Category: social science

Can McDonalds tell us anything about the value of the social sciences?

Taking a sideways look at George Ritzer’s famous McDonaldization thesis, Titus Alexander argues that rather than being an iron cage, social scientists have much to gain from treating such institutions as real time experiments and social models. In his …

Sensationalist messaging around “low-value degrees” ignores the reality of economic inequality

Analysing the recent government messaging on the value of university education, Zoe Hope Bulaitis, argues this rhetoric drastically simplifies how and where higher education adds value to society. In a predictable manner, the calculation of the economi…

Excluding the social sciences, arts and humanities from reporting downplays their importance to research, development and innovation

Drawing on findings from a new report into how the social sciences, humanities and arts (SHAPE) disciplines are understood and deployed in policy and industry, Eleanor Hopkins suggests inconsistent reporting and incentives contribute underestimation of…

Embodying social science research – The exhibition as a form of multi-sensory research communication

Interest in and recognition for communicating academic research in creative ways that reach different audiences is growing. Deborah Lupton reflects on how adopting the role of curator enabled her to bring together different skills, people and ideas to …

“To Clarify an Everchanging Present” – Hyperchronicity, Anachronism and the relationship between history and social science

Reflecting on the interplay of historical and social scientific concepts, Roland Betancourt discusses the extent to which current social and cultural trends influence the study of the past. Responding to critiques of current research being ‘presentist’…

What are social structural explanations?

Social structures are often invoked as the cause of various problems in society. In this post, Lauren N. Ross discusses how social structural causes can be understood as constraints and why clarity on this point is not just a problem of definition, but…

Book Review: Driving With Strangers: What Hitchhiking Tells Us about Humanity by Jonathan Purkis

In Driving With Strangers: What Hitchhiking Tells Us about Humanity, Jonathan Purkis argues that the nature of hitchhiking and its place in the world has important things to tell us both about who we are and who we might be. This hopeful book suggests …

No Impact People? Reframing research impact in the social sciences

Responding to a call for renewed thinking about how we understand and measure social science impact by Ziyad Marar, Ron Kassimir, outlines how the way in which impact is figured in the social sciences is often dependent on those external to its product…