Biography and Society in Transnational Europe and Beyond : an Introduction

During the past forty years, biographical research, which had significantly declined in post-war sociological inquiry, has gained new visibility and has become an established field within scientific social research. This revival has allowed biographical analysis to expand its scope and move beyond disciplinary borders while exploring new research perspectives and innovative methods, integrating narrative, ethnographic, visual and discourse approaches. The core question of biographical approaches has aimed at understanding how changes in society are connected with varying organisations of the self and family, work life, gender and generational relations, as well as institutional settings. Thus, biographical analysis has found one of its preferred research fields in social phenomena such as migration, also confronted with increasingly globalised societies, and new forms of communication. This article addresses the role played by biographical research in social theory and research and introduces the contents of the articles comprising the special issue on “Biography and Society”.