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Come nasce e come cresce una scuola sociologica. Merton, Lazarsfeld e il Bureau
No full textSpeaking of the Columbia sociological school, Hanan C. Selvin says: “We were satellites, not of one sun, but of two”. I substantially agree with this view and the story I try to tell in the book starts with an excursus on the interests and works of Merton and Lazarsfeld before they met at Columbia University.
Very often the writings on the intellectual collaboration between Merton and Lazarsfeld deal with its strangeness: Merton was first of all a theorist, Lazarsfeld a scholar oriented to methodology and empirical research; they were called at Columbia to follow two different directions.
In the first chapter of my book I try to point up some factors that made their strange collaboration possible: the interest of Merton for methodological themes (namely, for problems of data collections); the correspondences between the Lazarsfeldian empirical study of action and the Mertonian functionalism, that – according to my opinion – differs from the functionalism a là Durkheim or Parsons for the role it give to individual.
The second and third chapters are specifically dedicated to the analysis of the empirical productions of the Bureau. In 2001 I spent 5 months at Columbia as a Visiting Scholar; in that period I interviewed Bureau people (Merton, Katz, Kadushin, Sills and others), content-analyzed some 300 Bureau research reports and read unpublished materials referring to the main Bureau researches. The second chapter is subject-organized: I analyzed the Bureau researches grouping them by their main substantial theme: communication, consumer action, community studies, professions and education. In the third chapter I try a more methodological and theoretical analysis; the main thesis of the chapter is that – regardless to the specific subject of the researches – the Bureau approach gradually shifts from an atomistic / individualistic framework in the first years to a more authentically sociological framework in the golden period (the 50s). In the chapter I try to show the conceptual and methodological tools by which the social context was included in the framework of analysis of the Bureau researchers.
Finally, in the last chapter I try a sociological analysis of the Columbia school. Particularly, I draw on the concept of marginality, largely used in studies of sociology of science. Very often the concept of marginality was applied to study the figure of Lazarsfeld; as well he speaks of himself as a marginal man. Here I apply the concept of marginality to study an institution. In some published and unpublished writings the condition of marginality of the Bureau in the Columbia setting was treated as a limit. I’m convinced that some aspects of its marginality contribute to made the Bureau the important sociological school that we know. In the chapter I thoroughly analyze these aspects
Lo studio empirico dell’intervista. Tendenze recenti nel dibattito metodologico
No full textThe essay proposes to reconstruct the main orientations of the methodological debate on pre-test questionnaire strategies and on the analysis of interview processes. In particular, the focus is on two techniques that have been recently getting more attention during conventions of international scientific associations: the cognitive interview and the monitoring of the interviews. A restrictive conception of the interviewer emerges from this reconstruction. In this
scenario, although researchers look to improve their questionnaires through evaluations of
subjects outside the research (interviewees, panels of experts), the interviewers are mainly controlled, instead of being considered as privileged witnesses of survey issues
Sulle tracce dei big data. Questioni di metodo e percorsi di ricerca
No full textLa Sezione di metodologia dell’AIS, in occasione del termine del proprio mandato, organizza un convegno sul tema dei BIG DATA. La crescente disponibilità di ingenti volumi di informazioni su vari e numerosi aspetti dei sistemi sociali complessi sollecita nuove opportunità di studio e ricerca sulle sfide di cambiamento – in atto e in prospettiva – che essi si trovano a fronteggiare. Per la varietà dei fenomeni emergenti a livello aggregato, delle strutture di interazione sociale collocate a vari livelli di complessità, degli artefatti culturali che le opportunità di ricerca sui big data pongono all’attenzione degli scienziati sociali, il Convegno si propone come luogo di riflessione interdisciplinare
"Progetto promozione ricerca". Si tratta di un finanziamento per le spese di pubblicazione del libro Come nasce e come cresce una scuola sociologica: Merton, Lazarsfeld e il Bureau, di cui sono autore unico.
No full textLogistic regression and log-linear models in social research: how to make their application to complex tables more understandable
No full textErasmus+ teaching mobility presso l'Universitat de Valencia (E)
No full textOverall objectives of the mobility: models and methods of academic teaching and research, with a special focus on social sciences and humanities.
Added value of the mobility (both for the institutions involved and for the teacher): the chance to build a network among European academic departments interested in exchanging their experiences about evaluation of academic teaching and research.
Content of the teaching programme: conceptual framework and devices of evaluation of Universities in Italy, with a particular reference to social sciences and humanities; comparision between Spain and Italy about these topics.
Expected outcomes and impact (not limited to the number of students concerned): contribute to building a culture of evaluation by the exchange of experiences and best practices developed in different institutional contexts
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