Digital media are normal. But this was not always true. For a long time, lay discourse, academic exhortations, pop culture narratives, and advocacy groups constructed new Information and communications technologies (ICTs) as exceptional. Whether they were believed to be revolutionary, dangerous, rife with opportunity, or other-worldly, these tools and technologies were framed as extraordinary. But digital media are now mundane, thoroughly embedded - and often unquestioned - in everyday life. Digital ICTs are enmeshed in health and wellness, work and organizations, elections, capital flows, intimate relationships, social movements, and even our own identities. And although the study of these technologies has always been interdisciplinary - at the crossroads of computer science, cultural studies, science and technology studies, and communications - never has a sociological perspective been more valuable. Sociology has always excelled at helping us re-see the normal. The Oxford Handbook of Digital Media Sociology is a perfect point of entry for those curious about the state of sociological research on digital media. Each chapter reviews the sociological research that has been done thus far and points towards unanswered questions. The 34 chapters in the Handbook are arranged in six sections which look at digital media as they relate to: theory, social institutions, everyday life, community and identity, social inequalities, and politics & power. More than ever, the contributors to this volume help make it a centralizing resource, pulling together the various strands of sociological research focused on digital media. In addition to providing a distinctly sociological center for those scholars looking to find their way in the subfield, the volume offers top sociological research that provides an overview of digital media to explain our quickly changing world to a broader public. Readers will find it accessible enough for use in class, and thorough enough for seasoned professionals interested in a concise update in their areas of interest.

The rapid pace of technological change over the last decade, particularly the rise of social media, has deeply affected the ways in which we interact as individuals, in groups, and among institutions to the point that it is difficult to grasp what it would be like to lose access to this everyday aspect of modern life. The Oxford Handbook of Social Media and Music Learning investigates the ways in which social media is now firmly engrained in all aspects of music education, providing fascinating insights into the ways in which social media, musical participation, and musical learning are increasingly entwined. In five sections of newly commissioned chapters, a refreshing mix of junior and senior scholars tackle questions concerning the potential for formal and informal musical learning in a networked society. Beginning with an overview of community identity and the new musical self through social media, scholars explore intersections between digital, musical, and social constructs including the vernacular of born-digital performance, musical identity and projection, and the expanding definition of musical empowerment. The fifth section brings this handbook to full practical fruition, featuring firsthand accounts of digital musicians, students, and teachers in the field. The Oxford Handbook of Social Media and Music Learning opens up an international discussion of what it means to be a musical community member in an age of technologically mediated relationships that break down the limits of geographical, cultural, political, and economic place.

While some social scientists may argue that we have always been networked, the increased visibility of networks today across economic, political, and social domains can hardly be disputed. Social networks fundamentally shape our lives and social network analysis has become a vibrant, interdisciplinary field of research. In The Oxford Handbook of Social Networks, Ryan Light and James Moody have gathered forty leading scholars in sociology, archaeology, economics, statistics, and information science, among others, to provide an overview of the theory, methods, and contributions in the field of social networks. Each of the thirty-three chapters in this Handbook moves through the basics of social network analysis aimed at those seeking an introduction to advanced and novel approaches to modeling social networks statistically. They cover both a succinct background to, and future directions for, distinctive approaches to analyzing social networks. The first section of the volume consists of theoretical and methodological approaches to social networks, such as visualization and network analysis, statistical approaches to networks, and network dynamics. Chapters in the second section outline how network perspectives have contributed substantively across numerous fields, including public health, political analysis, and organizational studies. Despite the rapid spread of interest in social network analysis, few volumes capture the state-of-the-art theory, methods, and substantive contributions featured in this volume. This Handbook therefore offers a valuable resource for graduate students and faculty new to networks looking to learn new approaches, scholars interested in an overview of the field, and network analysts looking to expand their skills or substantive areas of research.

This title examines how contemporary currents in sociology and social theory have influenced the field of organisation studies. It aims to combat the tendency towards myopia in the organisation studies field, which encourages reliance on resources and references drawn from within the field and discourages scholars from going beyond these boundaries to find inspiration and ideas. The contributing authors show how sociologists and sociological concepts from the US and Europe have provided new insights into the functioning of organisations.

Required reading for anyone interested in the profound relationship between digital technology and society Digital technology has become an undeniable facet of our social lives, defining our governments, communities, and personal identities. Yet with these technologies in ongoing evolution, it is difficult to gauge the full extent of their societal impact, leaving researchers and policy makers with the challenge of staying up-to-date on a field that is constantly in flux. The Oxford Handbook of Digital Technology and Society provides students, researchers, and practitioners across the technology and social science sectors with a comprehensive overview of the foundations for understanding the various relationships between digital technology and society. Combining robust computer-aided reviews of current literature from the UK Economic and Social Research Council's commissioned project "Ways of Being in a Digital Age" with newly commissioned chapters, this handbook illustrates the upcoming research questions and challenges facing the social sciences as they address the societal impacts of digital media and technologies across seven broad categories: citizenship and politics, communities and identities, communication and relationships, health and well-being, economy and sustainability, data and representation, and governance and security. Individual chapters feature important practical and ethical explorations into topics such as technology and the aging, digital literacies, work-home boundary, machines in the workforce, digital censorship and surveillance, big data governance and regulation, and technology in the public sector. The Oxford Handbook of Digital Technology and Society will equip readers with the necessary starting points and provocations in the field so that scholars and policy makers can effectively assess future research, practice, and policy.

With engaging new contributions from the major figures in the fields of the media and public opinion The Oxford Handbook of American Public Opinion and the Media is a key point of reference for anyone working in American politics today.

Analytical sociology is a strategy for understanding the social world. It is concerned with explaining important social facts such as network structures, patterns of residential segregation, typical beliefs, cultural tastes, and common ways of acting. It explains such facts by detailing in clear and precise ways the mechanisms through which the social facts were brought about. Making sense of the relationship between micro and macro thus is one of the central concerns of analytical sociology. The approach is a contemporary incarnation of Robert K. Merton's notion of middle-range theory and presents a vision of sociological theory as a tool-box of semi-general theories each of which is adequate for explaining certain types of phenomena. The Handbook brings together some of the most prominent sociologists in the world. Some of the chapters focus on action and interaction as the cogs and wheels of social processes, while others consider the dynamic social processes that these actions and interactions bring about.