La dispute récurrente entre Braudel et Gurvitch a pris une nouvelle tournure en 1958 lorsque chacun explicita son approche des temps. Braudel estime que sa distinction entre trois durées historiques devrait offrir un cadre épistémologique et méthodologique commun aux sciences sociales, sociologie comprise. La typologie des temps sociaux de Gurvitch ne lui semble pas opératoire : elle est trop qualitative. Gurvitch lui répond que réalité et temps historiques se rapportent à des genres particuliers de temps sociaux, qualitatifs-quantitatifs, discontinus-continus... L’étude de (...) ces derniers confirmerait que l’historien et le sociologue ne peuvent concevoir de la même manière leur objet et leur méthode. Esquisse d’une analyse critique.The recurrent debate between Braudel and Gurvitch was given a new development in 1958, when both of them clarified their definition of time. In Braudel’s mind the distinction he made between three different historical times offered a common epistemological and methodological framework for social sciences, including sociology. For Braudel, Gurvitch’s typification of time in terms of social times seemed to be unoperative : it is too qualitative. Gurvitch replied to him that historical reality and historical times referred to specific types of social times : qualitative-quantitative, discontinuous-continuous... The study of these types would confirm that the historian and the sociologist do not conceive their object and their method in the same way. The article sketches a critical analysis of the question. (shrink)

La dispute récurrente entre Braudel et Gurvitch a pris une nouvelle tournure en 1958 lorsque chacun explicita son approche des temps. Braudel estime que sa distinction entre trois durées historiques devrait offrir un cadre épistémologique et méthodologique commun aux sciences sociales, sociologie comprise. La typologie des temps sociaux de Gurvitch ne lui semble pas opératoire : elle est trop qualitative. Gurvitch lui répond que réalité et temps historiques se rapportent à des genres particuliers de temps sociaux, qualitatifs-quantitatifs, discontinus-continus... L’étude de (...) ces derniers confirmerait que l’historien et le sociologue ne peuvent concevoir de la même manière leur objet et leur méthode. Esquisse d’une analyse critique.The recurrent debate between Braudel and Gurvitch was given a new development in 1958, when both of them clarified their definition of time. In Braudel’s mind the distinction he made between three different historical times offered a common epistemological and methodological framework for social sciences, including sociology. For Braudel, Gurvitch’s typification of time in terms of social times seemed to be unoperative : it is too qualitative. Gurvitch replied to him that historical reality and historical times referred to specific types of social times : qualitative-quantitative, discontinuous-continuous... The study of these types would confirm that the historian and the sociologist do not conceive their object and their method in the same way. The article sketches a critical analysis of the question. (shrink)

Given what we know about the nature of knowledge and scientific work it no longer makes sense to think of scientific knowledge as demarcated from “ordinary” knowledge through its methods or the characteristics of the scientific community. As the social studies of science have shown, boundaries become ambiguous when viewed close up so that science merges with ordinary knowledge. But does this mean that distinctions between knowledge claims rest on nothing more than social conventions, powerful as these might be? The (...) articles in this special issue address this question from a variety of perspectives, while this introduction sets out this broader framework and highlights the themes that unite the individual articles. Our central argument is that although boundary work is difficult, complex, and contingent, it is too important to be left to chance or tradition. We need to rescue expertise from the antiessentialist consensus that there is nothing but attribution. (shrink)