Publication Date:
May 2006
Cambridge University Press
Bernhard Giesen
Jason L. Mast
Taking a “cultural pragmatic” approach to meaning, the contributors suggest a new way of looking at the continuum that stretches between ritual and strategic action. They do so by developing, for the first time, a model of “social performance”. This volume offers the first systematic and analytical framework that transforms the metaphor into a social theory and applies it to a series of facinating large-scale social and cultural processes–from September 11 and the Clinton/Lewinsky Affair, to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Willy Brandt’s famous “kneefall” before the Warsaw momument.
- Professor Alexander is one of the leading cultural sociologists in the US
- The first attempt to bring performative studies into the center of sociology. This volume offers the first, systematic performance based analytical framework
- Makes a path-breaking contribution to social theory and cultural sociology - the first attempt to synthesize sociological and performance studies theories with conceptual frameworks