Sociality

The notion of 'sociality' is now widely used within the social sciences and humanities. However, what is meant by the term varies radically, and the contributors here, through compelling and wide ranging essays, identify the strengths and weaknesses of current definitions and their deployment in the social sciences.

“ This book reclaims sociality as a research domain for socio-cultural anthropology, as it clearly emphasises the processual and biosocial character of sociality instead of looking at it as a product of social relations or as a biological capacity. The ethnographic case studies provide fine examples of the ever-changing forms in which humans relate to each other, to animals and to the environment, and of how they infuse objects and actions with meaning, as well as anticipate the future and imagine possible worlds. ” ·  Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale

"An ambitious book that aims to put both the concept and changing empirical status of sociality at the center of the agenda of anthropology and the social sciences more broadly… The contributions are all at a high level . " ·  Webb Keane , University of Michigan

Nicholas J. Long is Assistant Professor in Anthropology at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He is the author of Being Malay in Indonesia (NUS/NIAS/University of Hawai’i Press, 2013) and the co-editor of Southeast Asian Perspectives on Power (Routledge, 2012) and The Social Life of Achievement (Berghahn Books, 2013).