Epistemological Approach to Social Imaginaries, as an Analytical Category within Social Science

Abstract

This article is designed to put forward an epistemological reflection on imaginaries, as an analytical category in social science, through which the multiple meanings that subjects make up in their interaction, around different aspects of their social life, such as citizenship and religiosity. Likewise, the reflections put forward herein are part of the research process conducted in the ongoing doctoral dissertation entitled “Imaginary Meanings around Citizenship and Religiosity, in a Group of Young University Students from Pereira.” As part of the epistemic and theoretical foundation of this category, a broad review of its use in social science has been conducted, especially as per the social theory of Castoriadis and other related authors, whose common line of reflection aims to account for private-life senses. Accordingly, theoretical reviews and related research were carried out, which shown that this category, permeated by culture, becomes a powerful analytical resource that enables a comprehension of the meanings created by social interaction while revealing the way in which such meanings work, thereby providing support to social practices related to the plots built between citizenship and religiosity. In short, imaginaries are a hinge category that makes it possible to identify the relationship between the actor and the world and, based on this, the construction of their realities.