Cultural Studies and the Sociology of Culture

Abstract

This article stresses the advantages that will ensue if sociologists enter into the interdisciplinary dialogue that constitutes the ever-changing field of cultural studies. The success and proliferation of cultural studies in the U.S., in academic programs and in publishing, has provided new opportunities for such cross-departmental moves. Cultural studies at its best is sociological. In the continuing cross-disciplinary dialogue that has characterized cultural studies in the decade or so of its progress in the U.S., the discipline of sociology has been notably absent. At the same time, within sociology, the study of culture has expanded in the last 20 years among sociologists of culture, and among those who have more recently been calling themselves "cultural sociologists. Some of these sociologists have themselves adopted the term cultural studies to describe their work. Some of the work in this area has begun to bridge the hitherto radical divide between sociology and cultural studies. Sociologists can contribute to the project of cultural analysis by focusing on institutions and social relations, as well as on the broader perspective of structured axes of social differentiation and their historical transformations. For example, the focus on the ideology and practices of the museum has been prominent in some important work in recent years in what is usually called museology or museum studies. The sociological perspective is invaluable in directing attention to certain critical aspects in the production of culture.