The Simmel's Sociological Analysis through the Methodological Construction of Social Types

The present work seeks to highlight the sociological reflection of Georg Simmel with regard to the construction of social types. Simmel promoted a reflection from a context of social transformation in which the advance of modernity modified the social landscape that the author was inserted. The emerging sociology in this context was confronted with this reality change, in that sense, the sociological reflection of Simmel inserts as an alternative way to the understanding of the social. Echoes of this sociological analysis methodology can be seen in large part from the first generation of the well-known Chicago School of Sociology.

The analysis of social types, for example, the stranger and the poor, are ways in which Simmel deals methodologically with the attempt to interpret society. In this sense, the present work reflects on this methodological alternative, especially for its innovative character in the sociological theory of its time. I emphasize the importance of the methodological construction of these social types, especially in their connection with the idea of social totality. An expression of the connection between social types and social totality can be seen in Simmel's Money Philosophy.

Finally, this paper proposes, from the analysis of the construction of social types mentioned by Simmel, the approach with the philosopher Walter Benjamin. Benjamin inherits from the sociology of Simmel the methodological perspective of analysis of society, especially with respect to the social construction of type that connects to a more comprehensive social organization. Thus, one of Benjamin's essays that mark this influence among the authors is Das Passagen-Werk, in which Benjamin analyzes the transformations of the city of Paris through these emerging social types in modernity.