Karaktär och kultur. Sociologisk moralistik från Riesman till Sennett

Summary, in English

The article describes and analyses an essentially American intellectual tradition which explicitly or implicitly poses the central question of Hellenistic and Roman philosophy – ”how should I live?” – as its main theme and concern, and which discusses the matter theoretically, empirically, and normatively. The tradition includes sociologists and other social scientists, but also cultural theorists, literary critics, essayists, and novelists. This article will conceive them as ”moralists” with immediate predecessors in the classical modern sociology. As moralists, they express a ”style of thought”. By way of introduction, two key concepts are defined, namely ”character” and ”culture”. The two notions combined display the moralistic hermeneutic horizon, but also a central problem in sociology. The article goes on with a discussion on the early modern moralists, among whom was for instance Montaigne. This intellectual current was of significant importance to classical sociology as well as to the 20th century American moralists. In this part of the article, the notion “style of thought” is introduced. The main part of the article consists of discussions on main problems and notions of American moralists Riesman, Trilling, Bell, Himmelfarb, Lasch, Bellah, Putnam, and Sennett. The article concludes with a substantial discussion on the elements of the American moralistic style of thought, as well as with some critical reflexions.

• Author: Bo Isenberg
• Department/s: Sociology
• Publishing year: 2008
• Language: Swedish
• Pages: 255-278
• Publication/Series: Sosiologisk tidsskrift
• Volume: Vol. 16
• Document type: Journal article
• Publisher: Universitetsforlaget
• Topic: Sociology (excluding Social Work, Social Psychology and Social Anthropology)
• Keywords: hermeneutics of the contemporary; character; culture; moralists; style of thought; sociologi; sociology
• Status: Published
• ISBN/ISSN/Other: ISSN: 0804-0486