The essay discusses the philosopher and sociologist Georg Simmel’s theorizing about the individual. Whereas it is typically within the context of the modern metropolis and the mature money economy that Simmel’s ideas have been discussed in the secondary literature, I render those ideas in another light by addressing the ontological and existential issues crucial to his conception of the individual. In Simmel, the individual is divided between the “what” and the “who,” between the qualities which make one something individual and (...) one’s non-repeatable and finite existence which makes one someone singular. I argue that whereas the first dimension can be understood sociologically, in terms of social relations, the latter is not accessible to sociology as such, but must be treated philosophically. Therefore, if we wish to address this duality that lies at the heart of individuality, a “philosophical turn” for sociology is called for. (shrink)

This review explores the present fashion for aesthetics in contemporary sociology. It evaluates the claims that society is undergoing a deep-seated process of aestheticization, and that sociology is experiencing an aestheticization of its epistemological concerns. The aestheticization literature is divided as follows: (1) the re-reading of classical sociological theory through the aesthetic dimension of modernity; (2) the claim that postmodern society involves an `aestheticization of everyday life'; and (3) those sociological theories which stress that contemporary society is more and more (...) like a work of art in its form. The argument is made that the discovery of aesthetics as a way of problematizing sociological reasoning is to some extent rediscovery, returning to various Kantian precepts: the disinterestedness characteristic of aesthetic experiences; the antinomy between the individual and the social aspects of taste; and the work of art as an organism predicated on an inner teleology. (shrink)

The challenges facing the life-worlds of political societies in the Islamic world require a radical shift of perspective that can improve our understanding of the contemporary situation of human rights politics. Not only the classical formulation of secularism, which aims at liberating the public sphere from domination of ‘the sacred’, but also the political-theological approach, which addresses the problems of modernity within the context of a disguised and refurbished dominance of ‘the transcendence’, suffer from and share a basic insufficiency in (...) handling human rights issues. According to these approaches, the basic issue stems from a realignment in relations between logics of the sovereign and the sacred or a redefinition of the position of state against religion. In this article, my object is shifting the scope of discussion concerning the rights beyond this logic of sovereignty by adopting an approach which provides a political ground for discussing the intermingling of religion in the life-world. From my point of view, the first step that should be taken to deepen our understanding of the argument of freedom is to unveil the nature of the sacred within the framework of a power network that longs for control over the whole lives of individuals constituting the society. In this regard, by going beyond the concepts such as fanaticism, fundamentalism or terrorism provided by ‘state mentality’, the significance of lifestyle politics for ‘rights talk’ will become more evident. From this point of view, the detection and critique of a zone of ‘weak citizenship’ constructed through restrictions stemming from the values and norms arising from the perceptions of particular communities organized through family, tradition and justice are essential. Such a critique will pave the way for a radical politicization of lifestyles by way of criteria of the demands for equal respect and dignity. (shrink)