PhDs and dissertations in the social sciences

Because the social science narrative has been extremely important in effort s to account for the process of Brazilian modernization, the study of socia l scientists themselves has become strategic to understanding Brazilian soc iety's representation of self. This article examines graduate work in the s ocial sciences, graduate students themselves, and their theses and disserta tions. Research has been based on a survey conducted among candidates for m aster's degrees and doctorates, as well as on an analysis of doctoral disse rtations defended between 1990 and 1997. The study reveals a discipline tha t is undergoing transformation a product of the process of democratization which its members has undergone and of the internalization of new parameter s guiding cognitive production. While this may have implied a loss in the f ield's capacity to generalize, it has gained in capillarity, in plurality, and in capacity to understand. This study also pinpoints the limits of the discipline, determined by an institutional situation where greater exchange with the members of society is still missing.