{"product_id":"the-construction-of-human-kinds-ron-mallon-9780198755678","title":"The Construction of Human Kinds","description":"Ron Mallon explores how thinking and talking about kinds of person can bring those kinds into being. Social constructionist explanations of human kinds like race, gender, and homosexuality are commonplace in the social sciences and humanities, but what do they mean and what are their implications? \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThis book synthesizes recent work in evolutionary, cognitive, and social psychology as well as social theory and the philosophy of science, in order to offer a naturalistic account of the social construction of human kinds. Mallon begins by qualifying social constructionist accounts of \u003cem\u003erepresentations\u003c\/em\u003e of human kinds by appealing to evidence suggesting canalized dispositions towards certain ways of representing human groups, using race as a case study. He then turns to interpret constructionist accounts of \u003cem\u003ecategories\u003c\/em\u003e as attempts to explain causally powerful human kinds by appealling to our practices of representing them, and he articulates a view in which widespread representations produce entrenched social roles that could vindicate such attempts. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eMallon goes on to explore constructionist concerns with the social consequences of our representations, focusing especially on the way human kind representations can alter our behaviour and undermine our self understandings and our agency. Mallon understands socially constructed kinds as the real, sometimes stable products of our cognitive and representational practices, and he suggests that reference to such kinds can figure in our everyday and scientific practices of representing the social world. The result is a realistic, naturalistic account of how human representations might contribute to making up the parts of the social world that they represent.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Ron Mallon\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0198755678\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780198755678\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Oxford University Press, USA\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 10\/18\/2016\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 262\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.15lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.30h x 6.10w x 0.90d","brand":"Ron Mallon","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":44717132579071,"sku":"9780198755678","price":68.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_bf6c9e63-883a-459e-bcca-71677b3debf5.jpg?v=1705687088","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/the-construction-of-human-kinds-ron-mallon-9780198755678","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}