Tarde vs Durkheim: The Debate

Bruno Latour playing Gabriel Tarde, 14 March 2008, Cambridge.

English translation of this interjection:

"There follows, according to [you], that it is not permissible to describe as social those individual acts where the social fact manifests itself, for example, the words of an orator (a manifestation of language), or the genuflections of a devotee (a manifestation of religion).

No, as each of these acts depends not only on the nature of the social fact, but furthermore on the mental and vital constitution of the agent and the physical environment, these acts are types of hybrids, socio-psychical or socio-physical facts, with which it is important no longer to tarnish the scientific purity of the new sociology."

Category:

Education

Tags:

• social
• science
• tarde
• durkheim
• latour