Detecting the Social

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-vii

   PDF

2. Introduction

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 1-25

3. The Scene of the Crime

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 27-60

4. Who’s to Blame?

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 61-94

5. The Myth of the Good Life

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 95-122

6. How Do We Connect?

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 123-147

7. Conclusion

   • Mary Evans, Sarah Moore, Hazel Johnstone

   Pages 149-165

8. Back Matter

   Pages 167-196

   PDF

This book analyses the ways in which twenty-first century detective fiction provides an understanding of the increasingly complex and often baffling contemporary world — and what sociology, as a discipline, can learn from it.

Conventional sociological accounts of fiction generally comprehend its value in terms of the ways in which it can illustrate, enlarge or help to articulate a particular social theory. Evans, Moore, and Johnstone suggest a different approach, and demonstrate that by taking a group of detective novels, we can unveil so far unidentified, but crucial, theoretical ideas about what it means to be an individual in the twenty-first century. 

More specifically, the authors argue that detective fiction of the last forty years illuminates the effects of urban isolation and separation, the invisibility of institutional power, financial insecurity, and the failure of public authorities to protect people. In doing so, this body of fiction traces out the fault-lines in our social arrangements, rehearses our collective fears, and captures a mood of restless disquiet. By engaging with detective stories in this way, the book revisits ideas about the promise and purpose of sociology.​

• Detective Fiction
• Nordic Noir
• Sociology of literature
• Sociology of the arts
• Scandinavia
• Scottish fiction
• Crime fIction

“The book revisits ideas about the promise and purpose of sociology. Detecting the social provides a unique and fascinating study into the World's favourite reading genre and is a must read for people interested in not only sociology and criminology but also those who want to investigate further the motives behind their favourite writers, and their detectives.” (Barry Forshaw, Crime Time, crimetime.co.uk, February, 5 , 2019)

“The book uses a range of examples from the genre, as well as comparative discussions with previous eras of detective fiction. … the book will be key reading across the social sciences.” (New Books network, newbooksnetwork.com, January 14, 2019)

“A joy to come across this brilliant examination of why contemporary crime fiction has become such a powerful, pertinent and unsettling cultural form. While many conventional literary critics remain baffled - or alarmed - by the genre’s popularity, Evans, Moore and Johnstone reveal how crime fiction increasingly places itself in the space between the real and the fictional, engaging with our sense of collective unease at the shifting power relationships of our era.” (William Shaw, Journalist and Author, UK)

“This fascinating study reveals the numerous ways in which contemporary detective fiction is both a reflection and an analysis of the relationship between the individual and society in 21^st century capitalism. Material insecurity, corrupt institutions, new technology, big data, new forms of the self all play a part in post 1970s novels. Read this insightful book and you will never again dismiss Scandi noir and its UK equivalent as merely genre fiction.” (Linda McDowell, Professor Emerita of Human Geography, University of Oxford, UK)

“Detecting the Social: Order and Disorder in Post-1970s Detective Fiction offers a beguiling and significant proposition: that detective fiction is a form of quiet radical social intervention.  Focusing on post-1970s Anglophone detective fiction, this valuable book reveals how the genre of detective fiction – often categorized as socially and politically conservative – interrogates cultural norms of social order, moral virtue, and narrative certainty. Evans, Moore and Johnstone reveal that, in detective fiction, nothing is certain, and nothing is forever.  The implications of this reach far beyond the parameters of the genre itself: this book makes an imperative contribution to detective fiction studies, but also to how critics have thought, and continue to think, about genre more generally – and how we think about ourselves.  Murder is here revealed to be, indeed, a fine art.”(Stacy Gillis, Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary Literature, Newcastle University, UK)

 

 

• Department of Gender Studies, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK

  Mary Evans

• Department of Social & Policy Sciences, University of Bath , Bath, UK

  Sarah Moore

• Department of Gender Studies , London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK

  Hazel Johnstone

Mary Evans is Leverhulme Emeritus Professor, Department of Gender Studies, London School of Economics, UK. 

Sarah Moore is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Social & Policy Sciences, University of Bath, UK. 


Hazel Johnstone is Departmental Manager, Department of Gender Studies, London School of Economics, and Managing Editor, European Journal of Women's Studies, UK.

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