de la Fuente, Eduardo (2003) Hugh Dalziel Duncan: the forgotten interactionist? In: Proceedings of the Australian Sociological Association Conference. pp. 1-8. From: TASA 2003: Australian Sociological Association Conference, 4-6 December 2003, Armidale, NSW, Australia.

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Abstract

The symbolic interactionist tradition is alive and well as measured by the number of researchers, publications and associational bodies, identifying with this approach. Yet the history of symbolic interactionism and its debt to early Chicago sociology is the source of some debate. In this paper, I examine the writings of a post-war adherent of this perspective who is little discussed these days: Hugh Dalziel Duncan. In a series of books, the most influential of which would be Communication and Social Order, this author sought to offer an alternative to the kind of 'mechanistic' models prevalent in American sociology of during the 1950s and 60s. Relying on the theories of Dewey, Mead, Simmel and Burke, he also took fellow symbolic interactionists to task for their failure to explain how symbols do their work or what it means to describe interaction as the performance of 'agency'. Pre-empting the recent cultural turn, Duncan made no distinction between the humanities and social sciences, and sought to place the study of aesthetic forms such as comedy at the centre of sociological reflection. Why then are his many publications so little read today?

Item ID:	40503
Item Type:	Conference Item (Research - E1)
ISBN:	978-0-646-42927-4
Keywords:	interactionist; sociology; social theory
Related URLs:	Organisation
Additional Information:	Also presented at: TASA 2003: Australian Sociological Association Conference, 4-6 December 2003, Armidale, NSW, Australia.
Date Deposited:	24 Sep 2015 00:07
FoR Codes:	16 STUDIES IN HUMAN SOCIETY > 1608 Sociology > 160899 Sociology not elsewhere classified @ 100%
SEO Codes:	97 EXPANDING KNOWLEDGE > 970116 Expanding Knowledge through Studies of Human Society @ 100%
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