Meloni, M. (2016) From boundary-work to boundary object: how biology left and re-entered the social sciences. The Sociological Review Monographs, 64 (1). pp. 61-78. ISSN 2059-7932
Abstract
In an archaeological spirit this paper comes back to a founding event in the construction of the twentieth-century episteme, the moment at which the life- and the social sciences parted ways and intense boundary-work was carried out on the biology/society border, with significant benefits for both sides. Galton and Weismann for biology, and Alfred Kroeber for anthropology delimit this founding moment and I argue, expanding on an existing body of historical scholarship, for an implicit convergence of their views. After this excavation, I look at recent developments in the life sciences, which I have named the ‘social turn’ in biology (Meloni, 2014), and in particular at epigenetics with its promise to destabilize the social/biological border. I claim here that today a different account of ‘the biological’ to that established during the Galton–Kroeber period is emerging. Rather than being used to support a form of boundary-work, biology has become a boundary object that crosses previously erected barriers, allowing different research communities to draw from it.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2016 The Author. The Sociological Review Monographs published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of the Sociological Review Publication Limited. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made. |
Keywords: | Galton; Kroeber; epigenetics; boundary-work; boundary object |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Sociological Studies (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 25 Apr 2016 14:15 |
Last Modified: | 25 Apr 2016 14:15 |
Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2059-7932.12013 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | John Wiley & Sons Ltd. |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1002/2059-7932.12013 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:98969 |