Interpretivists Flashcards
Interpretivists
- More focus on Verstehen, ‘empathy’ (Weber) - want the reasons behind behaviour - Action Theory (micro).
- Based upon understanding the interpretations and meanings that people apply to actions.
- Lots of supposed founders including Boas, Kant and Dworkin.
Interpretivist Ideas
- Society is constructed of individuals with agency (free will).
- We should look at individual’s meanings that are applied to events (micro-sociology) as opposed to structural, one size fits all approaches.
- We should obtain qualitative data which is more subjective.
- Individuals are unique in their interpretations of events and therefore cannot be studied in traditional scientific ways.
Interpretivist Limits
-Difficult to replicate methods - losing reliability.
-Can be overly influenced by researcher’s interpretations of actions such as by using leading questions - losing objectivity (should Sociology be value-free?).
-Small-scale nature of methods limits how much findings can be generalized to society, particularly if Interpretivism focusses on minority groups.
-Can be seen as unscientific - for example by being difficult to falsify the conclusions of research (is Sociology a science?).
Interpretivists Strengths
- Higher Validity than Positivist methods, as they uncover meanings and motivations behind people’s actions - deeper than the ‘social facts’ of Positivists.
- Produces qualitative data which reveals hidden meanings (at the cost of practicality).
- Champions the ‘underdogs’ in societies, giving a voice to the unheard.
- Gains an insight into hard-to-reach groups.
Interpretivist Examples
-Willis- ‘Learning to Labour’ used Interpretivist methodology to investigate working-class boys’ experiences of school.
-Jock Young used Interpretivist methodology to research marijuana users in Notting Hill.
Fuller, Mac an Ghail, Archer and others used Interpretivist Methodology to research teacher and pupil interactions.
