This article analyses the historical constitution of culture as object in social sciences, in terms of popular culture, national culture and mass culture. It compares the processes of institutionalisation of sociology according to the different national and regional contexts and it looks at how this subject of study becomes autonomous through task specialization when competing with other disciplines. The regaining of the interpretative unit and a conceptual review for the study of 'global objects' are defined as the main challenges for sociology nowadays.
culture; sociology; social sciences