Welcome to the second edition of Working Notes, the online bulletin for Sociology At Work. In this edition, we tackle the question of what it means to be 'too academic' in an applied context. The idea of being 'too academic' (or 'not academic enough' as the case may be) refers to a way of defining and dividing sociological practices outside academia from university traditions. Within a non-academic work setting, the phrase ‘too academic’ often implies placing a different value on the scholarly application of theoretical and methodological concepts than is usually practised in formal academic contexts. This edition of Working Notes aims to highlight the different ways in which research practices and the application of theoretical frameworks are shaped by the fields in which applied sociologists work.
