ABSTRACT
The “sociology of knowledge” is a branch of sociology which studies the relations between social conditions and intellectual productions, such as science, literature, and the products of the mass media of communication. While tracing its origins to certain German social philosophers of the nineteenth century, including Karl Marx, it took on an interactionist orientation in the twentieth century, particularly in the writings of Max Weber and Karl Mannheim. The “social conditions” that constitute the independent variable in the sociology of knowledge are found to be broader and more complex than those usually discussed in theoretical writings. Although the promise of the sociology of knowledge is great, there have been few researches systematic enough to merit the appellation of scientific study. Professor Powell here delineates the first steps in a study in the sociology of knowledge dealing with a highly specialized contemporary 361form of semi-popular literature — that produced by the so-called “beat generation” In this analysis, as in several previous chapters, the notion of degree of involvement in or commitment to a role becomes salient.
