Doing Sociological Research

Fülszöveg

This book is about doing sociology rather than theorising about it or writing about the results of sociological research. Accounts of how sociology is actually practised, as opposed to accounts of how it siiouid be practised, are rare; and all too often there is sonne considerable divergence between the two. Yet within this divergence are to be found many of the most significant issues in sociological methodology and epistemology.
Accounts of how sociological research is carried out are thus at least as valuable, both to students and fellow researchers, as the exhortations to be found in the much more common textbooks on methodology. In Doing Sociological Research eight British sociorogists recount candidly and in detail the history of the major research projects in which they have been involved, many of which have led to the important 'case-study' publications on which the teaching of sociological method is often based. They demonstrate, among other things, how the... Tovább

Fülszöveg

This book is about doing sociology rather than theorising about it or writing about the results of sociological research. Accounts of how sociology is actually practised, as opposed to accounts of how it siiouid be practised, are rare; and all too often there is sonne considerable divergence between the two. Yet within this divergence are to be found many of the most significant issues in sociological methodology and epistemology.
Accounts of how sociological research is carried out are thus at least as valuable, both to students and fellow researchers, as the exhortations to be found in the much more common textbooks on methodology. In Doing Sociological Research eight British sociorogists recount candidly and in detail the history of the major research projects in which they have been involved, many of which have led to the important 'case-study' publications on which the teaching of sociological method is often based. They demonstrate, among other things, how the organisational context of research, the personal relationships of the researchers and the reaction of the reading public, both lay and academic, fashion the 'findings' no less than the selection of a particular research strategy, sample or method of data analysis.
Doing Sociological Research will serve as a text for both undergraduate and graduate students in sociology. It is also a contribution to the sociology of sociological knowledge.
Colin Bell is Professor of Sociology at* the University of Aston. Howard Newby is Reader in Sociology at the University of Essex. Vissza