New materialisms and social research methodology

Nick J. Fox

Chapter 24 in Elgar Concise Encyclopedia of Research Methods in the Social Sciences, 2026, pp 172-180 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: The new materialisms are a range of contemporary perspectives that are characterised by relationality, post-anthropocentrism and monism. As such, they supply a novel perspective on both the social world and social inquiry. The focus of research shifts from individual bodies or other materialities to contextual assemblages. In place of a focus on human agency, these perspectives acknowledge a wide range of human and non-human agencies that together produce the world. Finally, they cut across many conventional dualisms including culture/nature, micro/macro, human/non-human and agency/structure. Without structures or systems, power in new materialist theory works micropolitically, leading new materialist theorists to focus on the forces and affects operating in everyday interactions and events. This entry explores the main strands and theoretical perspectives within new materialist theory, and then shows how this translates into a conceptual toolkit that may be used in empirical social scientific studies.

Keywords: Affect; Assemblage; Ethology; Micropolitics; Monism; New Materialism; Post-anthropocentrism; Research-assemblage (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781803921297
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781803921303.00032 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:21471_24

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.e-elgar.com

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Jack Sweeney ().