Re-writing the social, re-writing sociology: Donzelot, genealogy and working-class bodies

A generation ago, Dorothy Smith's groundbreaking work (1974) inspired numerous sociological neophytes to not only prioritise their own embodied experience, but also to question the hitherto taken for granted methodological conventions of the then current sociology. Yet for some students growing up on Smith's Marxist-influenced "nourishment," worrying problems remained. Fortunately, with "textual maturity" some resolution of these problems can now be proposed. Thus, this paper introduces readers to Donzelot's genealogical analysis of the "social" (Donzelot 1984) in order to show that Smith's original critique of conventional sociology must now be re-evaluated. Specifically, it will suggest that Smith's unquestioning usage of Marxist discourse needs to be subjected to critical analysis, because Marxism itself was heavily implicated in the original "invention" of sociology, and the "social" more generally.