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Stanisław Ossowski (22 May 1897 – 7 November 1963) was a Polish sociologist. He held
professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...
ships at University of Łódź (1945–1947) and
University of Warsaw The University of Warsaw (, ) is a public university, public research university in Warsaw, Poland. Established on November 19, 1816, it is the largest institution of higher learning in the country, offering 37 different fields of study as well ...
(1947–1963).


Life

Ossowski was born on 22 May 1897 in Lipno, Poland. Ossowski first contributed to
logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the study of deductively valid inferences or logical truths. It examines how conclusions follow from premises based on the structure o ...
and
aesthetics Aesthetics (also spelled esthetics) is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature of beauty and taste (sociology), taste, which in a broad sense incorporates the philosophy of art.Slater, B. H.Aesthetics ''Internet Encyclopedia of Ph ...
before moving on to
sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...
. He studied philosophy at the University of Warsaw, his teachers were i.a. Tadeusz Kotarbiński, Jan Łukasiewicz and Władysław Tatarkiewicz. He also studied in Paris (Collège de France), in Rome and in London. He took part in the 1920 war. Doctorate (Analysis of the notion of a sign, 1925) wrote to Tadeusz Kotarbiński at the University of Warsaw. He took part in the September campaign. He spent the occupation in Lviv and Warsaw. He taught sociology at an underground university. He was a proponent of humanistic sociology and antinaturalism, differentiating between the
natural science Natural science or empirical science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer ...
s and the
social sciences Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of society, societies and the Social relation, relationships among members within those societies. The term was former ...
. He believed that all phenomena of social life had a consciousness aspect. For example, a social bond, especially ethnic or national, is the result of imaginations and beliefs. Their pathological forms, such as racism or chauvinism, were strongly denounced by Ossowski, while praising positive manifestations such as patriotism ("private homeland" or "ideological homeland"). Ossowski was one of the greatest intellectual and moral authorities in post-war Poland, he has had a strong influence on Polish sociologists, including
Zygmunt Bauman Zygmunt Bauman (; ; 19 November 1925 – 9 January 2017) was a Polish–British sociologist and philosopher. He was driven out of the Polish People's Republic during the 1968 Polish political crisis and forced to give up his Polish citizenship. ...
and Jerzy Szacki. In 1949 Ossowski was a founding member, and from 1959 to 1962 vice-president, of the
International Sociological Association The International Sociological Association (ISA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to scientific purposes in the field of sociology and social sciences. It is an international sociological body, gathering both individuals and national sociol ...
. In 1956 he was a founding member of the reactivated
Polish Sociological Association The Polskie Towarzystwo Socjologiczne (PTS) (Polish Sociological Association) is the main professional organization of sociologists in Poland. The PTS defines its mission as "supporting the development of sociology and popularizing sociological kno ...
and became its first president (1957–1963). Ossowski was married to Maria Ossowska, a fellow sociologist and
social philosopher Social philosophy is the study and interpretation of society and social institutions in terms of ethical values rather than empirical relations. Social philosophers emphasize understanding the social contexts for political, legal, moral and cultur ...
. Maria Ossowska and Stanisław Ossowski are considered among the founders of the field of "science of science" due to their authorship of a seminal 1935 paper, "The Science of Science."A synonym for "science of science" is the back-formed term " logology" (
Christopher Kasparek Christopher Kasparek (born 1945) is a Scottish-born writer of Polish descent who has translated works by numerous Polish authors, including Ignacy Krasicki, Bolesław Prus, Florian Znaniecki, Władysław Tatarkiewicz, Marian Rejewski, and Wł ...
, " Prus' ''
Pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian language, Egyptian: ''wikt:pr ꜥꜣ, pr ꜥꜣ''; Meroitic language, Meroitic: 𐦲𐦤𐦧, ; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') was the title of the monarch of ancient Egypt from the First Dynasty of Egypt, First Dynasty ( ...
'': the Creation of a
Historical Novel Historical fiction is a literary genre in which a fictional plot takes place in the setting of particular real historical events. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to oth ...
", ''
The Polish Review ''The Polish Review'' is an English-language academic journal published quarterly in New York City by the Polish Institute of Arts and Sciences of America. ''The Polish Review'' was established in 1956, as a successor of the ''PAU Bulletin''. It ...
'', vol. XXXIX, no. 1, 1994, note 3, pp. 45–46; Stefan Zamecki, ''Komentarze do naukoznawczych poglądów Williama Whewella (1794–1866): studium historyczno-metodologiczne'' Logological Views of William Whewell">Logology_(sociology).html" ;"title="ommentaries to the Logology (sociology)">Logological Views of William Whewell (1794–1866): A Historical-Methodological Study], Warsaw, Polish Academy of Sciences, 2012, , [English-language] summary, pp. 741–43). The term " logology" provides convenient grammatical variants not available with the earlier terms, "science of science" and "sociology of science": i.e., "logologist", "to logologize", "logological", "logologically".
In 1951 he was removed from teaching. He was returned to the right to conduct classes after Polish October 1956. An indication of the esteem in which he was held by certain sections of Polish society is a statue of him erected in Central Warsaw.


Important works

* ''U podstaw estetyki'' (1933) * "The Science of Science" ("''Nauka o nauce''", 1935) * ''Więź społeczna i dziedzictwo krwi'' (1939) * ''Struktura klasowa w społecznej świadomości'' (1957) * ''O osobliwościach nauk społecznych'' (1962) * ''O ojczyźnie i narodzie'' (1984)


See also

*
List of Poles This is a partial list of notable Polish people, Polish or Polish language, Polish-speaking or -writing people. People of partial Polish heritage have their respective ancestries credited. Physics *Miedziak Antal * Czesław Białobrzesk ...
*
Logology (science of science) Logology is the study of all things related to science and its scientist, practitioners—philosophy of science, philosophical, biological, psychology of science, psychological, sociology of science, societal, history of science, historical, poli ...
* Robert K. Merton


Notes


References

*Bohdan Walentynowicz, ed., ''Polish Contributions to the Science of Science'', Dordrecht, D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1982, .


External links


The Sociological Ideas of Stanislaw Ossowski
''Journal of Classical Sociology'', vol. 6, no. 3, 2006, pp. 283–309 (abstract)
Class Structure in the Social Consciousness
(New York, Free Press of Glencoe, 1963) {{DEFAULTSORT:Ossowski, Stanislaw 1897 births 1963 deaths Polish sociologists 20th-century Polish philosophers Academic staff of the University of Warsaw People from Lipno, Lipno County