Introduction

The most extreme formulation of the phenomenological approach in contemporary sociology is probably that of the 'ethnomethodo-logical school'. An early statement by Garfinkel serves as an introduction to the way in which some basic sociological concepts have been reformulated. Postulate reappears implicitly in the work of several contemporary phenomenological sociologists, and often seems to imply a descriptive anti-theoretical stance. The concern with the ambiguously defined 'problem of social order' has produced a complex body of theory in which some aspects of the phenomenology of Alfred Schutz, especially his depiction of the 'common-sense world' and, latterly, some aspects of contemporary analytic philosophy, have been infiltrated by some of the general assumptions and perspectives of 'mainstream' American sociology. The emphasis upon social life being, in a fundamental sense, constituted by 'common-sense knowledge' Schutz draws several conclusions about the character of concept-formation in sociology.