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http://hdl.handle.net/11375/14120
Title: | CHARACTER AS A SOCIOLOGICAL PHENOMENON: AN INTERACTIONIST ANALYSIS OF SEMINARY LIFE |
Authors: | McLuhan, Arthur |
Advisor: | Shaffir, William Pawluch, Dorothy Miall, Charlene |
Department: | Sociology |
Keywords: | Character;ethnography;symbolic interaction;seminary;Sociology;Sociology |
Publication Date: | Apr-2014 |
Abstract: | <p>In the social sciences, the dominant approach to the study of character—people’s</p> <p>essential interactional dispositions, especially of a moral and durable nature—has been to</p> <p>treat it as a set of objective dispositions lodged within the individual. This dissertation</p> <p>challenges the objectivist orthodoxy in the study of character by examining it from a</p> <p>symbolic interactionist perspective (Mead 1934; Blumer 1969; Strauss 1993). Drawing on</p> <p>14 months of ethnographic research in two Protestant Christian seminaries as an</p> <p>empirical case, I find that character is ultimately a matter of audience definition, a selfother</p> <p>dispositional designation achieved in social interaction. Three empirical papers</p> <p>examine specific aspects of the character-making process. The first paper considers</p> <p>character as a contingency influencing people’s trajectories of involvement in group life.</p> <p>The second paper examines how ministry students define and experience character</p> <p>formation in the seminary. The third paper analyzes how character problems are</p> <p>identified and responded to in the seminary.</p> |
URI: | http://hdl.handle.net/11375/14120 |
Identifier: | opendissertations/8949 10029 5531779 |
Appears in Collections: | Open Access Dissertations and Theses |
Files in This Item:
File | Size | Format | |
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fulltext.pdf | 1.08 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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