Table of Contents

Introduction
1. Material Research Objects and Privileged Material Research Objects
2. How Material Research Objects Are Selected
3. Model Cases and the Dream of Collective Methods
4. How Subfield Categories Shape Knowledge
5. The Schemas of Social Theory
6. The Model Cases of Global Knowledge
Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index
 

About the Author

Monika Krause is associate professor of sociology at the London School of Economics. She is the author of The Good Project: Humanitarian Relief NGOsandthe Fragmentation of Reason and coeditor of Social Theory Now, both also published by the University of Chicago Press.

 

Reviews

“Krause has written a powerful, illuminating argument about how the social sciences should work. It is a worthy successor to Max Weber's Science as a Vocation.”
*Richard Sennett, Urban Initiatives, United Nations Habitat*

“Model Cases is an ambitious and compelling contribution to our understanding of the practice of scholarship, whose inner logic Krause perceptively dissects across different disciplines and methodologies. Her account of how scholars relate to the objects they study offers foundational insights into how we argue and perform research within the humanities."
*Carlos Spoerhase, professor of German literature, Bielefeld University*

"If the book didn’t already have a subtitle, On Canonical Research Objects and Sites, Monika Krause could have titled it Model Cases: On the Metaphysics of the Syllabus. Her fascinating book is an examination–even a deconstructive analysis–of the two- or three-page document traditionally handed out in the first class on a university program but now usually posted on class management systems like Blackboard."
*University World News*

"What do we as scholars look at when we do research? That is the simple but effective question that underlies Monika Krause’s highly instructive new book, Model Cases... It is a book that makes us think about the collective research patterns that we are a part of."
*LSE Review of Books*

"Model Cases would be excellent for a graduate seminar on the philosophy, theory, or methodology of a number of social science disciplines."
*Choice*