Kieran Healy’s Weblog Sociology and other distractions

Let me get this straight

So Nouri al-Maliki pardoned Saddam Hussein to promote national healing and move on, Gerald Ford is making one last appearance at the Apollo theater, and James Brown will shortly be buried at Arlington cemetery, his long reign of terror having come to an end at last. No, that’s not right. I’ll try again.

While I puzzle […]

OrgTheory of a Kind

Here’s something I’d forgotten I’d written. An early, co-authored publication of mine in ASQ. Sadly, only the first page survives. In case you’re unfamiliar with the topic, I should say that the bibliographical references and quotations are all perfectly accurate. Any resemblance to this paper is wholly accidental.

Non-Presence

I’m sure you’re all tearing your hair out with frustration or worry, so I apologise for not posting much. For the past week I have been on a very tiny island on the south end of the Rangiroa atoll, in French Polynesia. No internet access there. Also no electricity.

In other news, it turns out that […]

The Averaged American

Aha, via Andrew Gelman I see that a book I’ve been waiting for has just been published. Sarah Igo’s The Averaged American: Surveys, Citizens, and the Making of a Mass Public is a study of the history of quantitative social research in America, documenting how Americans came to think of themselves as the subjects of […]

MacKenzie’s Engine

I have been extremely irresponsible about my contribution to our OrgTheory book seminar on Donald MacKenzie’s An Engine, Not a Camera. But for once this is because my thoughts on the book metastisized into an article-length something-or-other. I’m still working on it so I won’t inflict it upon you (but stay tuned: eventually I will). […]

I thought you only had to worry about being bored unconscious

Although we’ve been on the same panel once before, Minnesota sociologist Chris Uggen clearly travels on a rougher conference circuit than me.