If the notion of boundaries has become one of our most fertile thinking tools,
it is in part because it captures a fundamental social process, that of relationality
(Somers 1994, Emirbayer 1997). This notion points to fundamental relational
processes at work across a wide range of social phenomena, institutions, and locations.
Our discussion focuses on the following substantive areas, moving from
micro to macro levels of analysis: (a) social and collective identity; (b) class, ethnic/
racial and gender/sexual inequality; (c) professions, science and knowledge;
and (d ) communities, national identities, and spatial boundaries. Together, these
topics encompass a sizable portion of the boundary-related research conducted in
anthropology, history, political science, social psychology, and sociology. Because
we are covering a vast intellectual terrain, our goal is not to provide an exhaustive
overview but to inform the reader about various trends across a range of fields.
Due to space limitations, we focus on how boundaries work in social relations, and
we do not discuss important developments in the growing literature on cognition
and on spatial, visual, and temporal cognitive distinctions in particular, since these
have been discussed recently in Howard (1995), DiMaggio (1997), and Zerubavel
(1997). Also, given our multi-disciplinary focus, we cover only part of the important
sociological literature on changes in boundaries—this topic receives attention
elsewhere (e.g., Tilly 2001).
If the notion of boundaries has become one of our most fertile thinking tools,
it is in part because it captures a fundamental social process, that of relationality
(Somers 1994, Emirbayer 1997). This notion points to fundamental relational
processes at work across a wide range of social phenomena, institutions, and locations.
Our discussion focuses on the following substantive areas, moving from
micro to macro levels of analysis: (a) social and collective identity; (b) class, ethnic/
racial and gender/sexual inequality; (c) professions, science and knowledge;
and (d ) communities, national identities, and spatial boundaries. Together, these
topics encompass a sizable portion of the boundary-related research conducted in
anthropology, history, political science, social psychology, and sociology. Because
we are covering a vast intellectual terrain, our goal is not to provide an exhaustive
overview but to inform the reader about various trends across a range of fields.
Due to space limitations, we focus on how boundaries work in social relations, and
we do not discuss important developments in the growing literature on cognition
and on spatial, visual, and temporal cognitive distinctions in particular, since these
have been discussed recently in Howard (1995), DiMaggio (1997), and Zerubavel
(1997). Also, given our multi-disciplinary focus, we cover only part of the important
sociological literature on changes in boundaries—this topic receives attention
elsewhere (e.g., Tilly 2001).
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