving Goffmans sociology of interaction rituals and Harold Garfinkels ethnomethodology explicitly follow in Durkheimian footsteps. Anne Rawlss great book has been the high point of this renewed interest ( Epistemology and Practice. Durkheim’s The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, 2004) : the author of The Elementary Forms of Religious is no longer the austere bearded man of the Third Republic, but the author of a decisive work on the question of modernity, as Bruno Karsentis new and stimulating reading of several of his books shows (see his recent La place de Dieu , 2023). Although Durkheim was entirely caught up in the republican ideology dominated by the "colonist" party, which aimed to civilize indigenous peoples while remaining silent about the extreme violence of the process (the sociologist merely lamented the "excesses of colonialism" without condemning its principle), he nonetheless outlined the possibility of a post-colonial anthropology that places all religions on an equal footing, making Australian totemism the matrix of all religious construction, and thus situating his work in a non-hierarchical perspective of distinction between peoples. This point has often been overlooked in favor of Durkheims epistemological project (aiming to produce a table of categories whose origin lies in the social process and not in the individual mind). In revisiting Durkheims analysis of religion, we take a fresh look at the question of the authors "secularism" and its contradictions, while at the same time seeking in the concept of effervescence the very principle of the establishment and reactivation of the social bond. Durkheim endeavors to think critically about modernity, through the concept of pathology, which seriously considers the unexpected consequences of the division of labor and the contradictions inherent in a world that has distanced itself from sacred functions, but does not provide itself with the means to make modernity sacred.

Francis Léveillé, Concordia University

"Hearkening" for a Material Hermeneutics

This paper seeks to bridge the recent gap between materiality and subjectivity in social theory. The material world is increasingly becoming a central topic in social theory. Emerging from this movement, new materialism turns our attention to a physical, tangible world that exists outside of our interpretations and representations of it. Although a generalized environmental crisis is acknowledged by most, there is a visible unease to engage with theories emerging from the material turn. Many academics trained in social constructionist traditions are voicing a certain form of pessimism towards new materialism. I argue that social constructionist theories and theories of materiality have evolved within their respective silos and very few attempts have been made to bridge the gaps between the two. However, recently, philosophers of technology such as Don Ihde have argued for a form of hermeneutics that extends to technical objects. Motivated by the challenge posed by the material turn and its appointment of agency to materiality, this paper pushes forward the idea of a material hermeneutics through Paul Ricoeur’s concept of hearkening . The hermeneutic subject is always constituted by otherness, through its encounters with its human others. A new encounter signifies a new questioning and a new understanding of the self. The only way to conceptualize a subject confronted with non-human otherness is then a subject that is further weakened. This paper thus seeks out the hermeneutic subject in its most weakened form. Such a weakened subject is theorized in Ricoeur’s 1974 essay Religion, Atheism, and Faith. In this very personal essay, Ricoeur juggles his Christianity with the atheist discourse of the modern world he inhabits. If God and religion are truly dead, can faith be salvaged in some way? The analysis that follows this question leads him to introduce hearkening as a form of being. Once religious structures of prohibition have been removed by atheism, a new opportunity to theorize the position of the subject within the world is opened. Ricoeur argues that at this bare level, before ethics, the subject must willingly open itself to the world. This leads to a mode of nonethical understanding which comes out of the initial act of listening devoid of any moral duties. This initial act of listening – hearkening – implies no relation to a pre-existing order since listening always comes before obedience. The subject does not have control of what comes to it in this first act, the first word holds agency over the subject. At this point Ricoeur offers us a subject which is opened to be acted upon by unknown agencies. This is where an agency of materiality can be considered to find a connection between hermeneutics and new materialism. A long detour has provided us with a weakened subject which puts its faith in active listening. This listening corresponds to a conative effort to exist and opens up the power of word to mold the subject. In the face of the unknown, of an epistemological limit, the weakened subject accepts to listen without striving to explain. Ricoeur describes the word that comes unto the subject as a vital reality . This term connects us to the work of new materialist authors such as Karen Barad and Jane Bennett. Although Ricoeur does not suggest that words express a conative effort independently of the will of the one who utters them, we can nonetheless understand the hermeneutics he presents as being more than an inter-subjective philosophy. Considering that for Ricoeur word is afforded an agency, the hermeneutic subject confronted with materiality, understood as a conative body, can willingly accept to be modified by nature – the agency of materiality – only insofar as it has a voice. The hermeneutic subject always understands itself as belonging to the cultural world and the mode of listening I present in this paper can extend this sense of belonging to the natural world. A true connection between hermeneutic subjectivity and the materiality presented in new materialism is probably impossible, but this paper shows that Ricoeur’s understanding of subjects driven by modesty and reflexivity is more than fit for a world where a deep understanding of the other and of the world is needed to live through rampant social and ecological crises.