Abstracts
Abstract
Art sociology may be simply seen as a specialised domain of sociological research. Yet the article suggests that it has also an overarching diagnostic significance to gain a better understanding of ongoing societal transformation trends. It analyses the classical contribution of Weber, Simmel and Bourdieu to the topic. Weber develops a causal-historical explanation for the development of occidental music. It becomes a key to the interpretation of the specific occidental form of rationalism beyond religion and economy. Simmel has a different approach. Art is for him one of the expressions of the modern times that he wants to describe to understand the transformation of the society in which he lives. The diagnostic function of art is at the centre of interest. Bourdieu, on his side, proposes a historical reconstruction for the development of the intellectual field in France during the 19th century. In this frame, art contributes to a symbolic revolution that establishes autonomous societal fields and promotes a qualitative differentiation of complex societies. Yet, Bourdieu’s researches on art have also a diagnostic potential. Building on the analytical heritage of the classics, the article inquiries into the loss of autonomy of the art field in the contemporary art market and contributes to the debate on the heuristic significance of art sociology.
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Appendices
Biographical note
Gregor Fitzi – fitzigregor@gmail.com –, is senior fellow at CISP: ‘Interdisciplinary Centre Sciences for Peace’, at University of Pisa and associated researcher at the Centre Georg Simmel, École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris. After his PhD in Sociology at the University of Bielefeld, he was assistant professor at the Institute of Sociology, University of Heidelberg, Interim Full Professor of Sociological Theory at the University of Bielefeld and Co-Director of the Centre for Citizenship, Social Pluralism and Religious Diversity, at University of Potsdam. Among his recent publications are: Normative Intermittency. A Sociology of Failing Social Structuration. New York: Palgrave, (2022); The Challenge of Modernity. Simmel’s Sociological Theory, (2019); with Jürgen Mackert and Bryan S. Turner (eds.): Populism and the Crisis of Democracy. 3. Vols. London: Routledge, 2019; and with Bryan S. Turner. Max Weber’s Politics as a Profession. Special Issue of the Journal of Classical Sociology, 4/2019.
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