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Op-eds in newspapers represent an important form of intellectual debate that helps shape public opinion and elite policy. For academics, writing op-eds offers an opportunity to publicize a book or other research findings, and to gain influence and attention for their ideas. Given a reward structure within the academy that stresses peer review publication, professors are at a decided structural disadvantage, compared to journalists, when they try to enter the oped space. Thus op-eds give us a useful window into how academics and public sociologists enter the public sphere in comparison to columnists, think-tanks, politicians, social movement activists, and corporate leaders. Drawing on the innovative theoretical approach outlined by Ronald Jacobs and Eleanor Townsley, this paper offers an analysis of a selected set of Canadian op-eds and suggests a research agenda for studying op-eds in Canada. Not surprisingly, we find that journalists dominate the space of the op-ed in Canada. We also find that sociologists are fairly underrepresented compared to our obvious competitors in the social sciences. We conclude with thoughts about the implications of our findings for further research in the sociology of sociology, public sociology and the study of the social space of opinion. We also offer informed suggestions regarding normative and practical issues that Canadian sociologists should consider in light of these broader empirical patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Michael Burawoy's plea for a "legitimate" public sociology that would help to realize a progressive, social democratic political project, in particular by contributing to the spread of human rights, has rekindled a very old, heated, and divisive debate over the nature and purpose of the discipline. My paper focuses on the contribution to this debate made by John Porter (1921-1979), probably Canada's most famous and influential English-language sociologist to date. Following in a tradition of "New Liberal" scholarship developed in England near the end of the 19th century by Leonard Hobhouse and others, and introduced into Canadian academia and public service in the early decades of the 20th century, Porter developed and practised a type of methodologically sophisticated, "scientific" sociology that rejected the doctrine of value neutrality and advocated a form of "engaged practical intellectualism" intended to create a more thoroughgoing democracy in Canada. His approach is significant not only because it is an important and undocumented development in Canadian intellectual history, but because it has current relevance. My comparison of Porter's notion of New Liberal sociology and Burawoy's public sociology reveals many parallels between the two and demonstrates that a rereading of Porter's work would add to the current debate on what a "legitimate public sociology" might look like. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The evolution of sociology as a discipline in Canada is intimately related to its institutional position within Canadian universities. As student bodies expanded, not only did the demand for university-based sociologists increase but there was also a demand for society-specific class material for sociology courses. This paper examines the textbook, particularly in the 1970's, as a symbol of changes and developments in the discipline and demonstrates its role in synthesis-building, community-building, and nation-building in anglo-Canadian sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]