reification

Reification is the act or process of treating an abstract concept, relationship, or social construct as if it were a concrete, independent thing. The term derives from the Latin res, "thing," and in philosophical and social scientific usage refers to turning a conceptual or relational artifact into a perceived object with apparent material existence.

Historically, reification is associated with German idealism and developed in Marxist thought, notably by Georg Lukács. In this tradition, social relations such as value, labor, and exchange acquire apparent autonomy and power, and come to seem to govern individuals rather than being produced by human practices. Commodity fetishism is a classic example, where economic relations appear as things with intrinsic properties.

Reification appears across disciplines. In sociology and anthropology it describes treating markets, institutions, or cultures as though they were natural, self-contained entities. In linguistics and cognitive science it can refer to hypostatization, describing processes or relations with noun-like terms, or to the projection of intentionality onto nonhuman systems. Common examples include money or the market as if they possess independent agency, or laws and norms as if they exist prior to human action.

Scholars debate when reification is a misleading simplification and when it helps explain social structure. Critics warn that excessive reification can obscure power dynamics and historical contingency, while others argue that some degree of abstraction is necessary for analysis. The concept remains a useful heuristic for examining how ideas about "things" shape social reality.