Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: The Return of the Sociology of LiteratureIn recent years, literary studies have proclaimed a »social turn« (Stiemer/Büker/ Sanchino Martinez 2017), while the social sciences have conversely heralded a »literary turn« (Hammersley 2023).Or, to put it in a different way, the sociology of literature is making a comeback in both disciplines.In general, disciplines have a tendency to resume long neglected fields of research in order to achieve gains in innovation.This certainly also applies to the sociology of literature.Interest in the sociology of literature waned after the projects of a social history of literature (Huber/Lauer 2000; Schönert 2007) and the history of reception (Grimm 1977) came to an end.The theoretical frameworks of Niklas Luhmann (1997) and Pierre Bourdieu (1999) were not succeeded by similarly ambitious projects.What followed were refinements, differentiations and expansions of the two models and their application in numerous case studies.The system-theoretically oriented works of Siegfried J. Schmidt (1989), Niels Werber (1992), and Gerhard Plumpe (1995), as well as those attached to field theory by Joseph Jurt (1995), Pascale Casanova (1999), Gisèle Sapiro (2014), Markus Joch and Norbert Christian Wolf (2005), and Heribert Tommek (2015) are particularly noteworthy here.However, possible gains in innovation alone do not explain the return of a sociological interest in literature.After literary studies' orientation towards constructivist concepts of communication, discourse and knowledge, there has been a shift towards materiality, mediality, institutions, practices, reception and big data in recent years.In sociological theory, a similar development can be observed from (post-)structuralist approaches to performative and praxeological theories.The sensual appearance in the sense of aisthetics and, consequently, the study of effects, emotional engagement, and evaluation have come to the fore.
Source: Journal of Literary Theory
Institutions: University of Basel, University of Bamberg, University of Oxford
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
Estimated APC paid:
OpenAlex ID: W4408188337