This collection of the writings of Louis Schneider, an exceptionally gifted sociologist of religion the history of ideas, provides a sensitive but rigorous view of the place of ideas in social life. Di­vided according to the principal areas in which Schneider con­ducted research—history of social thought, principles of social the­ory, sociology of religion—are es­says on evolution, styles of re­search, and moral choice in human relations. His knowledge of systems of thought—dialec­tical, functional, and phenomenological—was peerless. The unifying theme in his work is the place of cultural formations in so­cial structures; as a result, his writings are alive with persons no less than systems.

"A thoughtful, scholarly yet accessible account of emotion that speaks to current debates associated with the ‘affective turn’ in disciplines including sociology, cultural studies, geography and psychology... invaluable for anyone wanting to understand contemporary engagements with affect, emotion and feeling." - John Cromby, Loughborough University "A lucid, engaging, and thoroughly insightful review of current social scientific thinking on emotions in social life by a leading scholar in the field... The book is sure to become essential reading for both students and researchers interested in emotion" - Jason Hughes, University of Leicester "A masterful exposition of the links between emotions and social relations... Empirically rich and theoretically deep, this is a highly readable book. - Svend Brinkmann, University of Aalborg This book is a compelling and timely addition to the study of emotions, arguing that emotion is a response to the way in which people are embedded in patterns of relationship, both to others and to significant social and political events or situations. Going beyond the traditional discursive understanding of emotions, Burkitt investigates emotions as a complex and dynamic phenomenon that includes the whole self, body and mind, but which always occur in relation to others.

Provides a way of accounting for the relationship between language and a variety of social phenomena.

This volume addresses many of the questions surrounding Paul and his social relations, including how to define and analyze such relations, their relationship to Paul's historical and social context, how Paul related to numerous friends and foes, and the implications for understanding Paul's letters as well as his theology.

This collection reflects the French influence on literary and representational theory which has been predominant in recent years. It contains stimulating essays on the fiction of Perault, Borges, James, Eco and Tournier. These are complemented by theoretical essays on power and representation which provide powerful critiques of Barthes, Derrida, Deleuze and Marin, writers central to the contemporary debate. Finally, two perceptive essays reflect upon and attempt to redirect current theory, drawing on and confronting the writings of Michel Foucault.

Drawing on the great wealth of knowledge and experience of education practitioners and theorists, the volumes in the Sociology of Education set of the International library of Sociology explore the very important relationship between education and society. These books became standard texts for actual and intending teachers. Drawing upon comparative material from Israel, France and Germany, titles in this set also discuss the key questions of girls' and special needs education, and the psychology of education.

Social (psychological and sociological) systems present considerable difficulties for modellers due to their complexity, multidimensionality, uncertainty and irreducibility. The book proposes that response functions (MRF) be used as a method of constructing purposeful, credible and integrated social systems' models from data and prior knowledge or information. A semi-empirical, or "grey-box", MRF model may be regarded as a trade-off between a knowledge-based model and a "black-box" (empirical) model. It may embody all the existing knowledge on the process (or a part thereof) and, in addition, it relies on parameterised functions, whose parameters are determined from measurements. Observations contain hidden information on the processes under consideration and one of the main purposes of the proposed method is to "extract" and describe these hidden relationships. Parameterisation offers ways to couple qualitative with quantitative analysis. This combination makes it possible to take into account all the phenomena that are not modelled with the required accuracy through prior knowledge. Although only a simplified picture of the processes is modelled, a "grey box" system model provides some insight into the system processes. These processes are featured by chains of causality, highlighting stressors and variables responsive to stressors. The method of response functions is a nonlinear regression method that implies credible models in the sense that they are identifiable and, hopefully, explain system output behaviour satisfactorily. For case studies the authors have selected the problems usually studied by psychologists and sociologists with statistical procedures, such as investigation of variance and discriminant analysis based on the general linear model or one of its multivariate generalisations (structural equation models, etc.); disordered eating and obesity; subjective well-being and alexithymia. An accompanying CD-ROM contains the demonstration versions of three models that are discussed in the various chapters.The Method of Response Functions in Psychology and Sociology is aimed at Mathematical Psychologists; Mathematical Sociologists; Applied Psychologists; Sociologists and Social Practitioners. It will also be suitable for use on undergraduate as well as graduate and postgraduate courses specializing in these areas.

The Contributions to the Sociology of Language series features publications dealing with sociolinguistic theory, methods, findings and applications. It addresses the study of language in society in its broadest sense, as a truly international and interdisciplinary field in which various approaches - theoretical and empirical - supplement and complement each other. The series invites the attention of scholars interested in language in society from a broad range of disciplines - anthropology, education, history, linguistics, political science, and sociology. To discuss your book idea or submit a proposal, please contact Natalie Fecher.

The robotics industry is growing rapidly, and to a large extent the development of this market sector is due to the area of social robotics – the production of robots that are designed to enter the space of human social interaction, both physically and semantically. Since social robots present a new type of social agent, they have been aptly classified as a disruptive technology, i.e. the sort of technology which affects the core of our current social practices and might lead to profound cultural and social change. Due to its disruptive and innovative potential, social robotics raises not only questions about utility, ethics, and legal aspects, but calls for “robo-philosophy” – the comprehensive philosophical reflection from the perspectives of all philosophical disciplines. This book presents the proceedings of the first conference in this new area, “Robo-Philosophy 2014 – Sociable Robots and the Future of Social Relations, held in Aarhus, Denmark, in August 2014. The short papers and abstracts collected here address questions of social robotics from the perspectives of philosophy of mind, social ontology, ethics, meta-ethics, political philosophy, aesthetics, intercultural philosophy, and metaphilosophy. Social robotics is still in its early stages, but it is precisely now that we need to reflect its possible cultural repercussions. This book is accessible to a wide readership and will be of interest to everyone involved in the development and use of social robotics applications, from social roboticists to policy makers.