The French Enlightenment Network

• Published in: The Journal of modern history Vol. 88; no. 3; pp. 495 - 534
• Main Authors: Comsa, Maria Teodora, Conroy, Melanie, Edelstein, Dan, Edmondson, Chloe Summers, Willan, Claude
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chicago The University of Chicago Press 01-09-2016; University of Chicago, acting through its Press
• Subjects: Advocacy; Centrality; Computer networks; Enlightenment; France; French people; Network analysis; Social groups; Social network analysis; Social networks; Statistical analysis; France
• ISSN: 0022-2801; 1537-5358
• DOI: 10.1086/687927

Comsa et al examine the social composition of the French Enlightenment network. People use basic statistical calculations to provide rough estimates of the size and importance of different social groups; given the nature of the data, however, they do not analyze them with standard social network analysis (SNA) methods. Rather, they corroborate, refine, and defend their findings through comparisons with arguments from the secondary literature. While their reasons for this approach are largely driven by the shape of their data (which make most SNA metrics unfeasible), they also advocate a method of network analysis that does not rely on mapping relationships between nodes and calculating such metrics as betweenness centrality or clustering coefficients; rather, it focuses on the relative size of, and overlap between, different subgroups in order to understand the overall structure and social composition of a historical network.