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Tradition
Explores the history, significance, and future of tradition as a whole. This book reveals the importance of tradition to social and political institutions, technology, science, literature, religion, and scholarship.
The Constitution of Society
Edward Shils's attempt to work out a macrosociological theory which does justice both to the spiritual and intellectual dispositions and powers of the mind and to the reality of the larger society is an enterprise that has spanned several decades. In his steps toward the development of this theory he has not proceeded deductively; rather he has worked from his own concrete observations of Western, Asian, and African societies. Thus, despite the inevitable abstractness of marcrosociological theory, the papers in this volume—which have been published separately since the Second World War—have a quality of vivid substantiality that makes the theoretical statements they present easier to com...
The Order of Learning
The Order of Learning considers the problems facing higher education by focusing on main underlying factors: the relationship of higher education to government, academic freedom, and the responsibilities of the academic profession, among others. Edward Shils argues that higher education has a central role in society, and that distractions, such as pressures from government, disinterest of students and faculty in education, and involvement of institutions of higher learning in social questions, have damaged higher education by deflecting it from its commitment to teaching, learning, and research. Shils believes that the modern university must be steadfast in its commitment to the pursuit of t...
The calling of social thought
Edward Shils was a central figure in twentieth century social thought. He held appointments both at Chicago and Cambridge and was a crucial link between British and American intellectual life. This volume collects essays by distinguished contributors which deal with the major facets of Shils’ thought, including his relations with Michael Polanyi, his parallels with Michael Oakeshott, his defense of the traditional university, his fundamental philosophical anthropology, and his important work on such topics as tradition, civility, and the nation. As an introduction to this complex and original thinker, it will be of interest to scholars and students in a number of fields, including sociology and social theory, but also to anyone interested in the intellectual life as it was lived in the mid-twentieth century, in the face of the Cold War and ideological struggle.
Portraits
In these vivid portraits of prominent twentieth-century intellectuals, Edward Shils couples the sensitivity of a biographer with the profound knowledge of a highly respected scholar. Ranging as widely across various disciplines as Shils himself did, the essays gathered here share a distaste for faddists who "run with the intellectual mob" and a deep respect for intellectuals who maintain their integrity under great pressure. Highlights include an affectionate treatment of Leo Szilard, the physicist whose involvement with the development of the atomic bomb led him to work ceaselessly to address its social consequences; a discussion of the educational philosophy of Robert Maynard Hutchins, the...
The Torment of Secrecy
Edward Shils's The Torment of Secrecy is one of the few minor classics to emerge from the cold war years of anticommunism and McCarthyism in the United States. Mr. Shils's "torment" is not only that of the individual caught up in loyalty and security procedures; it is also the torment of the accuser and judge. This essay in sociological analysis and political philosophy considers the cold war preoccupation with espionage, sabotage, and subversion at home, assessing the magnitude of such threats and contrasting it to the agitation—by lawmakers, investigators, and administrators—so wildly directed against the "enemy." Mr. Shils's examination of a recurring American characteristic is as timely as ever. "Brief...lucid... brilliant."—American Political Science Review. "A fine, sophisticated analysis of American social metabolism."—New Republic. "An excitingly lucid and intelligent work on a subject of staggering importance...the social preconditions of political democracy."—Social Forces.
The Selected Papers of Edward Shils, Volume 3
This third volume of the Selected Papers of Edward Shils brings together ten essays, three of which have never been published before and all the others of which have been completely revised and elaborated. They deal with the history of American and European sociology as an intellectual undertaking and as a means to the attainment of practical ends. Professor Shils's main themes are the influence of ethical and practical intentions on scholarly study in the social sciences, the autonomy of the intellectual tradition of sociology, and the significance of the institutional organization of sociological teaching and research.
