Social Science Research Methodology

 ONE question logically precedes any advice about the use of historical methods in social science research: What do social scientists mean by his¬torical research? Articles distinguishing between historical sociology and sociological history tend to develop ideal-typical portraits of each endeavor. Rather than presenting ideal types, this essay will unfold as much qualitative research does—by in¬ference. Nonetheless, this essay has an implicit theme: Whether done by social scientists or by historians, historical work requires a point of view. A print of view necessarily includes an interpre¬tive framework that implicitly contains some no¬tion of the "meaning of history."


The theoretical use of historical data also im¬plies a methodology. I do not use the term meth¬odology in its current sense of "application of specific method," such as analysis of document or participant observation. Rather, I use methodology in its classic sense: the study of the episte¬mological assumptions implicit in specific meth¬ods. I thus assume that a methodology includes a way of looking at phenomena that specifies how a method "captures" the "object" of study.