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Return to Meaning: A Social Science with Something to Say

Amazon.com Price:  $24.59 (as of 12/05/2019 20:02 PST- Details)

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Description

This book argues that we are currently witnessing not merely a decline in the quality of social science research, but the proliferation of meaningless research, of no value to society, and modest value to its authors – aside from securing employment and promotion.

The explosion of published outputs, no less than in social science, creates a noisy, cluttered environment which makes meaningful research difficult, as different voices compete to capture the limelight even briefly. Older, more significant contributions are easily neglected, as the premium is to write and publish, not read and learn. The result is a widespread cynicism among academics on the value of academic research, on occasion including their own. Publishing comes to be seen as a game of hits and misses, devoid of intrinsic meaning and value, and of no wider social uses whatsoever. Academics do research with the intention to get published, to not say something socially meaningful. That is what we view as the upward push of nonsense in academic research, which represents a serious social problem. It undermines the very point of social science.

This problem is far from ‘academic’. It affects many areas of social and political life entailing extensive waste of resources and inflated student fees in addition to costs to tax-payers. Part two of the book offers a range of proposals aimed at restoring meaning on the heart of social research and drawing social science back address the major problems and issues that face our societies.

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