Theoretical logic in cultural sociology: Semiotics, hermeneutics and dialectics in the work of Jeffrey Alexander
Bibliographic record
Abstract
In the Introduction to this issue of Thesis Eleven , we present the general theme that explores the theoretical logic in cultural sociology, by bringing to attention the three main threads of semiotics, hermeneutics and dialectics that seem to frame the analytical project of Jeffrey Alexander's works in sociology. We first position the term “culture” in its historical and theoretical origins in the nineteenth century, and question its further evolution in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, in order to highlight the background of Alexander's own attempt at grasping its internal dynamics, as it has been disputed in various traditions of the social sciences. Second, we delineate Alexander's position of considering the autonomy of culture with respect to both the break and the continuity that he is establishing by choosing to downplay Parsonss functionalism through a reappropriation of Dilthey, Durkheim, and Geertz, together with structuralism and pragmatic performance theory, in his efforts to theorize a true and genuine cultural sociology. While we underscore some lines of tension that run across the threads of semiotics, hermeneutics and dialectics in Alexander's own synthesis that finally coalesces in the civil sphere theory, where cultural sociology gets its overt political dimension, we open up on questions leading to the contributions of each of the participants in this issue.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.008 | 0.011 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.002 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.007 | 0.054 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.008 | 0.008 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.004 |
| Research integrity | 0.002 | 0.004 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".