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Sociology as a Skin Trade
Author(s) -
O'Neill John
Publication year - 1970
Publication title -
sociological inquiry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.446
H-Index - 51
eISSN - 1475-682X
pISSN - 0038-0245
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-682x.1970.tb00983.x
Subject(s) - argument (complex analysis) , sociology , documentation , context (archaeology) , politics , epistemology , order (exchange) , improvisation , body politic , law , political science , philosophy , computer science , medicine , economics , paleontology , biology , art , finance , visual arts , programming language
The purpose of the essay is to connect the practice of sociology with the sensitizing concept of a skin trade in order to relate it to the commonsense needs of the body‐politic. The critical observations on professional sociology are not the focus of the essay any more than the concerns of modern youth which are adopted as a context for its argument. The essay intentionally avoids documentation in the conventional sense for the sake of the improvisation contained in the image of the skin trade. It is the first step in a series of studies in the skin trade in which I hope to treat race, for example, as a skin disease and to develop the social and political aspects of various other body events.