Writing in the Social Sciences: beginning readings

An excellent introduction to writing in the social sciences is available through JSTOR. I think it would be a good place to begin.
“On Scientific Writing”
William F. Ogburn
The American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 52, No. 5 (Mar., 1947), pp. 383-388

I hate to admit that we are far behind the times in this presentation, but I found a journal article from 1977 which discusses the creation of the course I will be teaching next semester.

“Writing for the Social Sciences”
Eleanor M. Hoffman
College Composition and Communication, Vol. 28, No. 2 (May, 1977), pp. 195-197

“The Hierarchy of the Sciences?” by Stephen Cole in The American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 89, No. 1 (Jul., 1983), pp. 111ff argues that there is no difference between the natural (hard) sciences and the social (soft) sciences in terms of cognitive consensus or the rate at which new ideas are incorporated.

This might be an interesting way to address the feelings that social sciences isn’t as strong/hard/core as natural sciences.

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