Dlittle30

LATEST ARTICLES ( 858 )

• Brecht on Galileo on Science

  

  Bertolt Brecht composed his play Life of Galileo (1939) (link) while on the run in Denmark from Nazi Germany in 1938. Brecht was a determined anti-Nazi, and he... Read more

  Posted on 02 November 2023 SOCIETY

• Thinking About Social Class

  

  Marx's theory of social class is founded on the idea of conflict of interest defined by the property system. Marx puts the point this way in the Communist... Read more

  Posted on 31 October 2023 SOCIETY

• Orwell on Historical Truth

  

  George Orwell is celebrated for his recognition of the role of political lies in the conflicts of his time. For example: "Political language – and with... Read more

  Posted on 20 September 2023 SOCIETY

• An Absolutist Socrates

  

  We often think of Socrates as the ultimate "critical free thinker". He antagonized many in Athens through his relentless questioning of shared assumptions... Read more

  Posted on 13 September 2023 SOCIETY

• A Horrendous Massacre in Tamil Nadu, 1968

  

  A recurring theme in Understanding Society for the past several years is the occurrence of unfathomable atrocity in the twentieth century. Many of the examples... Read more

  Posted on 04 September 2023 SOCIETY

• Moses Finley's Persecution by McCarthyism

  

  MI Finley (1912-1986) played a transformative role in the development of studies of the ancient world in the 1960s through the 1980s. Read more

  Posted on 31 August 2023 SOCIETY

• Memory and Culture After 1989 in Central Europe

  

  The years following the collapse of the socialist-Stalinist regimes of eastern Europe were not comfortable for the people of the GDR, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary... Read more

  Posted on 21 August 2023 SOCIETY

• Are Organizations Emergent?

  

  Do organizations have properties that are in some recognizable way independent from the behaviors and intentions of the individuals who inhabit them? Read more

  Posted on 15 August 2023 SOCIETY

• Marxism and British Historiography

  

  It is noteworthy that some of the very best historical research and writing of the 1930s through 1970s in Britain was carried out by a group of Marxist... Read more

  Posted on 14 August 2023 SOCIETY

• A Curious Convergence Between Social Ontology and Process Metaphysics

  

  For the past six months or so I've been wrestling with how to reformulate my own thinking about the nature of the social world -- the nature of "social... Read more

  Posted on 04 August 2023 SOCIETY

• A New Course on the Terrible Twentieth Century

  

  I've spent the last several weeks designing a new honors course for juniors on the catastrophes of the twentieth century. It's not a "history" course, and it's... Read more

  Posted on 30 July 2023 SOCIETY

• The Generation of the Freedom Riders

  

  The courageous Catherine Burks-Brooks passed in early July in Birmingham, Alabama, at the age of 83. The New York Times ran an extensive and moving obituary... Read more

  Posted on 24 July 2023 SOCIETY

• Regulatory Failure in Freight Rail Traffic

  

  On any given day some 7,000 freight trains are in motion around the United States, with perhaps 70,000 individual freight cars and intermodal units in transit... Read more

  Posted on 22 July 2023 SOCIETY

• Trump, Hitler, and the Politics of Legality

  

  Christopher Browning is a noted and respected historian of the Nazi period and the Holocaust (link). His October 2022 article in the Atlantic on "the politics o... Read more

  Posted on 18 July 2023 SOCIETY

• The Air Traffic Control System and Ethno-cognition

  

  Diane Vaughan's recent Dead Reckoning: Air Traffic Control, System Effects, and Risk is an important contribution to the literature on safety in complex... Read more

  Posted on 09 July 2023 SOCIETY

• Life and Memory in Lviv

  

  The tragic death of Victoria Amelina in Kramatorsk, Ukraine on June 27 in a Russian missile attack against civilian targets makes me think of her writings... Read more

  Posted on 08 July 2023 SOCIETY

• Asian Network for the Philosophy of Social Sciences

  

  The third meeting of the Asian Network for the Philosophy of Social Sciences (ANPOSS) took place in Bangkok last week (link). It was a highly stimulating... Read more

  Posted on 30 June 2023 SOCIETY

• Eric Hobsbawm's History of the Historians' Group

  

  photo: Hobsbawm at workThe British historian Eric Hobsbawm was a leading member of the British Communist Party-affiliated Historians' Group. Read more

  Posted on 11 June 2023 SOCIETY

• Aldon Morris on the Civil Rights Movement

  

  Aldon Morris's Origins of the Civil Rights Movement: Black Communities Organizing for Change (1984) is a highly valuable treatment of the US civil rights... Read more

  Posted on 10 June 2023 SOCIETY

• How "micro" Does the Sociology of Social Movements Need to Go?

  

  Doug McAdam's Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency, 1930-1970 is recognized as a leading sociological study of the US Civil Rights movement. Read more

  Posted on 08 June 2023 SOCIETY