Typification

From Geography

Typification is a term created by Alfred Schütz. The process of abstraction and formalization by means of which we classify things as 'tables', 'cars', 'trees' and so on Schutz calls typification (Campbell, 1981, p.203). So typification is the proces of creating common definitions and is based on common actions from the past. When you see a dog, you expect sharp teeth without you really saw his teeth (Wagner, 1991). Any name includes a typification and is in a Edmund Husserl sense a nonessential empirical generalization. But these typifications enable us to recognise a situation, so we can choose the right techniques to deal with this certain situation. It's important to mention that typification doesn't play only a role in language, typification plays also a role in the institutionalizing of knowledge. For Schutz is typification also important to understand a society. The common stock of knowledge contains socially in a society approved recipies for dealing with recurrent problems. These typifications are absorbed through language and the institutionalized knowledge of society.

With typification, an individual can see the everyday life in terms of meaningful configurations instead of as an disorganized mess. What the individual does is to construct a world - the world he 'intends' in his everyday consciousness - by using the typifications wich are passed on to him by his social group.

References

Campbell, T. (1981). Seven Theories of Human Society. Claudan Press, Oxford.

Wagner, R. (1991). Alfred Schutz, on phenomenology and social relations. The university of Chicago Press: Chicago

Campbell, T. (1981). Seven Theories of Human Society, p. 203.

Contribution

Created by Pieter van Luijk 16 oktober 2012

Page enhanced by Niek van Enckevort 13:15, 24-10-2012

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