Mirrors and Windows. Essays in the History of Sociology

Opis książki:

Research Committees of the International Sociological Association (ISA) meet every two years: to coincide with the ISA`s congresses (held every fourth year) and at their own meetings between congresses. Although the ISA`s congress has never met in Poland its Research Committees occasionally meet here.
During the ISA Congress in Montreal in 1998, the then Secretary of the Research Committee on History of Sociology (RCHS), Jennifer Platt, suggested that the next interim conference of this Committee should be organised in June 2000 in Toruri, Poland, at the Institute of Sociology of Nicolaus Copernicus University (NCU). After a debate and voting, the Committee accepted this motion and we started to work. We were very pleased with that decision, particularly because in the 1990s, in the NCU`s Institute of Sociology a number of significant research and dissemination initiatives were undertaken in the field of history of Polish sociology. The Research Committee on History of Sociology of the Polish Sociological Association has its headquarters here. Archive of Polish Sociology is also located here. In addition, this is the centre of research on the biographical dictionary of Polish sociology as well as on the almanac of Polish sociology.
When preparing the RCHS interim conference, we wanted to stress the idea of the establishing of the national archives of sociology and to make the co-operation between the existing archives easier. It seems to us that this task has been fulfilled.
At the Torun three-day conference, about 30 scholars participated from 12 European countries and from the US, Canada and Australia. The programme, prepared mostly by the Secretary of the Committee, Christian Fleck, consisted of a number of sessions. There were the following thematic sessions: "Search of a `Good Society`: The Concept of Sociology as a `Moral Science` in the History of Sociology", "Archives on the History of Sociology", "Value-Incommensurability at the Turn of the Centuries", "Sociologists in Two Worlds", "Biographies in the History of Sociology", "Contemporary Concerns, Traditional Inscriptions: The Chicago School of Sociology". Three "General Sessions" were also held, as well as an "Author Meets Critics" session devoted to Reinhard Blomert`s book "Intellektuelle im Aufbruch. Karl Mannheim, Alfred Weber, Norbert Elias und die Heidelberger Sozialwissenschaften der Zwischenkriegzeit" (Muenchen: C. Hanser Verlag 1999).
This book reflects the content of the conference. The chapters, however, are not "simply" the papers given in Torun in June 2000; they were subsequently edited by the authors. We hope that the book will be an important contribution to the study of the history of our discipline and will interest many readers(...)
Janusz Mucha and Włodzimierz Wincławski

Książka "Mirrors and Windows. Essays in the History of Sociology" - Janusz Mucha, Dirk Kaesler, Włodzimierz Wincławski (red.) - oprawa miękka - Wydawnictwo Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika. Książka posiada 353 stron i została wydana w 2001 r.