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Sociological Methodology.
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Griswold
Wendy
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO
For their suggestionson this essay, I thank Misty Bastian, Mabel Berezin,
JeffreyBrooks, Paul DiMaggio, John Hall, John Padgett, Bernice Pescosolido,
Katheryn Ragsdale, Ann Swidler, Harrison White, Robert Wuthnow, members of
the Culture and Society Workshop at the Universityof Chicago, and two anony-
mous readers for SociologicalMethodology.
Aftersetting
analysis. Finally, I turnto the criticalissue of validation.
out three validity criteriafor the sociology of culture-parsimony,
plenitude, and amplitude-I demonstratetheir application with an
extendedexample frommy own researchon popular Nigerianfiction.
INTENTION
Agents,particularlyproducingagents,have intentions.Central
to the analytic frameworkproposed here is some social agent, or
agents, interactingwith some cultural object. Sociologistsmust not
reduce intentionto an agent's individualpsychologyor consciousness,
but this does not mean that the concept is not analyticallyuseful.
While it is futileto try to get at the subjectivityof any particular
of any
individual, it is possibleto reconstructprobable intentionality
agent whose contextand behaviorare known.4The purposeof doing
so is to separate the individuallyidiosyncraticfromthe socially in-
fluencedby determiningthe degree to which intentionality has been
shaped by social elements,which may be shared, and the degree to
which culturaloutcomesare themselvesshaped by intentions.
The simplest and most typical approach to intentionis to
attemptto connecta culturalobject to its producingagent by asking,
for example, why Piero della Francesca organizedthe elementsof his
painting Baptismof Christin a certainway, or whetherJohn Donne
intendedhis poem "A Valediction:ForbiddingMourning"to be about
death or departure. Taking the formeras an illustrativeproblem,
Baxandall (1985) suggests that the tracing of plausible intention
amounts to the reconstruction of the "charge" and "brief" that an
artist held at the time of his creationof some particularwork. The
charge, a general and immediatepromptforan agent to act, may be
internallygeneratedor may come froman externaland quite explicit
source. Piero was commissionedto paint an altarpieceforthechurchof
Sansepolcro sometimearound 1450; thus,in Baxandall's terms,Piero's
client gave him the charge,"Altarpiece!"This chargeentaileda set of
social expectations(local wisdomabout altarpieces)and the particular
concernsof thosewealthyenough to commissionthem: An altarpiece
'
Argumentsforthe necessityof determiningintentionalityin historicaland
sociological texts can be found in Skinner (1969) and Jones (1977).
6 In thisrespect,as in
others,parallelsbetweenthe presentdiscussionof
intentionand speech-acttheorywillbe noticed.The culturalobjectis likeAustin's
RECEPTION
8
The complexity is compounded by the fact that the analyst may also be
understood as an agent at t p>. This raises the problem of objectivity, for the
analyst is always implicated in his choice and treatmentof analytic objects. For
example, a reception study of The Catcherin the Rye has shown the different
responses of readers at t1 (1951), when the novel firstappeared, and at t2 (the late
1950s and 1960s), afterit had become a youth classic and had been belatedly taken
up by the literary criticism establishment (Ohmann and Ohmann 1976). The
analysts themselves, however, exist at t3 (1976). They have an interest in the
ideological underpinningsof the process of canonization and are workingat a time
when the constructionof the canon is a topic of lively debate in literarycriticism.
This position influencestheirselection of problems and materials. A student of the
sociology of knowledge (an agent at t4) might analyze the scholars who chose to
study canon formation,and so on ad infinitum.
COMPREHENSION
EXPLANATION
Comprehension Explanation
Goldmann's explicitconcernwithmethodcontrastssharplywith
Geertz's equally explicitrejectionof methodologicalspecificationbe-
yond "thick description."But in spite of his vigorousdenial of gener-
alizing intent or systematicprocedures,Geertz's actual practice in
interpretiveanalysismay be schematicallyrepresentedin similarfash-
ion. As an anthropologistwho has studiedformsof collectiveexpression
fromcockfightsto funerarycustoms,Geertz has considereda broader
range of cultural objects than Goldmann, and his research lacks
Goldmann's special emphasis on masterpieces(although cultural en-
durance seems to weigh heavily). Geertz examines cultural perfor-
mances fortheirenacted signsand symbols,notjust structures, and he
Comprehension Explanation
Cultural- Structures,
--Agent- Mentality Matrixof-Social and- Social and
object symbols, and situation local cultural cultural
patterns ofsocial sensibility experience experience
groupor (proximate) (remote)
category
Comprehension Explanation
Since certain
ence) to the slaves of the New World (local sensibility).11
typesof religiousknowledgewere passed on only throughthe eldersof
the West Africanpeoples fromwhich the slave trade drew,and since
the slave trade was largelyrestrictedto teenagersand young adults,
there was a rupturebetweenremoteand proximateexperiencethat
made it institutionally impossiblefortheseelementsof Africanculture,
despitetheirsignificance, of the New
to reappearin thelocal sensibility
World. Similarly,much sociological attentionhas been paid to the
disproportionaterepresentation of certaincategories,and not others,
among agents involved in the actual productionof cultural objects.
The explorationof social institutions need not be the ultimategoal of
socioculturalanalysis,but such institutionsdo constituteindispensable
variables in the explanationof culturalphenomena.
Now, takingtheframework developedin the examinationof the
explanatoryproceduresof Goldmann and Geertz,one may add inten-
tion,reception,and comprehension in termsof genre.The finalframe-
work, applicable to all modes of culturalanalysisthat aspire to deal
withthe culturalobject and at the same timeprovidea comprehensive
explanation,now looks like this:
Comprehension Explanation
VALIDI7Y
formula has developed over the two decades of its existence, its heroines having
grown more independent, more career oriented,and more sexually adventuresome,
differencesamong the three major producing countriesremain slight.
REFERENCES