Hidden Paths in Zygmunt Bauman’s Sociology: Editorial Introduction

In the immediate aftermath of his death, a number of excellent articles were written that each provide a different door into the vast room of Bauman’s sociology. In the past year or so, there have also been a number of books that have set about providing a more ‘critical analysis’ of his work whilst also considering how sociology might look anew and move creatively ‘beyond Bauman’ (Blackshaw 2016; Jacobsen ed. 2016; Rattansi 2017). In so doing, these welcome contributions clearly take Bauman’s sociological imagination very seriously and provide useful reference points for both scholars and students seeking a more robust examination of Bauman’s ideas. Each contribution deserves to be read and studied as they provide new and considered insights into Bauman’s legacy for the social sciences and humanities. Throughout the article that follows, we make our own contribution to the curious reader’s deliberations on these debates by shining a light on those aspects of Bauman’s work that may have become somewhat hidden and possibly overlooked in what we see as a growing tendency to focus primarily upon his later writings on ‘liquid modernity’. We argue that in order to grasp fully the meaning of Bauman’s writing in the more popular post-2000 phase, it is vital that one understands these earlier foundations of his thought. In this way, we hope that we may go some way to rebalancing the concerns of some contemporary critics.