{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,4]],"date-time":"2026-05-04T13:09:25Z","timestamp":1777900165177,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":63,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"6","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2016,7,11]],"date-time":"2016-07-11T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1468195200000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/page\/policies\/text-and-data-mining-license"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["journals.sagepub.com"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Sociology"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2016,12]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>This article offers an outline of a pragmatic sociology of the book. Whilst ubiquitous, books have received relatively little attention from sociologists. I propose to remedy this situation by drawing upon the ideas of GH Mead, namely his neo-Hegelian theory of the subject\u2013object relationship. Mead\u2019s chief insight is that objects such as books are first social and only then physical entities. They have agency not because of their thing-ness, so to speak, but because of their sociality. After reviewing the existing literature on the book, I discuss Mead\u2019s most relevant contributions. In the proposal for a pragmatic sociology of the book that follows, I combine pragmatism\u2019s focus upon the materiality of meaning-production with genealogy\u2019s concern with power and violence. I conclude with an illustration of the approach: the simultaneous decanonization of Tocqueville\u2019s Democracy in America among sociologists today and its canonization in political science.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1177\/0038038515587650","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2015,6,25]],"date-time":"2015-06-25T23:25:57Z","timestamp":1435274757000},"page":"1185-1200","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1177\/sage-journals-update-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":2,"title":["Following the Book: Towards a Pragmatic Sociology of the Book"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"50","author":[{"given":"Filipe","family":"Carreira da Silva","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon, Portugal"},{"name":"Selwyn College, University of Cambridge, 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