Ira J. Cohen, Ph.D.
Associate Professor

Member of Graduate Faculty in Sociology, New Brunswick
Member of the Graduate Faculty in Liberal Studies, Newark

Office: 621 Hill Hall
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E-Mail: icohen@rci.rutgers.edu

Office Telephone: 973-353-5422
(I am accessible at my home number which is available upon request.)

Education

Ph.D. University of Wisconsin-Madison 1980

Research Interests

I am a social theorist with extensive commitments to research and education in classical and contemporary theory and social thought. My interests have developed in three phases: 1) Classical social thought was my earliest interest with special attention to the works of Max Weber. 2) I next focused on structuration theory, the sociological ontology originated by Anthony Giddens with whom I studied as a graduate student visitor to the University of Cambridge. I continue writing more broadly in the general area of theories of action and social praxis today. 3) Most recently I have shifted course yet again. I have compiled extensive research in the sociology of solitude, a topic that opens exciting new perspectives on fundamental themes in social theory. (See below) I also am involved as both General Editor and the editor of a volume in a publishing series entitled Modernity and Society (see below).

Current Research Projects

The Sociology of Solitary Action (in progress with Polity Press). This book introduces and develops an original model of solitary action, i.e. action generated by actors who are not (or only minimally) co-ordinated with other actors in the immediacy of time and space. In every culture actors engage in solitary actions each day. In modern Western cultures actors spend substantial amounts of time doing things by themselves each day. Yet solitary action is seldom even noticed in sociology, and until now it has remained theoretically unaddressed. Solitary actions vary in form just as much as social interactions. Representative examples range from intense creative pursuitsm, to self-reflection, to pragmatic problem soling, to light diversions (reading, music), to solitary manual labor, to rhythmic physical routines such jogging or bicycle riding. My model of solitary action reconstructs and synthesizes insights from theories of social action proposed by Erving Goffman, Harold Garfinkel, Anthoby Giddens, George Herbert Mead among others. Solitary actions are analyzed both on the level of high culture (where solitude is often highly prized) and everyday life (where people take many solitary actions for granted). Chapters from The Sociology of Solitary Action have been presented at leading universities and conferences.  The boo should appear in 2010-2011.
In addition to my own research I engage in a variety of editorial work.  Over the years I have served on the editorial boards of journals such as Sociology: The Hournal of the British Sociology Association and Theory, Culture and Society and both author and editor as a member of the Editorial Advisorry Board of The Cambridge Dictionary of Sociology.  I also have served as General Editor for the series Modernity and Society for Blackwell Publishers.

Ira J. Cohen, The Sociology of Solitary Action (in progress for Polity Press in U.K.)

See also  Ira J. Cohen “A Model of Solitary Action” paper presented at session on New Directions in the Sociology of Cululture, meetings of the American Sociological Association, Bioston Massachusetts August 2009.

Ira J. Cohen "Theories of Action and Praxis." In A Companion to Social Theory, Bryan S. Turner (ed.). Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 2000 pp. 73-111.

Ira J. Cohen and Mary F. Rogers, "Autonomy and Credibility: Voice as Method." Sociological Theory 1995 12:3: pp. 304-318.

Ira J. Cohen, Structuration Theory: Anthony Giddens and the Constitution of Social Life. London: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1989. Translated into Spanish: Teoría de la Estructuración; Anthony Giddens y la Constitución de la Vida Social. Translated by Ángel Carlos González Ruiz; Iztapalapa: Universidad Auónoma Metropoliatana 1996.

Ira J. Cohen "The Underemphasis on Democracy in Marx and Weber" in A Weber-Marx Dialogue, Robert J. Antonio and Ronald M. Glassman (eds.). Lawrence: University Press of Kansas 1985: pp. 274-299.

Ira J. Cohen "Max Weber on Modern Western Capitalism" Introductory Essay in: Max Weber, General Economic History. New Brunswick: Transactions Press.  Pp. XV=LXXXIII.