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The first wide-ranging, organic analysis of the sociology of unmarkedness and taken-for-grantedness, this volume investigates the asymmetry between how we attend to the culturally emphasized features of social reality and ignore the culturally unmarked ones.
Concerned with the structures of cultural invisibility, unconscious rules of irrelevance, automatic frames of meaning, and collective attention patterns, it brings together scholarship spanning sociology, anthropology, and social psychology, to cover various aspects of humdrum, unglamorous, nondescript, nothing-to-write-at-home-about social phenomena, developing the key assumptions, underpinnings, and implications of this field of study.
As comprehensive analysis of unremarked features of our social existence, this book will appeal to scholars across the social sciences with interests in social theory and the sociology of everyday life.
List of contents
List of Contributors List of Tables and Figures 1. What is Done When Nothing Special is Being Done. Social Theory and the Power of the Unmarked Theoretical Outlines 2. Taken for Granted: Semiotic Asymmetry and the Sociocognitive Production of Normality 3. Routines, Rituals and Reflexes: The Powerful Undercurrents in Everyday Life Core Arguments and Epistemological Implications 4. Sociocultural Defaults at Rest and in Motion: Cognitive Sociologies of the Unmarked 5. Nothing Important: Exploring the Personal and Social Meanings of Negative Experience 6. From Background to Default: The Epistemic Role of the Unmarked Variations on the Theme 7. Early Detection's Blind Spots: Attentional Conflict in the Mammography Wars 8. Normalization of the Wrong Normal: Unmarked Futures in the 2015-2016 Refugee Crisis in Poland Conclusive Remarks 9. "Noise or Music? Clutter or Shoe? On Attachment and Foreground Producing Strategies 10. The Unmarked and the Methodology of Social Research 11. Remarks About What Is Considered Important and Unimportant in Sociology Index
About the author
Carmelo Lombardo is Full Professor of Sociology at Sapienza-University of Rome, Italy.
Lorenzo Sabetta is Tenure-Track Assistant Professor of Sociology at Sapienza-University of Rome, Italy.
Summary
Concerned with the structures of cultural invisibility, unconscious rules of irrelevance and automatic frames of meaning, this book represents the first analysis of the sociology of unmarkedness and taken-for-grantedness, developing the key assumptions and underpinnings of the study of nondescript, humdrum social phenomena.
Report
"Sociology suffers from an attention deficit disorder of sorts, focusing on .001% of human action that takes place against a background of the taken for granted which occupies the rest of our experience. Here, in this adventurous volume, Lombardo and Sabetta gather essays that collectively redirect our gaze to the vast unmarked world, bringing opportunity for fresh insight."
Peter Bearman, Columbia University
