Category: Sociology

Pluck vs. Luck

by David Labaree, posted in History of education, Meritocracy, Sociology, Systems of Schooling, Teaching

This post is a piece I recently published in Aeon.  Here's the link to the original.  I wrote this after years of futile efforts to get Stanford students to think critically about how they got to their current location at the top of the meritocracy.  It was nearly impossible to get students to consider that … Continue reading Pluck vs. Luck

Max Weber’s “Science as a Vocation”

by David Labaree, posted in Educational Research, History, Scholarship, Sociology

Today I'm posting Max Weber's classic piece on "Science as a Vocation."  It was originally delivered as a speech at Munich University in 1918.  Its relevance for scholars today is as great as it was then, asking these questions: What does it mean to be a scientist? What are the sources and limits of scientific … Continue reading Max Weber’s “Science as a Vocation”