Four Galore? The Overlap between Mary Douglas’s Grid-Group Typology and Other Highly Cited Social Science Classifications

Verweij, Marco; Alexandrova, Petya; Jacobsen, Henrik; Béziat, Pauline; Branduse, Diana; Dege, Yonca; Hensing, Jakob; Hollway, James; Kliem, Lea; Ponce, Gabriela; Reichelt, Inga; Wiegmann, Mareile

doi:10.1177/0735275120946085

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Four Galore? The Overlap between Mary Douglas’s Grid-Group Typology and Other Highly Cited Social Science Classifications

Verweij, Marco Jacobs University, Bremen, Germany
Alexandrova, Petya European Asylum Support Office, Grand Harbour Valletta, Malta
Jacobsen, Henrik University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Béziat, Pauline ETH Zurich, Zurich, ZH, Switzerland
Branduse, Diana Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands
Dege, Yonca School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, London, UK
Hensing, Jakob University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Hollway, James Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland
Kliem, Lea Institute for Ecological Economy Research, Berlin, Germany
Ponce, Gabriela ETH Zurich, Zurich, ZH, Switzerland
Reichelt, Inga University of Leeds, Leeds, West Yorkshire, UK
Wiegmann, Mareile Vrije Universiteit, Brussels, Belgium

2020-9-9

Published in:

Sociological Theory. - SAGE Publications. - 2020, vol. 38, no. 3, p. 263-294

Sociology and Political Science

English Recently, neuroscientists have argued that elementary ways of organizing, perceiving, and justifying social relations lurk behind the diversity of social life. In developing grid-group typology, anthropologist Mary Douglas proposed such universal forms. If these are universal, then we could expect other widely cited classifications to overlap with grid-group typology. We tested this expectation by examining to which extent the elements of Douglas’s typology overlap with those of 39 highly influential classifications proposed since 1970. We established overlap by calculating the interrater agreement among 11 coders. Fair to good interrater agreement, despite a complex coding exercise and minimal training, suggests that such overlap exists. Nevertheless, limits to our research design call for further studies. These findings should contribute to a rekindling of the question whether universal forms of organizing and perceiving social relations exist and to a further consideration of whether Douglas has managed to uncover these.

Language

English

Open access status

closed

Identifiers

DOI 10.1177/0735275120946085
ISSN 0735-2751

Persistent URL

https://folia.unifr.ch/global/documents/107955

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