Sociology of Time
Time sociology (also sociology of time ) is a discipline of sociology that deals with the social aspect of time . One speaks here of social time .
Different societies differ greatly in how they handle time. Social time is primarily linked to work rhythms. The individual perception of time (subjective time), on the other hand, is the research area of cognitive psychology , but these two aspects are closely interlinked.
History of the Sociology of Time
The sociology of time was founded with the text Social Time in 1937 by Pitirim Sorokin and Robert K. Merton , who followed up Henri Bergson and Émile Durkheim . They pointed out the interpersonal aspect of time perception and use. In his book “ About Time ”, Norbert Elias describes the development of time consciousness in the context of his civilization theory, which he first presented in his work About the Process of Civilization (1939).
Social history
The week is to be understood as the first time unit created by man , which is not based on rhythms given by nature (in contrast to the astronomical time concepts of day , month and year ).
Time and its social perception only became necessary with the coordination of larger networks ( division of labor ). Hunting and gathering cultures usually do not know an abstract concept of time, despite storage (e.g. of fuel), but temporal organization and coordination, for example when hunting large prey. In agriculture and animal husbandry, the term has been necessary since the advent of markets and can also be determined empirically. Today almost all industrial societies have taken on the measurement of time in seconds , minutes and hours , while the year counting systems ( calendar calculation ) still have different bases, and the term day also includes different concepts of beginning and end.
Time in societies based on the division of labor today
The existence of a social concept of time is directly related to the phenomenon of planning , i.e. the mental anticipation of a future action. If you don't have to plan, you don't need a concept of time. One also speaks of the social unit time in contrast to the natural proper time ( time budget research ). It should be noted that the idea of a linear course of time is a prerequisite for the idea of progress , and a division into “ modern ” and “premodern” societies only makes sense in connection with a linear understanding of time.
Within a modern society, different subjective time rhythms can arise as daily routines for individual groups (e.g. bakers, students, unemployed people). Due to increasing mechanization, a decoupling from the naturally given time has become stronger and stronger (night life, night owl ). Joint work , coordination and organization are not possible without taking the time aspect into account. The importance of the synchronization of processes in which several actors are involved increases the more differentiated a society is.
In western societies, time is predominantly viewed as a resource that should be managed ( time management ) and used (“time is money”, “wasting time”). It's about doing as much as possible in as little time as possible. This creates a kind of "acceleration of life". Time pressure and time constraints arise from the need to coordinate in a society. See also: acceleration. The change in time structures in modern times
The time is different to previous and other companies as compensation in stark contrast to the work seen. That is the area of interest of the sociology of leisure .
With the growing penetration of mobile telephony , the importance of the synchronized time as a framework for time planning and organization begins to decline in the 21st century, especially in the leisure sector, as mobile telephones make it possible to meet ad hoc or to postpone appointments.
See also
literature
- Günter Dux : The time in history. Your logic of development from myth to world time . Frankfurt am Main 1989.
- Norbert Elias : About the time Frankfurt / Main 1984
- Anthony Giddens : The Constitution of Society. Fundamentals of a theory of structuring [from d. Engl.] Frankfurt / Main, New York 1988, chapter 3.
- Alois Hahn : Sociological Aspects of Scarcity . In: Heinemann, Klaus (ed.): Sociology of economic action . Opladen 1987, pp. 119-132.
- Hermann Lübbe : Is time shrinking? The dynamics of civilization and the morality of dealing with time: Shortened stay in the present In: Weis, Kurt (Hrsg.): Was ist Zeit? . Munich 1995, pp. 53-80.
- Armin Nassehi : The time of society . 2nd Edition. VS, Wiesbaden 2008, ISBN 978-3-531-15855-6 (new edition with an article "Gegenwarten").
- Matthias Meitzler : Sociology of Transience. Time, aging, death and remembering in a social context . Publishing house Dr. Kovac, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-8300-5455-9 .
- Helga Nowotny : proper time. Creation and structuring of a sense of time . Frankfurt am Main 1989, Chapter 1 "The illusion of simultaneity".
- Hartmut Rosa : Acceleration. The change in time structures in modern times . Frankfurt am Main 2005. (Suhrkamp pocket book science; 1760)
- Jürgen P. Rinderspacher: Society without time. Individual use of time and social organization of work . Frankfurt 1985, New York, pp. 12-54.
- John P. Robinson, Geoffrey Godbey: Time for life. The surprising ways the Americans use their time . Philadelphia 1999.
- Alfred Schütz , Thomas Luckmann : Structures of the lifeworld . Neuwied 1975, Darmstadt, pp. 73-87.
- Pitirim Sorokin, Robert K. Merton : Social Time: A Methodological and Functional Analysis In: American Journal of Sociology 42, pp. 615-629. 1937, (available as pdf; 1.5 MB) ( Memento from May 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ↑ Critical: Paul Reinbacher (2009): Time management is not a private matter! Dealing with time is (also) a question of culture in organizations. In: Group dynamics and organizational advice 40 (4), pp. 393–406 ( doi : 10.1007 / s11612-009-0092-9 ).
- ^ Eva Thulin and Bertil Vilhelmson (2007): Mobiles everywhere: Youth, the mobile phone, and changes in everyday practice. In: Young 2007; 15; 235 ( doi : 10.1177 / 110330880701500302 ).