Interstitial Sociologies and Their Associations

Interstitial Sociologies and their Associations

Alongside (and sometimes interpenetrating with) mainstream sociological activity are special-focus sociologists whose work draws on sociology but whose activities and identities tend to be quite separate. Mainstream sociologists are seen as those teaching (researching) in mainstream sociology departments while those conducting sociology teaching or research outside this organisational setting may be trained as sociologists or explicitly drawing on sociological frameworks and methods. Their identities are partial and they often do not engage with mainstream sociologists or their associations in part because of exclusionary formal disciplinary boundary-setting and partly because they are more committed to other scholarly establishments. Such ‘other sociologists’ can be identified by data on social scientists more generally and their existence is pointed to by separate interstitial associations. The paper examines the apparenbt extent of the various fields of interstitial sociologists and presents information on their associations – which tend to be one of the more visible signs of their existence. Such associations have particularly arisen in the Global North but equal attention will be focused on those from the Global South.