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Recent scholarship highlights the importance of public discourse for the mobilization and impact of social movements, but it neglects how cultural products may shift discourse and thereby influence mobilization and political outcomes. This study investigates how activism against hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) utilized cultural artifacts to influence public perceptions and effect change. A systematic analysis of Internet search data, social media postings, and newspaper articles allows us to identify how the documentary Gasland reshaped public discourse. We find that Gasland contributed not only to greater online searching about fracking, but also to increased social media chatter and heightened mass media coverage. Local screenings of Gasland contributed to anti-fracking mobilizations, which, in turn, affected the passage of local fracking moratoria in the Marcellus Shale states. These results have implications not only for understanding movement outcomes, but also for theory and research on media, the environment, and energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The migration of millions of southerners out of the South between 1910 and 1970 is largely attributed to economic and social push factors in the South, combined with pull factors in other regions of the country. Researchers generally find that participants in this migration were positively selected from their region of origin, in terms of educational attainment and urban status, and that they fared relatively well in their destinations. To fully measure the migrants’ success, however, a comparison with those who remained in the South is necessary. This article uses data from the U.S. Census to compare migrants who left the South with their southern contemporaries who stayed behind, both those who moved within the South and the sedentary population. The findings indicate that migrants who left the South did not benefit appreciably in terms of employment status, income, or occupational status. In fact, inter-regional migrants often fared worse than did southerners who moved within the South or those who remained sedentary. These results contradict conventional wisdom regarding the benefits of exiting the South and suggest the need for a revisionist interpretation of the experiences of those who left. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article focuses on the Townsend movement, institutionalism and the political opportunity in the U.S. The largest and most ambiguous American social movement of the Great Depression was led not by a menacing demagogue, but by a befuddled gray-haired doctor, Francis E. Townsend. The Townsend movement seems to fit conflicting views on social movements and thus presents a puzzle for social theorists. It has been concluded that grievances due to crises can augment challenger theories and require more consideration. These grievances are not constant and may influence the development of insurgencies consistent with the challenger perspective in at least two ways. Crises can breed uncertainty in people that may change their perceived long-term interests and the parameters of the free-rider problem. The analysis shows that political opportunities play a positive role in promoting movements, as suggested by the polity model. The standard polity model emphasizes aid from social movements and polity members, and we found that where the labor movement was strong, the Townsend movement also flourished.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The two articles that follow seek to familiarize American sociologists with the writings of their counterparts in France in an area of interest that has been phrased somewhat differently in the two countries. They represent the product of a collaborative effort that came into being at the 1962 meeting of the International Seminar on Family Research, in Washington, D.C., with aid from the Committee on Socialization and Social Structure of the Social Science Research Council and from the Centre National de Ia Recherche Scientifique, Path, France. Although the focus of attention is on the French literature dealing with the interrelationships between person and society, both papers address themselves to similarities and differences in approach in the two countries. Both are being published in French (in the "Bulletin de Psychologie," Sorbonne, Path) as well as in English. it is hoped that these first steps toward a dialogue between workers in the two countries will contribute to an awareness of significant substantive research and of salient issues that will benefit from further discussion across national boundaries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowhere in An American Dilemma does Gunnar Myrdal present an empirical test of the Central theory from which his book takes its name. The main critics of the theory have also jailed to test the basic assumptions on which their criticisms are based. This study attempts to test, empirically, the basic propositions, postulates and assumptions of Myrdal's primary theory. The results indicate that a dilemma exists in the sample studied, but that the techniques people employ to resolve the dilemma are frequently quite different from those assumed by Myrdal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contemporary American sociology, there exists no unified and comprehensive theoretical system that could serve as an instrument for coordinating and integrating existing sociological knowledge. Present-day American sociology represents a multiverse of theories and approaches. For the purpose of bringing at least some external order into a rather chaotic situation, the author suggests a classificatory system that distinguishes three main categories of sociological theory on the basis of general methodological criteria: positive or natural-science theories; interpretative sociologies treating sociology as a science sui generis, and non-scientific or evaluative social theories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a conception of action drawn from the five major pre-world War II volumes of Znaniecki, Maclver, and Parsons, the contributions of Ward, Giddings, Ross, Small, Cooley, Mead, Thomas, Faris, and Park were investigated for antecedents of the action scheme.. References to consciousness, subjectivity, the subject-object relationship, ends, means, reflection and choice, rules, and a distinctive subjective investigative technique were found in their works. The bases of an action orientation in American sociology can be discerned in the two decades before and after World War I and in both the traditions of positivistic evolutionism and subjective idealism. Cooley's concept of valuation, Mead's notion of the individual act, and Thomas' definition o/the situation probably provide the most significant antecedents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The stages of the nuclear family's life cycle are much less clearly defined in rural India than in the United States. The extremely young age at marriage in the villages studied accentuates the couple's dependence on the joint household. One consequence of a long childbearing period and high mortality is a large proportion of orphans and widows with dependent children. This again demonstrates the importance of a larger kinship group in providing the stability and continuity the nuclear family lacks. Despite high fertility, the average size of the nuclear family at its maximum, when the mother is 45 years old, is only 5.39, including the parents. Evidence is resented to show that the probability of death for any member of a family is contingent on the survival of the other members, and that the mortality of widows, widowers and orphans is much higher than that of the general population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This review article looks at politics, values, and sociology in American society and focuses on the book "The Sociological Imagination," by C. Wright Mills. According to the author, the center of sociology is the sociological imagination and the commitment to social criticism. Furthermore, sociology should be used to make humans more rational and more free. The article discusses Mills' grand theory, social systems, Mills' attack on abstracted empiricism and bureaucratic practicality, and how the author's image of American society differs from Mills' image.

Various recent studies have demonstrated the need for a thorough reappraisal of the commonly held belief about U.S. adult citizens' voluntary association memberships. Sociologists Mirra Komarovsky and Morris Axelrod have provided evidence for urban dwellers, to whom such behavior has been especially attributed, that membership in a large number of associations is not characteristic of many Americans. This article presents evidence on several problems associated with this issue. It provides evidence about pattern of membership in voluntary associations of adult Americans in general, some correlates of membership which might be considered determinants and some correlates of membership which might be considered results of significance to theories about voluntary associations. For this purpose a secondary analysis of recent surveys has been performed. The study revealed that voluntary association membership is not characteristic of majority of U.S. citizens. Membership has been more characteristic of Whites than Afro-Americans and more among Jewish than Protestant. Moreover it has been observed that membership has been related to socioeconomic status and family status. Membership is also associated with voting in political elections and support for charities.

This article treats differences in marriage patterns of persons in the United States according to their educational level. The marriage patterns discussed include trends in the number of marriages, age at marriage, stability of marriage, resident and nonresident marriages, number of times married, broken marriages, and bachelorhood and spinsterhood. The source material used for the study comes from decennial censuses but most of it is from a special study of about 9,000 persons who married between 1947 and 1954. For this study, one of the regular monthly surveys in which employment and other demographic data are collected, covered a sample of more than 20,000 households which were representative of the civilian noninstitutional population of the United States. The high level of marriage rates and the decline in divorce rates after World War II are doubtless caused by a great variety of factors, many of which are imperfectly understood. The study revealed that men in middle and upper economic strata tend to have not only a high amount of education but also a high marriage rate, an above-average age at marriage, and a low divorce rate. Persons who discontinue their education before they complete high school tend also to have low incomes and high rates of marriage dissolution by separation, divorce, or widowhood.

This article reports a study of the effect of religiosity on the relation between sexual gratification and marital satisfaction. One of the distinguishing features of marriage is that it is a relationship in which socially sanctioned sexual intercourse is engaged in with some regularity and particularly in the early years, with considerable frequency. Consequently, it could be presumed that the more gratifying the sexual activity, the greater would be the participants' satisfaction with their marriages. This conclusion follows from the assumption that gratification from a significant, frequently recurring activity contributes to the satisfaction with the total relationship of which the activity is a part. It is likely that the tendency for satisfaction with marriage to be influenced by sexual gratification is reinforced in contemporary American society by the numerous sources that promulgate the idea that sexual gratification is essential for a happy, satisfactory marriage. It is reasonable to suppose, therefore, that sexual gratification would enhance and that non-gratification would decrease, women's and men's positive feelings about their marriages as a whole.

Discrepancies between currently experienced and desired distributions of power in society indicate a preference to alter or accept a change in social arrangements. Such dispositions, even, when consciously and intensely experienced, are not necessarily incipient pressures for social change. This article reports a study of one possible determinant of preference for change in the distribution of power in the society of the U.S., the degree of status consistency. There is some support for the hypothesis of an inverse relationship between the degree of status consistency and preference for change in the distribution of power. The relationship appears to be related directly to stratum position. Two lines of interpretation of this finding are suggested in the article. One stresses the possibility that mobility or other modes of adjustment to status inconsistency may account for the variation in the relationship. The other suggests that the measurement of status consistency did not take into account the simultaneous salience of status characteristics.

This paper examines social position in relation to social stratification. It questions whether the American society consists of a few fairly discernable social strata or of a multitude of overlapping social positions. Previous attempts have been made to construct a method whereby persons could be placed functionally within the social structure. A major limitation of most of these studies lies in the initial procedure. Most authors define structure only in order to get to the far more important psychological traits characterizing each class. The present study applies profile scales which are exactly one foot in length. To reduce bias each scale was given only two reference points. The final instrument consisted of nine scales and an appendaged background data sheet. Neither social position nor social class can be considered as single variables. The results of both the social position and social class scales are displayed graphically. Social class and social position were correlated with the seven rating scales by means of the Pearsonian method. Reliability and validity were also tested in the study.

The article presents some salient changes that have occurred in the social stratification of Euro-American population during the Second World War. Its second objective is to point out which of these changes are likely to continue in the transitory post-war period and which are bound to end with the armistice. Before the war, the factual and legal status of women was unequal to that of men. In all Western countries, with no exception whatsoever, women's political, economic and other rights and privileges were more limited than those of men. Some high positions and functions were legally closed for women; some occupations were either factually or legally monopolized by men. Women's remuneration for similar occupations was lower than for men. Rights of the wife in the family were less extensive than those of the husband. The war saw a dramatic change in this status, with women entering armed forces and other occupations totally monopolized by men. As a result these occupational, economic and functional changes in the position of women, their total status has become closer to that of men.

Renewed interest among sociologists in well-documented historical materials as a basis for comparative study of social systems has turned attention to backgrounds of American treatment of Negro during the period of slavery. The article presents principal features of the social structure of the ante-bellum South, particularly as exemplified in the system of social stratification. The pattern of social stratification in the ante-bellum South has been fairly complex and by no means constant in time and space. The slavery system, and the caste system which partially paralleled it, was the most common and the most certain fixed point of orientation in the stratification system. This becomes even more significant when it is recognized that, despite the general impression to the contrary, slaveholding was in no statistical sense typical of Southern whites. Slaveholders constituted only 35.3 percent of the total free population in 1790. All those immediately connected with the slavery system formed only 57 percent of the entire population in 1790 and precisely one half in 1860.

The emergence of social classes was a serious concern before the Second World War. After the War, however, problems of different dimensions have been clogging the intellect of social scientists. Demography has indeed played an important role, if not a prominent one, in the social stratification and emergence of social classes. Not universal equality nor near-equality of status but a high rate of vertical mobility has been the most important demographic basis of tradition of classlessness in the U.S. The long-existing favorable balance of vertical circulation of individuals in American society, i.e., the excess of upward over downward moves, has diminished and seems likely to be further reduced. The educational system, which is the chief American institution explicitly conceived as a mechanism for facilitating the ascent of talented individuals, must become more highly selective of individual merit if the loss of certain dwindling sources of upward mobility is to be offset. It must be admitted that there is no criterion of what would be exactly enough vertical mobility to prevent the formation of conscious and hostile classes in the U.S.

The basic theoretical assumptions underlying social science in the Soviet Union, the organization of research and the application of research findings differ sharply from the situation prevailing in the U.S. Here, as a reflection of the pluralistic organization of American society, the individual social scientist is free to choose from a number of competing theoretical assumptions, that the organization of research is decentralized and that the social scientist has considerable difficulty in securing the practical application and adoption of his findings. The situation in the USSR is almost the exact opposite. Formally at least, all science in the USSR is supposed to be guided by the theoretical assumptions of dialectical materialism. As is usually the case, a purely formal description is not quite accurate. In recent years at any rate the theoretical assumptions of dialectical materialism have been less prominent foundations for work in the social sciences than the requirements of the party line.