On Modernization of the Humanities
How to Cite
Yanitsky O.N. 2018. On Modernization of the Humanities — Sociologicheskaja nauka i social’naja praktika. Vol. 6. No. 1. P. 7-22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.19181/snsp.2018.6.1.5734
Abstract
Globalization and the Fourth Technological revolution as its driving force challenge the humanities. The growing unfitness between a highly complex, mobile and risky globalization process and current short-term and monodisciplinary approach to the study of it is still characteristic to the majority of humanities. The article is grounded on the review of works of leading world theorists in modernization (Z. Bauman, U. Beck, M. Castells, M. Fisher-Kowalski, A. Giddens, J. Urry), on the author’s personal experience in running a set of international and domestic research projects, including multilevel studies of urban structures, socio-ecological and disaster issues, and the study of social movements in Russia and abroad. Compilation chronic of socioecological conflicts, building graphs of disposition of forces involved, semi-structured in-depth interviews, and including observation have been used. The major research findings are the following. First, the humanities should follow the above global space-time changes. Second, a mass digital transformation of public life is going on and the study of facts is gradually replaced by the study of dramatized facts produced and spread by media. Third, a new object of study, the sociobiotechnical systems (the SBT-systems) have emerged in which social, biological and technical structures and processes are highly integrated by various metabolic processes. Fourth, an existing social order (on all levels) is critically lags behind and therefore is replacing by temporal agreements, road-maps, etc. Fifth, a global information network is potentially all-embracing and all-penetrating risk which destroys the very essence of a man’s privacy. Sixth, metabolic processes are a double-sided phenomenon, physical-chemical and social as such. Seventh, all above processes challenge the established forms of social researches. Their organizational structure should fit to multisided and nonlinear processes of the SBT-system evolution combining top-down and bottom-up approaches. Eight, the ‘technological innovation—social life—the humanities’ interactions should be studied at all levels of the SBT-system functioning and evolution.
Keywords:
virtualization, digitalization, globalization, humanities, interdisciplinary approach, metabolism, method, modernization, technological revolution, the SBT-system
References
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Giddens A. The Politics of Climate Change. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2009. 256 p.
The Public Reconstruction of Science and Technology. Ed. by A. Irwin, B. Wynne. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 232 p.
Keen D. Complex Emergences. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008. 293 p.
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Prigogine I., Stengers I. Order out of Chaos. London: Heinmann, 1984. 349 p.
Robertson R. Globalization. Social Theory and Global Culture. London: SAGE Publications, 1994. 211 p.
Schwab K. The Fourth Industrial Revolution. Cologny: World Economic Forum, 2016. 211 p.
Touraine A. Return of the Actor: Social Theory in Postindustrial Society. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988. 171 p.
Urry J. Mobilities. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008. 336 p.
Waters M. Globalization. Lnd. & N.Y.: Routledge, 1995. 185 p.
Yanitsky O. A Primary Eco-Structure: The Concept and its Testing. Social Analysis. 2012. Vol. 2 (2). P. 7–24.
Yanitsky O. Sociology of Critical Areas. Open Journal of Social Science Research. 2014. Vol. 2 (3). P. 112–118.
Chizhevsky A. l. Zemnoye Echo Solnechnych Bur’. Isdanie vtoroye. [The Earth Echo of Sun Storms]. M.: Mysl’ publ., 1976. 367 p. (In Russ.).
Davydov Yu. N. Max Weber i sovremennaya teoreticheskaya sotsiologiya. Aktual’nye problemy weberovskogo sotsiologicheskogo ucheniya [Max Weber and modern theoretical sociology. Actual issues of Weberian sociological thought]. M.: Martis publ., 1998. 510 p. (In Russ.).
Ionin L. G. Sotsiologiya v obchzhestve znanyi. Ot epokhi moderna k informatsionnomy obsjchestvy [Sociology in a Knowledge Society. From modern epoch towards information society]. M.: House of the Higher School of Economy publ., 2007. 431 p. (In Russ.).
Kirdina S. G. Institutsional’nye matritsy i razvitiye Rossii [Institutional matrix and Russia’s development]. M.: ТЕIS publ., 2000. 213 p. (In Russ.).
Kon I. S. 80 let odinochestva [80 years of loneliness]. M.: Vremya publ., 2008. 432 p. (In Russ.).
Kravchenko S. A. Riski v nelineinom globolokal’nom sotsiume [Risks in nonlinear globolocal socium]. M.: ANKIL publ., 2009. 224 p. (In Russ.).
Lisichkin G. S. Plan i rynok [Plan and market]. M.: Ekonomika publ., 1966. 96 p. (In Russ.).
Meerovitch M.G. Rasselencheskaya doktrina Rossii: segodnya i 100 let nazad [A habitat doctrine of Russia: today and 100 years before]. Irkutsk: Publ. House of Irkutsk State University, 2014. 227 p. (In Russ.).
Naumova N. F. Chelovek i modennizatsiya Rossii [A man and modernization of Russia]. M.: KANON+: ROOI “Rehabilitatsiya”, 2006. 591 p. (In Russ.).
Sorokin P. A. Golog kak factor. Vliyanie goloda na povedenie ludei, sotsial’nuyu organizatsiyu I obzhchestvennuyu zhizn’ [Hunger as a factor. A hunger’s impact on peoples’ behavior, social organization, and public life]. M.: Akademia & LVS publ., 2003. 684 p. (In Russ.).
Shkaratan O. I. Rossiyskiy poriadok: vector peremen [Russian Order: Vector of Changes]. M.: Vita-Press publ., 2004. 207 p. (In Russ.).
Sotsyal’nye nauki v postsovetskoi Rossii [Social sciences in post-Soviet Russia]. Ed. by G. S. Batygin, L. A. Kozlova, E. M. Sviderski. M.: Akademicheskyi project publ., 2005. 416 p. (In Russ.).
Vernadskyi V. I. Problemy biogeochimii. Trudy biogeocimoceskoi laboratorii [Biogeochemical issues. Works of biogeochemical laboratory]. Issue XVI. M.: Nauka publ., 1980. 320 p. (In Russ.).
Yanitsky O. N. Metabolicheskaya konseptsiya sovremennogo goroda [Metabolic concept of a modern city]. Sotsiologicheskaya nauka i sotsial’naya practika. 2013. № 3. P. 16–32. (In Russ.).
Yanitsky O. N. Sotciologiya kriticheskih sostoyaniy obshcestva [Sociology of critical states of society]. Sotsiologicheskaya nauka i sotsial’naya practika. 2014. № 4. P. 5–24. (In Russ.).
Yanitsky O. N. Sotsiobiotechnicheskiye sistemy: novyi vzgliad na vzaimodeistviye cheloveka i prirody [Sociobiotechnical systems: A new view on man-nature interactions]. Sotsiologicheskaya nauka i sotsial’naya practika. 2016. № 3. Р. 5–22. (In Russ.).
Arsenault A., Castells M. Switching Power: Rupert Murdoch and the Global Business of Media Politics. International Sociology. 2008. Vol. 23(4). P. 488–513.
Bauman Z. The Individualized Society. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2001.
Beck U. World Risk Society. Malden, MA: Polity Press, 1999.
Burawoy M. What is to be Done? Theses on the Degradation of Social Existence in a Globalizing World. Current Sociology. 2008. № 56 (3). P. 351–359.
Burawoy M. Facing the unequal world. Current Sociology. 2015. № 3 (1). P. 5–34.
Bourdreau J.-A., Davis D. E. Introduction: A processual approach to informatization. Current Sociology. 2017. Vol. 65. № 2. Monograph (1). P. 151–166.
Cities of Europe: The Public’s Role in Shaping the Urban Environment. Ed. by Deelstra T.,Yanitsky O. Moscow: Mezhdunarudnye Otnosheniya, 1991, 393 p.
Castells M. The Rise of Network Society. 2nd Edition. Oxford: Wille-Blackwell, 1999. 656 p.
Fisher-Kowalski M., Haberl H. Socioecological Transitions and Global Change. Trajectories of Social Metabolism and Land Use. Vienna: Klagenfurt University, 2007. 265 p.
Giddens A. The Politics of Climate Change. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2009. 256 p.
The Public Reconstruction of Science and Technology. Ed. by A. Irwin, B. Wynne. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. 232 p.
Keen D. Complex Emergences. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008. 293 p.
Meier R. The Communication Theory of Urban Growth. Mass.: MIT Press, 1965. 256 p.
Prigogine I., Stengers I. Order out of Chaos. London: Heinmann, 1984. 349 p.
Robertson R. Globalization. Social Theory and Global Culture. London: SAGE Publications, 1994. 211 p.
Schwab K. The Fourth Industrial Revolution. Cologny: World Economic Forum, 2016. 211 p.
Touraine A. Return of the Actor: Social Theory in Postindustrial Society. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1988. 171 p.
Urry J. Mobilities. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2008. 336 p.
Waters M. Globalization. Lnd. & N.Y.: Routledge, 1995. 185 p.
Yanitsky O. A Primary Eco-Structure: The Concept and its Testing. Social Analysis. 2012. Vol. 2 (2). P. 7–24.
Yanitsky O. Sociology of Critical Areas. Open Journal of Social Science Research. 2014. Vol. 2 (3). P. 112–118.
Citation Formats
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Harvard
Yanitsky, O. N. (2018) ’On Modernization of the Humanities’, Sociologicheskaja nauka i social’naja praktika, 6(1), pp. 7-22. doi: https://doi.org/10.19181/snsp.2018.6.1.5734.
Section
THEORY AND METHODOLOGY
Publisher: Federal Center of Theoretical and Applied Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences (FCTAS RAS)