Andrew Abbott - Theorizing the Economics of Knowledge-for-Itself
Third Annual Theorodology Prize Lecture
Date: April 22, 2013
Time: 4:30 PM
Location: 300 Wallace Hall
The lecture will discuss evolution in the sites in which pure knowledge – knowledge produced without instrumental purpose -- has been produced, suggesting that the institutional primacy of universities, established in the early 20th century, may be coming to an end, and discussing the social forces that will determine where knowledge-for-itself will be produced in the future.
Andrew Abbott is the Gustavus F. and Ann M. Swift Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Sociology and the College at the University of Chicago. Abbott took his BA (in history and literature) at Harvard in 1970 and his PhD (in sociology) from the University of Chicago in 1982. Prior to his return to Chicago in 1991, he taught for thirteen years at Rutgers University. Known for his ecological theories of occupations, Abbott has also pioneered algorithmic analysis of social sequence data. He has written on the foundations of social science methodology and on the evolution of the social sciences and the academic system. He is the author of five books and seventy articles and chapters.