The specification of temporal origins for biography and autobiography — typically within the Enlightenment or modernism — that appear in sociological discussion are interrogated through discussing two parallel sites of origin. The first is Merton's discussion of `sociological autobiography', the second the feminist concern with reflexivity within sociological research processes. Both are related to the notion of `auto/biography'. `Auto/biography' disrupts conventional taxonomies of life writing, disputing its divisions of self/other, public/private, and immediacy/memory. Relatedly, `the auto/biographical I' signals the active inquiring presence of sociologists in constructing, rather than discovering, knowledge.
Responding to John Scott's (2005) ‘Sociology and its others’, the idea of hybridic sociologies is developed, Mills’ ideas about ‘the sociological imagination’ are discussed, Scott's proposal for a core curriculum countered with some suggestions for extended in-depth disciplinary debate about an intellectually expansionist programme for UK sociology, and responses to these suggestions as well as to the broad argument are welcomed.
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