Abstract

Ever since the attempts to theorize our thinking about society and its
course of development began, the study of continuity and change has been
one of the key issues that triggers our curiosity on this subject. As our
thinking about society advances, our theories and methodologies develop
too. It is perhaps an oversimplification to say that sociological perspectives
help to trace how different snapshots of social realities are connected and
form a phenomenon at a given time and place, while historical perspectives
help to trace this phenomenon retrospectively and connect it to other
events across time and place. Either way, each discipline has laid a foundation
toolkit to study continuity and change, so as to uncover how we
have come to be where we are today. This theoretical and methodological
toolkit has been largely adopted and further developed by social science
historians and especially historical demographers, where a crucial role has
been played by Theo Engelen. Here I continue the debate on continuity
and change in demographic behavior that has been prominent throughout
the work of Engelen (1987; 1997; 2002; 2003; 2006; 2014; Engelen & Wolf,
2005). By taking this debate further, my aim is to illustrate how some
major concepts in history and sociology, namely generations and contexts,
may help us to advance our understanding of the continuity and change
surrounding the phenomenon of fertility decline.