In nine pages this research paper provides a book review and analysis on the nature of American culture and society as represented by the author's postmodern perspective. Eleven sources are cited in the bibliography.
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the conflict (radical, sociopolitical) view of the professions and disciplines" (1998, p. xiv). Essentially, what Rossides offers is a perspective on society that offers fresh insight into the relationships between
powerful society forces, such as knowledge and power, and the way that society regards the institutions that are the harbingers of knowledge - the professions and the disciplines. Rossides
argues that the professions and disciplines in the US still possess a self-image and ideology that derives from the small-scale entrepreneurial economy of the nineteenth century (1998). However, Rossides posits
that various disciplines and professions are beginning to realize that they neither create nor apply knowledge according to the traditional paradigm. Rather, knowledge is generated on a "selective basis within
a dominant world view that contains a hierarchy of what constitutes knowledge and what is worth knowing" (1998, p. xv). With these premises in mind, Rossides begins the text
of his book with an examination of the sociology of knowledge. He differentiates the term "knowledge," from such words as information, data, etc., as referring "to knowing why things or
people behave as they do: the solar system, plants, the human body, a septic tank, consumers, voters, spouses...and so on" (Rossides, 1998, p. 2). Therefore, the sociology of knowledge
deals with knowledge about how knowledge itself develops. From this starting point, Rossides goes on to discuss a brief history of how the sociology of knowledge has developed over the
last seventy-five years, and how this perspective pertain to both primitive culture, and advanced horticultural and agrarian societies. To his credit, Rossides writes in a straight forward manner that
is practically jargon-free. He begins simply and then builds his way toward more complex concepts. However, he quickly arrives at a discussion of social power, the nature of knowledge