A New Science: The Breakdown of Connections and the Birth of Sociology

by Bruce Mazlish

Overview

In this book Mazlish examines the historical origins of sociology, looking closely at how what he terms the "cash nexus"—the omnipresent substitution of money for personal relations—was perceived as changing the nature of human relations in the 19th century and led to the development of sociology as a means of dealing with this condition. Mazlish also considers the breakdown of connections in modern society: how the orderly 18th century world in which God, humanity, and nature were closely connected to one another came to be replaced with one of felt disconnection, and how individualism then came to be seen as replacing a sense of community in modern society. He investigates the work of a number of 19th-century English writers who were concerned with this breakdown of connections, including Adam Smith, William Wordsworth, Edmund Burke, Thomas Carlyle, and particularly novelists such as Benjamin Disraeli, Elizabeth Gaskell, and George Eliot. He also explores the influence of Darwin, presents Engels and Marx as precursors of the science of sociology and discusses at length the major founding figures of modern classical sociology: Ferdinand Tönnies, George Simmel, Emile Durkheim, and Max Weber.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195058468
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	10/12/1989
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.75(w) x 8.63(h) x 1.23(d)

About the Author

Bruce Mazlish is Professor of History at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and was awarded the Toynbee Prize for 1986–87. His books include The Fourth Discontinuity (1993), James and John Stuart Mill (1975), and The Western Intellectual Tradition, with J. Bronowski (1960).

Editorial Reviews

What makes this book stand out is the way in which Mazlish situates sociology in the broader context of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century social thought. This is the most interesting treatment I have read of how there came to be a felt need for sociology, of how a place was created in the intellectual firmament for this new science.”

—Craig Calhoun, University of North Carolina

“Although numerous able interpreters have attempted syntheses of the sociological tradition, Mazlish is the first to search so boldly for its ultimate intentions. . . . Beginning students will find this a stimulating, wittily written introduction to the history of sociology.”

—Harry Liebersohn American Historical Review

“An accessible, fascinating, erudite, and provocative tour de force with a memorable, even gripping, conclusion. It is a must for both college and general libraries.”

—Choice

From the Publisher