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This book analyzes the history of contemporary or 'new' music in the twentieth-century through the lens of the sociology of modern culture, linking the paradoxical aspects of twentieth-century music to the central processes in modern culture that are analyzed by sociology and social theory.

Peter Baehr's new book examines unmasking in the history of social theory, politics and contemporary media. In this review, I focus on the assessment of styles of theorizing in social theory and sociology in particular. Baehr shows that through its inheritance of an Enlightenment commitment to a critique of power and domination, mainstream sociology (including the discipline's conservative critics) have absorbed an "unmasking" model of critique where instead of "scientific refutation" or "principled disagreement" what is practiced is the removal of a "disguise". I consider the book's rich history of masking and unmasking in social thought, as well as the claim that "dramaturgical" and Anglophone sociologies are more favorably disposed towards the "masking" trope; although, I also observe the book's historical depth is not matched by contemporary breadth (for e.g. it doesn't consider the migration of social theory into new domains). I conclude by asking whether reflection on styles of thought in social theory can be separated from a sociology of sociology; and also ask whether the masking and unmasking dialectic is yet another chapter in the long history of what the Greeks called theoria.

<p>Um dos dilemas recorrentes na sociologia da arte tem sido como balancear abordagens <em>internalistas</em> e <em>externalistas</em> dos fenômenos estéticos (isto é, explicações estéticas e sociais); ou o que este artigo caracteriza como a necessidade de sair de um modelo "<em>ou arte ou sociedade"</em> para um modelo de lógica "<em>tanto arte quanto sociedade</em>". Nos últimos anos, os dilemas conceituais foram intensificados por uma tendência de o capitalismo se tornar um fenômeno mais explicitamente cultural. Ao mesmo tempo, os conhecimentos sobre arte e estética saíram da esfera da <em>grandiosidade</em> e da alta cultura para o mundo prosaico do dia a dia. Este artigo propõe que a solução para os dilemas em curso da sociologia da arte, e para o atual desafio das bases da arte e do conhecimento estético é adotar um paradigma textural, ao invés de um modo de pensar textual. O paradigma textural foi desenvolvido primeiramente no pensamento sobre lugar e é adequado para pensar os problemas da sociologia da arquitetura e do urbanismo – incluindo o problema de como o tecido urbano, às vezes, começa a desemaranhar; ou porque alguns estilos arquitetônicos improváveis voltam à moda (como, por exemplo, o brutalismo pós-guerra).</p><p>BOTH-AND: ON THE NEED FOR A 'TEXTURAL' SOCIOLOGYOFART</p><p><strong>Abstract</strong></p><p>One of the recurring dilemmas in the sociology of art has been how to balance 'internalist' and 'externalist' accounts of an esthetic phenomena (i. e., a esthetic and social explanations); or, what this paper terms the necessity of moving from an either-or model of art and society to adopting a both - and logic. In the last few years, the conceptual dilemmas have been further heightened by developments such as capitalism becoming more explicitly cultural; and knowledges about art and aesthetics moving from there almof the 'grand' and the high cultural to the more prosaic and the every day. This paper proposes that a solution to the ongoing dilemmas of the sociology of art, and the current challenge of the proliferation of arts/aesthetics-knowledge bases, is to adopt a textural rather than textural mode of thinking. The textural paradigm was first developed in thinking about place and is well-suited to thinking through problems in the sociology of architecture and urbanism – including the problem of how the urban fabric, at times, starts to unravel; or why some unlikely architectural stillest age comebacks (e. g., post-war brutalism).</p><p>Keywords: textures; sociology of art; Ingold; Lefebvre; architecture and urbanism.</p><p><strong> </strong></p><p>SUR LA NECESSITE D'UNESOCIOLOGIE DE LA TEXTURE DE L'ART</p><p class="Standard"><strong>Resumé </strong></p><p class="Standard">L'un des dilemmes le plus récurrent dans la sociologie de l'art c'est de savoir comment équilibrer les approches internalistes et externalistes des phénomènes esthétiques (c'est-à-dire des explications esthétiques et sociales); ou ce que cet article définit comme la nécessité de sortir d'un modèle «d'un art ou d'une société» pour un modèle logique «à la fois l'art et société». Au cours des dernières années, les dilemmes conceptuels ont été aggravés par la tendance du capitalisme à devenir un phénomène plus explicitement culturel; au même temps, la connaissance de l'art et de l'esthétique est passée de la sphère de la grandeur et de la haute culture au monde prosaïque de la vie quotidienne. Cet article propose que la solution aux dilemmes actuels de la sociologie de l'art et au défi actuel des fondements de la connaissance de l'art et de l'esthétique consiste à adopter un paradigme textural plutôt qu'un mode de pensée textuel. Le paradigme de la texture a été développé pour la première fois en pensant sur le lieu et convient aux problèmes sociologiques de l'architecture et de l'urbanisme, y compris comment, le tissu urbain commence parfois à se démêler; ou comme certains styles architecturaux improbables sont revenus à la mode (comme le brutalisme d'après-guerre).</p><p class="Standard"><strong> </strong><strong>Les mots-clés:</strong> textures; sociologie de l'art; Ingold; Lefebvre; architecture et urbanisme.</p><div><div><div><p> </p></div></div></div>

Daniel Bell's writings are often cast as offering a contemporary jeremiad regarding the corrosive effects of culture upon the modern economic and social order. In this paper, I take the opposite approach and argue that Bell is a sensitive cultural analyst who is claiming that human experience ought not to be deprived of culture – understood as symbol and myth that tap into the felt need for human transcendence. Bell could therefore be seen as a strong advocate for the concept of culture, and for a cultural sociology. It is only that the modern (and postmodern) versions of culture do not realize the full potential of culture to move and inspire human actors. The conclusion is reached that what ails modern culture is neither rationalization nor secularization, but rather what Bell termed the 'Great Profanization'. Rendering culture profane is much more serious, and deleterious, than any of the other specific dynamics sociologists have diagnosed regarding modern culture.

The sociology of art has experienced a significant revival during the last three decades. However, in the first instance, this renewed interest was dominated by the 'production of culture' perspective and was heavily focused on contextual factors such as the social organization of artistic markets and careers, and displays of 'cultural capital' through consumption of the arts. In this article, I outline a new mode of approaching art sociologically that begins with Alfred Gell's (1998) Art and Agency, but comes to full fruition in what I am calling the 'new sociology of art'. A major theoretical statement that captures many of the aspirations of the new approach is Jeffrey Alexander's essay: 'Iconic Consciousness: The Material Feeling of Meaning'. It is suggested that the new sociology of art has much in common with material culture studies, and that a more robust concept of the artwork's agency is needed now that art has well and truly taken on a social and cultural life well beyond those institutions traditionally understood as the 'art world'.

This article welcomes Born's proposal that the sociology of art learn from 'adjacent fields' that can 'augment the sociological repertoire'. It agrees especially that sociologists can learn much from the anthropology of art and material culture studies. However, it challenges Born's claim that the sociology of art has 'seen little progress in recent years' and thus questions certain aspects of her proposal for a 'post-Bourdieuian theory of cultural production'. The central argument is: rather than an 'analytics of mediation' — which Born recommends — the sociology of art can benefit from studying material 'mediators' at work in concrete artistic networks, and the role of aesthetic agency and art in the constitution of social life more generally. The ar ticle concludes that the path forward for a sociology of art may lie precisely in not trying to force a reconciliation between macro and micro approaches, or between humanities and social science perspectives.

This article examines the sociology-aesthetics nexus in Georg Simmel's thought. The article suggests that it is useful to divide Simmel's linking of sociology and aesthetics into three distinct types of propositions: (1) claims regarding the parallels between art and social form (the "art of social forms"); (2) statements regarding principles of sociological ordering in art and aesthetic objects (the "social forms of art"); and (3) analytical propositions where aesthetic and social factors are shown to work in combination. In the latter case, the sociology-aesthetic nexus moves beyond mere analogy. It is argued that in those instances where Simmel shows that aesthetic factors are central to the social bond the linking of aesthetics and sociology is theoretically most insightful.

Despite intense debate regarding the `cultural turn', there has been very little framing of these intellectual conflicts in terms of the sociology of ideas or knowledge. Following Gouldner, the article proposes that sociology has oscillated between two major styles of thought: Classicism and Romanticism. The latter stimulated an interest in culture amongst social scientists and also led to an emphasis on the cultural properties of social life. Yet Romanticism has its equal in the opposing tendency to see the sociological study of culture as no different from other forms of social scientific explanation (Classicism). The notion of `style wars' is used to frame debates about the `cultural turn' and its consequences for sociology. Divisions within the sociology of art — a subfield within the sociology of culture — are used to demonstrate that one major fault line in these debates is the notion of aesthetics. It is suggested that theoretical and methodological debates about culture, and its role in sociology, require some degree of sociological reflexivity about the predominant styles of thought present in the discipline.

This article maps recent developments in social science writing about the arts and argues for seeing this work in terms of the label the `new sociology of art'. It considers four major lines of re-assessment being carried out by sociologists studying the arts: firstly, a reconsideration of the relationship between sociological and other disciplinary approaches to art; secondly, the possibility of an art-sociology as against a sociology of art; thirdly, the application of insights from the sociology of art to non-art `stuff '; and, fourthly, the sociology of the artwork conceived as a contingent social fact. The argument is made that these developments represent an advance on the tendency to limit sociological investigations of the arts to contextual or external factors. The `new sociology of art' is praised for framing questions about the aesthetic properties of art and artworks in a way that is compatible with social constructionsim.