Pragmatic regimes of sociologists’ sense-building. Experiments in existential sociology

Abstract

Sociology as a science constantly requires various kinds of justifications. Sociologists themselves encounter these justifications. The author of this article links justifications to scholars’ search for existential meaning in their own work. However, sociology has failed to develop a language for analyzing existential meaning. The article aims to propose pathways for developing such a language and to demonstrate its possibilities. The article analyzes the development of the concept of meaning in Weber, Schütz, and Goffman. It then examines the discussion of sense-building in Russian sociology. Subsequently, the author proposes drawing on the resources of pragmatic sociology to address emerging theoretical problems, particularly the concepts of regimes of engagement and orders of justification. Sense-building is understood as a method of attributing meaning through the qualification of certain units and their ordering in accordance with the values of the actor and institution. The article analyzes situations of meaning crises in connection with sense-building theory. Several empirical examples are provided. Ultimately, the author proposes a theoretical framework of sense-building in regimes of engagement, grounded in pragmatic sociology.    

For citation: Shobyrev, A. (2026) Pragmatic regimes of sociologists’ sense-building. Experiments in existential sociology. Russia’s Directions. Vol. 4. No. 3. P. 168–201.

Additional Info

Submitted: April 1, 2026

Reviewed: April 23, 2026

Copyright: © Auhtors, 2026

Distribution: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)