While social scientists and historians have been exchanging ideas for a long time, they have never developed a proper dialogue about social theory. William H. Sewell Jr. observes that on questions of theory the communication has been mostly one way: from social science to history. Logics of History argues that both history and the social sciences have something crucial to offer each other. While historians do not think of themeselves as theorists, they know something social scientists do not: how to think about the temporalities of social life. On the other hand, while social scientists' treatments of temporality are usually clumsy, their theoretical sophistication and penchant for structural accounts of social life could offer much to historians. Renowned for his work at the crossroads of history, sociology, political science, and anthropology, Sewell argues that only by combining a more sophisticated understanding of historical time with a concern for larger theoretical questions can a satisfying social theory emerge. In Logics of History, he reveals the shape such an engagement could take, some of the topics it could illuminate, and how it might affect both sides of the disciplinary divide.

作者:(美)小威廉·H.休厄尔(William H. Sewell)

小威廉·H.休厄尔：芝加哥大学政治学与历史学弗兰克·P.希克森（Frank P.Hixon）杰出贡献教授，著有《法国的工作与革命》（Work and Revolution in France）和《布尔乔亚革命的修辞》（A Rhetoric of Bourgeois Revolution）等作品。