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The article presents information on the December 1, 1975 issue of the periodical "Rural Sociology." This issue of "Rural Sociology" follows the tradition of the December 1965 issue. A cumulative index for the 10 years 1966 through 1975 has been added as a separate supplement. The updating work was guided by earlier efforts of authors Sheldon Lowry and Nancy Hammond. An explication of procedures and contents is contained in the "Guide to Usage" section of the present index. A word is in order here about the regular issue of the journal. All of the papers were invited. The RSS presidential address is, of course, the usual open invitation to comment on whatever the retiring officer sees fit to his or her views and interests. President Harold Capener has examined the organizational context for application of scientific knowledge. His concern is to set out some guidelines to improve the chances of success for applied social sciences like rural sociology. Capener's remarks provide a fitting introduction to the rest of the issue. His observations help to remind the reader of the historical events and organizational handicaps within which the discipline operates. As he notes, that context is not unrelated to performance of tasks by the rural sociologist-the burden of the other three papers.

The paper describes a frame of reference for rural development research with an emphasis on identification and assessment of consequences for people and communities of programs and policies undertaken in the name of rural development. It is suggested that rural development research is not an academic specialty in the traditional sense and that a tendency to regard it as such should be avoided. Development is political and concerned with values, and rural development research must be cognizant of those features. It is contended in the paper chat many of the features of a the prevailing ideology of development have produced outcomes which cannot be regarded as developmental: for example, vulnerability, excessive dependency, social costs associated with an emphasis on efficiency, inequality, excessive centralization of decision-making and control, and so on. Attention is also directed to the nature of knowledge produced by rural sociologists with an emphasis on the need for greater integration of knowledge around major policy and development issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

T. Lynn Smith analysed the rural class structure in America on the basis of 1959 census data. This paper correlates the proportion of lower class population with the prevalence of corporate farming, based upon an analyses of the proposition of total state agricultural production accounted for by the 31,000 largest farms (r = .76%). The implications of these data are that, with progressive expansion of large scale agriculture, the American rural population will develop into what Smith identifies as the two-class system. Note is also taken of some regional variation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article evaluates the productivity of sociologists in extension, teaching, and research. Prior to the evaluation, data were gathered from 111 individuals who work in or with the Extension Service throughout the U.S. and have at least a master's degree in sociology or rural sociology. In measuring the productivity of sociologists in teaching and research positions, American Sociological Review was used as the point of reference. The respondents of the study were then asked to indicate the number of each type of output, which they had produced from 1973 to 1975. Basing on these processes, the author of this article assumed that extension sociologists with the doctoral degrees would have greater exposure to traditional productivity scales than those with terminal master's degrees, due to the length of their academic training. The author concludes that the proposed productivity rating scale cannot be taken or used literally, however, the scales can be used as an evaluation measure for productivity output.

Rural sociology confronts a continuing crisis of identity because of its failure to develop a sociology of agriculture. Historically, despite an initial focus on agriculture, rural sociology became deflected to the analysis of rurality. Recent emphasis of rural sociologists on the "turnaround" phenomenon is symptomatic but fails to deal with the fact that such turnaround represents the penetration of previously rural space by urban-based economic functions, Rural sociology could resolve its problems, as has agricultural economics, by providing ideological justification for land grant productionism or by developing a new constituency for itself. This would probably jeopardize its location in the land-grant system but in all likelihood represents the only way out of a closed and limited paradigm. Several Neo-Populist and Neo-Marxist developments in the sociology of agriculture hold promise for a revised rural sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As rural sociologists, we should be as clear as possible about our basic concepts and objects of study. From GaIpin (1915) on, defining the "rural" has preoccupied rural sociologists. Urban sociology recently faced a similar problem, and political economists reoriented the field by looking beyond the city to the social production of spatial forms. I apply a related critique to rural sociology, which has traditionally seen "rural' as cultural, ecological, or occupational. The two main explanations of rural culture, Germeinschaft and human ecology, are inadequate. The former is not specifically rural, and the latter obscures the structure of social relations. The recent proposal for a strictly rural ecology also fails in consider underlying political-economic determinants. I suggest in conclusion two constituents of rural: "capitalist space' in the form of uneven regional development; and the "mode of primary production" (including the occupational category). which is distinguished by its direct interaction with the natural environment. Rural sociologists have always focused on farming but are now beginning to treat agriculture, the other extractive industries, anti peripheral regions as crucial elements in the capitalist social system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologists suggest that the substantial decline in public support for environmental protection on the basis of a panel study of Washington State residents may be an artifact of the research design employed. The available evidence does not support the existence of the strong age-environmental concern relationship assumed by sociologists, an assumption central to their emphasis on the effects of maturation. Apparently recognizing that readers might be skeptical that a maturation of only 4 years could account for the reported decline in environmental concern.

Popular discourse today so weds rurality and conservatism together in the United States that one does not seem quite at home without the other. But what is it really about the rural that beckons slapjack labels of conservatism? Scholars and practitioners, only a handful of them rural sociologists, have suggested a variety of explanations: antigovernmentalism, religion, lack of education, manual labor, poverty, primitivism, and a culture of poverty, among others. Each of these approaches, though, misses a sustained agent of rural dispossession and depopulation: the state. This article theorizes rural politics through pro‐state, stateless, and anti‐state positions. I bridge literature that documents the state as an agent of industrialization, extraction, exploitation, consolidation, and corporatization in rural America and literature on politics and the rural. In the process of my review, I suggest anarchism can help explain the significance and potential of the stateless and anti‐state positions in rural politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologist Charles Perry died earlier this year. Shortly before his death, the chief editor of the journal "Rural Sociology" sent him a letter telling him of the chief editor's decision to accept his manuscript for publication in "Rural Sociology." Although saddened very much by his death, the chief editor was glad to know that he knew his manuscript had been accepted by the journal. He will be eulogized by others, Perry was a first-rate scholar, a first-rate reviewer for the journal, and a first-rate human being. The chief editor will miss him personally and professionally rural sociology was better off because of him and will be poorer due to his absence. The manuscript that are being published in the September 1, 1986 issue of the journal was to have undergone some revision by him prior to publication. Since he could not do this, Forrest A. Deseran, deputy editor of the journal, and Mary C. Hester, the copy editor of the journal, undertook primary responsibility for making the needed changes. The manuscript itself, however, is still a product of Perry's, written, largely, in his own inimitable style.

This article presents information on the annual business meeting of the rural sociology section of the American Sociological Society. The meeting was held at the Commodore Hotel, New York city on 29 December, 1935. In the meeting, Mr. B.L. Hummel, Chairman of rural sociology section of the American Sociological Society, described the problems he had encountered in preparing the program for the rural section. He emphasized the difficulty of obtaining an adequate number of sessions because of the regulations of the general society concerning section meetings. Several members of the section suggested the need for improved publication facilities for rural sociologists and for an improved and enlarged annual program to include material of interest to teachers of rural sociology as well as the research and extension personnel. It was also agreed upon in the meeting that those who are interested in discussing the promotion of rural sociology research in the experiment stations and those interested in the development of the research program in the Division of Farm Population and Rural Life will meet later at Room A, of the Commodore Hotel for an informal afternoon discussion with Dr. Carl Taylor.

Rural areas continue to face a series of challenges; many are likely to have profound impacts on the vitality of these places over the long term. Of central concern is whether the rural sociological enterprise, a potentially vital source of information and guidance on such diverse issues, will be able to effectively respond to such challenges. The author argues that in order to strengthen its relevance and viability in coming years, the rural sociological profession must embrace three important shifts. First, it must modify the manner in which it engages in the production of new knowledge by pursuing a more balanced portfolio of investments in disciplinary and transdisciplinary research. Second, it must take a bold step to build bridges to new entities whose missions, goals, and values closely align with those of the Rural Sociological Society. And third, it must take a more proactive role in generating quality, scientifically sound information that is aligned with the needs of federal and state policy communities, particularly information that can better articulate how policies are likely to impact rural people and places. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explore how feminist researchers informed by standpoint theoretical frameworks employ the process of self-reflection to counter the reproduction of inequalities in ethnographic investigation. Although it is not a cure for this dilemma, we argue that researchers can be self-conscious about the ways in which they reproduce power in the course of their work; furthermore, sustained attention to these dynamics will enrich ethnographic accounts. We begin by outlining the diverse ways in which feminist enthnographers draw on standpoint epistemology to generate strong reflexive methodological strategies. Then we describe challenges posed by postmodern and postcolonial critics, and outline how feminists have contributed to these to these debates and have responded with innovative methodological strategies, especially in relation to self-reflexive techniques. In conclusion, we discuss how rural sociologists might incorporate these methodological insights into their ethnographic investigations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologists have disagreed sharply over whether rapid, re- source-related community growth leads to disproportionate increases in criminal activities. Enough studies have now accumulated, however, to permit a more comprehensive assessment. The existing studies fall into three categories. The first two, which employ county-level data and victimization surveys, have encountered inconclusive and mixed results. By contrast, the 23 before-and-after comparisons in specific communities have been highly consistent: All but 2 of the 23 report greater increases in criminal activity than in population (p < .0001 by the sign test). The mean ratio of increased crime to increased population is over 4.4 to 1; regression analyses lead to more conservative ratios ranging as low as 3.2 to I and as high as 3.6 to I. Despite considerable variations in approaches, methods, and study communities, sufficiently consistent findings show that simple regression equations explain 85-98 percent of the variance. The weight of the accumulated evidence indicates that increases in criminal behaviors are significantly more than proportional to increases in populations in rapid-growth communities. Data from other studies would argue against a generic "social pathology" hypothesis; instead, the accumulated findings may best be explained by narrowly focusing on changes in community social structure that accompany rapid growth and result in impairment of informal social controls, particularly the declines in a community's density of acquaintanceship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the author's response to various critics on issues related to rural sociology. The author says that an intellectual crisis in rural sociology was a coming crisis in western sociology. The paradigm concept is of heuristic value which explains "more-or-less" usage of it. The author further says that rural sociology is at a truly interesting point in time. Much of its most senior leadership is close to retirement. In its place is, if you will, the next generation. In the short run, this is the group that will lead the discipline. The paradigms they subscribe to and help to develop will provide the intellectual frames of reference within which many rural sociologists will work.

Falk and Zhao (1989) have recently suggested that increased theoretical diversity characterizes the last decade of published research in Rural Sociology. We suggest that this claim is premature, given paradigmatic trends in the larger discipline of sociology. From a reanalysis of data sources and the use of an analytical framework based on the partial paradigm concept, we conclude that rural sociology is attempting to further integrate theory, methodology, and image of the subject matter within a positivistic partial paradigm framework. We further suggest that rural sociologists continue their pursuit of a reflexive understanding of the practice of social science as an integral part of their research agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents information on the establishment of the Rural Sociological Society which was founded in response to the conditions which resulted from the economic crisis known as the Great Depression. Rural sociologists have been involved in responding to social conditions created by the rural crisis of the 1980s which shares similarities with the social and economic conditions in rural areas a half-century ago. Rural sociologists have played key roles in the development of rural policy. In addition, rural sociologists have also come to occupy an increasing number of academic and research-administrator positions which have allowed them to affect research, teaching, and extension agendas relative to rural issues.

The current social and economic conditions of agriculture and rural America provide an excellent opportunity for rural sociologists to make significant contributions in research, teaching, and extension. There are, however, forces at work that are challenging the resource base of rural sociology. Rural sociologists need to initiate several actions to expand our program base. We also need to expand our linkages to the general scientific community and to increase communication among members of the Rural Sociological Society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The sociologist has for a number of decades been called upon to render practical service in fields of social maladjustment, especially in the fields of crime and poverty, and has for many years conducted researches and written books in the fields of normal social behavior and conditions, but by and large it has been only during the last eight years, beginning with the Hoover Commissions, and greatly increasing during the New Deal, that he has been called upon to render actual counsel and service in studying and guiding large public activity programs. Concerning the criticism and censure of sociology and the sociologist by other social scientists, there are probably two broad generalizations which will cover the situation. In the first place, sociology is always dealing with phenomena, which are also at least partially the phenomena of other social sciences, and sometimes with biological phenomena. The sociologist must therefore expect and should welcome the critical judgment on his work of these other scientists.

The contemporary energy situation raises new problems for rural development which require fresh thinking and perhaps some reorientation by sociologists. Five major frameworks for the sociological analysis of energy - rural development interactions in developing countries are critically evaluated. The frameworks are appraised in terms of their conceptualization of energy and its social significance, and the sociological variables emphasized. It is argued that despite the relative unfamiliarity of energy to many sociologists, an uncritical acceptance of the models. concepts, and assumptions of technological perspectives on energy is unwarranted. Energy reductionism. in particular, is a technological imperative that can have a very significant impact on the characteristics of sociological analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As reflected in rural Sociology textbooks, rural sociologists have typically believed that rural people in general and Farmers in particular, place a much lower value on formal education than do their urban counterparts (Bertrand, 1958:229; Rogers and Bertrand. 1972:152). Most of us have known this fact for so long that we do not remember where we learned it or in what studies this empirical generalization was first set forth. Thus, we argue that the notion of a lower priority among rural people for formal education has become part and parcel of our rural subdisciplinary wisdom. The purpose of this brief note is to question this traditional wisdom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Judging from sources such as textbooks and journal indices, there is no such thing as the study of rural ecology. In reality, sociologists have long been studying ecological relationships in rural areas, but the term rural ecology has not been used as an umbrella under which studies in that field are grouped, synthesized, and built upon. The objective here is to propose a synthesis, under a single unifying framework, of some old and new efforts in rural sociology that focus directly on, or have as an important underlying dimension, the human ecology of rural areas. Such a synthesis is not only important in the development of rural sociology as a field of study, but is also basic to the work of increasing numbers of rural sociologists who have recently given emphasis In important areas of research such as agricultural sociology, rural development, and environmental sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we argue that rural sociologists have, for the most part, pursued perspectives which largely ignore the actor's view of the world. We suspect that this has led to a form of theoretical-empirical myopia influencing what is known and can be known about the empirical world, including the concept "rural." We suggest that rural sociologists at least consider viewing the world as an on-going accomplishment rather than as a take-for-granted facticity. Our thesis is very much akin to Feyerabens's "plea for tolerance in matters epistemological," albeit with a "rural" twist to it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Daniel Patrick Moynihan's thesis that males in low income black families do not adequately meet the economic demand of their nuclear families was examined by investigating the effects of marital and parental status positions on male agriculture workers' earnings. Comparisons of these effects by race were also made to see how the earnings of black male workers compared with the earnings of white male workers. Generally the findings showed that black males earn more if they have a wife and child (or children). The effect of the marital position on earnings was significantly lower for blacks than for whites, however. No difference was found in the case of the parental position. In spite of minor differences by race, we conclude that the findings question Moynihan's thesis, since higher earnings were associated with the black males' family status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interest in community satisfaction as a research topic has been increasing among rural sociologists. Although the concept is promising, it offers a set of conceptual problems which must be addressed prior to application and measurement. The purpose of this article is to offer some suggestions which might place community satisfaction within a useful theoretical framework. Specifically, it is argued that community satisfaction can be profitably viewed as one dimension of the definition of the situation, where satisfaction refers to definitional and community a situational component. The theoretical implications and operational possibilities of such a perspective are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article describes the work activities of the extension sociologist, the relative advantage and disadvantage of extension roles in relation to teaching or research roles, and the relevance of sociological training and research for extension work. Detailed descriptions of the data base used in this article appear in the studies previously cited. Nevertheless, it is worth repeating that information was solicited from all 50 extension directors in 1975. The respondents were organized in four categories. First, those who received 50 percent or more of their funding from the Extension Service. Second, those who received minor funding from the Extension Service, 49 percent or less, with most funding coming from teaching or research. Third, sociologists in teaching or research who occasionally provided information to, or consulted with, those in extension but received no funding from the Extension Service. Fourth, those who worked extensively with sociological information but with graduate degrees from related disciplines.

The utility of metropolitan and urban dominance constructs for dealing with patterning of noneconomic and nondemographic factors in hinterland areas is explored by examining attitudes toward selected aspects of traditional morality within a large (N=11,465) sample of Pennsylvania adolescents living in farm, open country, and small town residence categories. In general, as miles from city centers increased, the degree of adherence to traditional attitudes also increased. The patterning in correlation terms was equal to that shown in others' research for economic and demographic variables. The dominance measures compared favorably to place or residence as explanatory factors. It is suggested that ecological dominance be explored more vigorously by rural sociologists interested in trying to understand rurality in America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various reports published within the issue, including one of Jess Gilbert's Presidential Address and commentaries by Michael Burawoy and John Gaventa.