Cultural Theory: An Introduction / Edition 2

by Philip Smith, Alexander Riley

Overview

This second edition of Cultural Theory provides a concise introduction to cultural theory, placing major figures, traditional concepts, and contemporary themes within a sharp conceptual framework.

• Provides a student-friendly introduction to what can often be a complex field of study
• Updates the first edition in response to reader feedback and to the changing nature of the field
• Includes additional coverage of theorists from the classical period to include Nietzsche and DuBois
• Introduces entirely new chapters on race and gender theory, and the body
• Considers themes that have become more important in theoretical activity in recent years such as computers and virtual reality, cosmopolitanism, and performance theory
• Draws on theories and theorists from continental Europe as well as the English-speaking world

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781405169073
Publisher:	Wiley
Publication date:	08/11/2008
Edition description:	2nd ed.
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.70(w) x 9.60(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Philip Smith is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Queensland, Australia. He received his Ph.D. at the University of California at Los Angeles. Among the books he has authored or edited are Researching the Visual (2000), The New American Cultural Sociology (1998) and the Cambridge Companion to Durkheim.

Table of Contents

Preface to the First Edition: About this Book vi

Preface to the Second Edition ix

Acknowledgments x

Introduction: What is Culture? What is Cultural Theory? 1

1 Culture in Classical Social Theory 6

2 Culture and Social Integration in the Work of Talcott Parsons 26

3 Culture as Ideology in Western Marxism 34

4 Culture as Action in Symbolic Interactionism, Phenomenology, and Ethnomethodology 54

5 The Durkheimians: Ritual, Classification, and the Sacred 69

6 Structuralism and the Semiotic Analysis of Culture 92

7 The Poststructural Turn 111

8 Culture, Structure, and Agency: Three Attempts at Synthesis 128

9 British Cultural Studies 144

10 The Production and Reception of Culture 158

11 Culture as Text: Narrative and Hermeneutics 176

12 Psychoanalytic Approaches to Culture and the Self 195

13 The Cultural Analysis of Postmodernism and Postmodernity 207

14 Postmodern and Poststructural Critical Theory 228

15 Cultural Theories of Race and Gender 241

16 The Body in Cultural Theory 262

References 280

Index 296

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"For those stalking culture, you'd best set out with this mapping of the terrain."
—Roger Friedland, University of California, Santa Barbara

"The second edition of Cultural Theory provides a clear, lively, and timely introduction to leading thinkers and their ideas. Its lucid writing and comprehensive scope is of great value to students and scholars seeking to understand the field of cultural theory."
—Robin Wagner-Pacifici, Swarthmore College

"Bringing alive a subject as broad as cultural sociology is difficult, but this fresh edition succeeds brilliantly. Books about theory are usually less than exciting, let alone inspiring, but this book glows and absorbs as it informs. I have depended on it for years, cannot do without it, and, given the growth of cultural theory, I cannot see how anyone else can."
—Barry Schwartz, University of Georgia

Editorial Reviews

"This is the best introductory survey of cultural theories I have read." — Christian Smith, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

"I cannot conceive of a better introduction to a century of cultural theory. Smith gives cultural theory life and brings it down to earth, where it belongs." Barry Schwartz, University of Georgia

"Philip Smith has written the Zagat guide not just to sociology of culture and cultural sociology, but of cultural theory in the grandest sense. This will be a great introduction for students and a cheat sheet for more than a few professors. Bravo!" Roger Friedland, University of California at Santa Barbara

"This engaging book deftly maps the important theoretical traditions in the field of cultural analysis, with special attention to the leading thinkers. Philip Smith's lucid writing and comprehensive scope will be of great value to students and scholars as they seek to orient themselves in the field and identify the major concepts." Robin Wagner-Pacifici, Swarthmore College

"Being a remarkable practitioner in the domain of cultural theory, Philip Smith adopts a powerful stance in his far-reaching approach of the genealogy of this domain." Laurent Thévenot, Ecole des Hautes Etudes, Paris

".Smith has produced a very useful and informative introduction to a broad variety of theories and culture" Choice

From the Publisher