The Study of China in Universities: A Comparative Case Study of A ...

In other words, literature in this branch of the sociology of education primarily analyzes social knowledge about society in classroom teaching and the public discourse regarding schooling, and identifies its social determinants and ideological characters (Kolbe, Sunker, & Timmermann, 1997). This is different to my concern, which focuses on the sociological development of knowledge construction and its development in universities. One area of literature, which is closer to the area of research covered in this study, is the sociology of scientific knowledge. This group of literature provides many insights into academic cultures and social elements in the construction of knowledge. The problem is that the general focus of the literature in this discipline mainly documents the social processes through which specialized knowledge is produced (Delamont, Atkinson, & Parry, 2000). In other words, this field refers to science only as encompassing natural science. The focus of this body of works is mainly concerned with the natural sciences with social networks, research teams and laboratory settings being the main features. Whereas this study is concerned with the intellectual social organizations of humanities and social sciences disciplines, the social setting of a scientific laboratory is not applicable for social scientists. On the other hand, in contrast to the aforementioned fields, Karl Mannheim’s theories on the sociology of knowledge can provide a theoretical reference for the area of research covered in this study. To illustrate how Mannheim’s thinking and the development of his ideas in the sociology of knowledge are relevant to this research, I shall first introduce Mannheim’s sociology of knowledge.

2.1.1. Mannheim’s Sociology of Knowledge

During the 1920s, Mannheim, the Hungarian-born philosopher/sociologist, grouped together intellectual activities that he had reflected on as “cultural sociology.” In a series of essays, he discussed how culture comes about and the movement and the process that become an organizing principle of spiritual life (Kettler, Meja, & Stehr, 1982). He saw that “nothing remains identical to itself, eternally fixed and that everything is subject to constant change—as is the case with political forms, art, religion, science…” (Kettler et al., p. 46).