Practice Theories

Practice theories perceive social life as practical activity. Social practices can be described as routinized behavior which integrates elements such as bodily know-how, material objects, technology, understandings, and emotions. Practice theories focus on how such elements are interwoven through human activity. They acknowledge the coconstituting role of material objects and emphasize practical intelligibility, the embodied ways in which people know what and how to do next in a situation. The very capacity of individuals to act upon their environment is produced in and through social practices. Practice theories perceive social reality as one of a kind: No distinctions are made between social realms, layers or levels. So far, this branch of theorizing has proven its strength for understanding microphenomena in dispersed places and times. Recently, theorists have begun to conceptualize the dynamics of more extensive patterning of practice-material arrangement bundles in time and space. For instance, they can appear more or less frequent, more or less firmly or densely clustered, and more or less related to other practices in more or less stringent and enduring ways. If practice theories manage to demonstrate utility and merit for understanding stability and change in larger social phenomena they are here to stay in sociology.