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This study identified the 100 most impactful global contributors to religion journals and mapped their respective disciplinary affiliations. To conduct this investigation, we performed a secondary data analysis of a Scopus-derived database featuring the world's leading scientists. The mean contributor published 51.93 papers, had an h-index of 13.57, and an hm-index 11.50. Most contributors were located in the USA with the most common disciplinary affiliations being religion, non-specialized (n = 22), sociology, non-specialized (n = 21), sociology of religion (n = 20), and theology (n = 11). The results reveal that religion discourse is populated by some of the leading scholars in the world. Leveraging their expertise can help advance the field's knowledge development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The main purpose of this paper is to provide a biographical sketch of the late Hans L. Zetterberg and a historical background to a translation of an essay based on a lecture given by Zetterberg in Stockholm in 1995. In it, he recounts his time at the Department of Sociology at Columbia University in the years 1953–1964. This essay is full of insights into an inspiring and formative period for Zetterberg in the United States, particularly in the stimulating milieu that was Columbia, at this time the center of American sociology led by Robert K. Merton and Paul Lazarsfeld. In the introduction to this translated essay, I give a brief overview of the establishment of sociology as a discipline in Sweden, and the transfer of knowledge between the United States and Sweden (and Europe, more broadly), embodied in Hans Zetterberg. In the post-WWII years, American sociology, which had a strong positivistic imprint, played an important role in shaping the beginnings of Swedish sociology. However, the transfer of knowledge went both ways, with Zetterberg, a semi-central and often neglected figure, being both a significant contributor to sociology at Columbia in its period of greatest prominence, and in his native Sweden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relatively few studies have examined the construct of self-esteem among Mexican immigrant adolescents in the United States, and most studies have focused on the independent influence of variables as opposed to adopting an ecological perspective. The present study examined individual, familial, and societal predictors associated with the self-esteem of Mexican immigrant youth. This study also examined the moderator effects of bilingualism, family cohesion, and parent-adolescent conflict on the relationship between perceived societal discrimination and Mexican immigrant adolescents' self-esteem. Hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted drawing data from Wave 2 of the Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study (CILS). The sample consisted of 575 Mexican immigrant adolescents. The results indicated that academic achievement, bilingualism, and family cohesion were positively associated with self-esteem, while parent-adolescent conflict and societal discrimination were negatively associated with self-esteem. Additionally, both bilingualism and parent-adolescent conflict moderated the relationship between perceived societal discrimination and self-esteem. The findings of this study suggest that in order to protect the self-esteem of Mexican immigrant adolescents, social work practitioners need to target individual, familial, and societal context factors associated with self-esteem. Specifically, family cohesion appears to be most salient to the self-esteem of Latino adolescents. Bilingualism also protects Mexican immigrant youth from the harmful effects of societal discrimination. It is also crucial to identify sources of parent-adolescent conflict among Mexican immigrant families and work to resolve them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the New Voices Initiative for the history of sociology in the U.S. that was formulated during the 2019 American Sociological Association (ASA) Annual Meeting in New York. Topics include the relevance of the history of sociology discipline to academic sociology, the views of early career scholars about the history of sociology as a risky proposition for significant intellectual investment, and an overview of the conception of the New Voices Initiative. Also discussed are the opportunities and needs surrounding sociology's history.

Pragmatism, especially the works of Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, John Dewey, and George Herbert Mead, is in the midst of a revival in American sociology. American sociologists have drawn on these authors in their addressment of contemporary debates in the wider disciplinary field. Placing these contemporary applications of pragmatist thought alongside the broader intellectual tradition of pragmatic philosophy, however, demonstrates tensions associated with this revival. This paper draws on the work of John Dewey as a particularly stark case of the conflict between the philosophy of social science espoused by the original pragmatist philosophers and the use of their ideas in American sociology today. This treatment affords the opportunity to recover a vision for social science which has been overlooked in the contemporary pragmatist revival with deep implications for the practice of social science today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of caste played a prominent role in the early American sociology of race and race relations. The concept was developed largely through case studies of racially segregated communities in the American Deep South during the 1930s. While the concept of caste was largely abandoned by the middle of the 1950s, elements of a caste theory remain useful for both understanding contemporary work on race relations and the development of the sociology of race. This paper proposes a revised and expanded conception of caste grounded in the Black-White dynamic of American race relations. This approach builds on the performance circuit framework of economic sociology, arguing that "caste" refers to the roles, rules, and etiquette that govern economic interaction and give them meaning. The expanded approach develops three premises that highlight the consequences of caste. First, the entanglement of occupational and social roles is a key component of a racialized caste system. Second, deeply rooted racial animus prevents the social cohesion necessary to transition out of an economy defined by caste. Finally, the precarity of nominal class advancement within the dominated caste inhibits organizing that might challenge the overall system. This reevaluation of the caste concept resolves many of the limitations of the original caste school and bridges the divide between cultural and economic-based analyses of race relations in the early days of the American social sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

C. Wright Mills' The Sociological Imagination (1959) represents one of the most influential texts of postwar American sociology. The title has become a catchphrase that stands for a style of thought that transcends both theoretical dogma and the constraints of mere methodological rule following. This article sets out to show that Mills' vision of the sociological imagination had more in common with the then dominant lines of scholarship than his broadside against Parsonian grand theory and Lazarsfeldian abstracted empiricism in the main part of the book would suggest. Among the tools that Mills introduced as fostering the sociological imagination were 2 × 2 tables. The article traces the use of such tables over time and across scholarly communities and shows that, contrary to Mills' own estimate, these tables describe a common nexus between his own work and that of Parsons and Lazarsfeld. All three scholars made ample use of this formal tool to construct sociological arguments at central places of their oeuvre. Given its shared use across otherwise divergent schools, the 2 × 2 table is a prime example for what historians of science have called paper tools, i.e. statistical formulas, algorithms, tables, diagrams, graphs, etc., that structure scientific research across different schools of thought and theoretical approaches. Drawing on the notion of paper tools, the article advances a post-Kuhnian perspective on the history of sociology that shifts the research focus from substantive ideas to formal tools and demonstrates elements of commensurability among presumably incommensurable schools of thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Erving Goffman's written legacy bears on sociology as a whole, or so he argued in his Presidential Address to the American Sociological Association (Goffman, 1983). However, while being celebrated as important to the discipline, his work is also interpreted in inconsistent ways, often downplayed or marginalized, and even neglected. This paper claims that Goffman's "well known aversion to self-disclosure" (Shalin, 2013) does not justify overlooking his trajectory, from the unknown "margins" of a Canadian small town to the elusive "center" of American sociology—and much less does it justify still circulating assessments of his personality, crafted while overlooking his life experiences—and, especially, his writings. Anecdotal evidence of his "enigmatic" personality (Lemert, 2003), or "bad-boy outrageousness" (Berger, 1986), works as a derailing tactic, leading to unwarranted appraisals of Goffman's personality—and, more importantly, to the neglect of crucial aspects of his work. From a theoretical standpoint, Simmel's treatment of "the stranger" as a social relationship, and Merton's concept of "moral alchemy", are used here to try to make some sense of the mixture of celebration and neglect still surrounding "Goffman". Historical data was gathered in part from the "Erving Goffman Archives'' (Shalin, 2013). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on the career, relevance and human side of U.S. sociologist Talcott Parsons.

An introduction to a series of articles on the works of U.S. sociologist Talcott Parsons is presented.

The decline of interest among sociologists in the works of Talcott Parsons over the last several decades has been driven in substantial respects by a belief that he was personally conservative in his political views and that his theoretical formulations were rigidly tied to a conservative view of social order. The present paper reviews Parsons' major political involvements through the course of his career from his student days through the last decade of his life. The review demonstrates that Parsons was a typical academic liberal of his time and that his liberalism was expressed especially in several major applied essays. In the 1930s, he was an early and active opponent of Nazism. During World War II, he taught professionals to administer occupied territories and nations effectively. After the war, he advocated for government support of the social sciences, citing the important contributions they had made to the war effort. In the 1950s, he wrote a famous critical analysis of the Joseph McCarthy movement in American politics. In the 1960s, he contributed supportive essays to the Civil Rights movement. Later in the decade and in the 1970s, he contributed to the protection of academic freedoms while also proposing accommodations to the demands of the student movement for more "relevant" teaching and greater participation in university governance. Throughout his career, he taught and worked closely with students of various political views and sought to protect their rights of freedom of political expression. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper provides insights on the contemporary relevance of Talcott Parsons's writings by analyzing 20 textbooks from Austria, Germany, Great Britain and the United States, published in 1999–2019. Whether having knowledge of Parsons is helpful to today's students and other interested readers, and what knowledge, deserves consideration. Therefore , the paper asks: Which future gains of readers did textbook authors envision when they chose, in their own present, to discuss (or not) sociological writings from long ago? In order to understand what future opportunities authors wanted to create for readers, as well as how they chose to discuss Parsons to this end, the paper draws on Niklas Luhmann's notion of memory. The analysis reveals several key competencies that student and other interested readers might acquire through having knowledge of Parsons' writings and its critiques. These potentials would have gone unnoticed if authors had assessed Parsons's relevance only according to whether he adequately considered conflict or not, as has been done in many debates about his work until today. Moreover, through analyzing how authors remembered Parsons, I distilled two key selective criteria: First, what must be remembered in order to enable readers to acquire those competencies? Second, which memories would be impeding for readers and thus be better left out? These criteria are relevant for research, as well. Looking at the future, it would be desirable that sociologists let Parsons assist them in their research in many different ways, if possible. As a result, we might see a revival of Parsons that enables genuine advancement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution to consideration of "Talcott Parsons and Politics" explores the kind of optimism of sociology's "incurable theorist" that is evident in his mature view of the USA as the world's "New Lead" society. Statements related to optimism can be identified in his extensive writings and this article focuses upon its expression when as an "early career academic" in the late 1920s and 1930s he laid the foundations for his life-long work in sociology. Parsons' sociology developed as the USA's twentieth century contribution unfolded. His "moderate optimism" about the viability of the American experiment shares deeply and intimately in his claim that sociology had finally emerged as an analytical social science oriented by the theory of social action. His mature work considers the "societal community" to be the peculiar focus for sociology's special scientific attention. The USA has taken on this "New Lead" role at the same time that the societal community itself has emerged from within American experience. The discussion here is as much a personal memoire of the author, revisiting efforts to understand how the earliest stages of Parsons's sociology were maintained by him over a long career. Parsons sociological scholarship exhibited American characteristics. As sociology's "incurable theorist" he sought understanding of his own (American) situation, and its context, past and present, seeking to promote a social science that contributed positively to global society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social and built environments may influence physical activity (PA). However, evidence for South Asian Americans (SAA), a group with low PA levels and high cardiometabolic risk, is lacking. We assessed the association between five neighborhood factors and PA behaviors in a community-based cohort of SAA. Data were from the Mediators of Atherosclerosis in South Asians Living in America (MASALA) Study 2010–2013 (n = 906). Adjusted multivariable models stratified by sex regressing PA behaviors on neighborhood factors were run. Higher neighborhood social cohesion was associated with 17% more PA MET minutes/week in men (p < 0.01), but not in women. Having a park/playground near home was associated with meeting PA guidelines (odds ratio (95% CI): men: 3.14 (1.20–8.24); women: 3.67 (1.17–11.52). Neighborhood factors were associated with favorable PA behaviors in SAA. PA interventions for SAA that increase neighborhood social cohesion or focus on linking individuals with local resources may be effective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The long-standing divide between sociology as an activist discipline vs. sociology as a science is examined in light of the current trend for American sociology focus on a limited set of justice issues resulting from inequalities and discrimination against certain categories of persons. Increasingly, this trend is pushing sociology toward become an activist discipline and, as a result, an ideologically-oriented discipline in its teaching and research activities. The outcome of this trend is the growing marginalization of those committed to sociology as a science in departments and academic meetings, resulting in demoralization of sociology's scientists and their escalating concern over their fate in a discipline increasingly mimicking a social movement organization. Even more damaging to sociology will be a loss of respect inside academia and a loss of relevance among publics not sharing American sociology's political biases. Furthermore, the chance for sociology to use its vast store of knowledge to help clients of all types solve their organizational problems will be lost if sociology is defined as a political rather than scientific enterprise. Sociology will thus willingly leave the vast resource niche for applications of social science knowledge to disciplines that know little about social organization (i.e., economics and psychology). Sociology will endure, of course, but it will not realize its enormous potential for reshaping societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The scope and structure of social theory are often analyzed as part of or preamble to theorizing proper. This paper takes an indirect approach to the metatheoretical question, "what does social theory look like in terms of scope and structure?" by analyzing a form of social theory that sociologists tend not to think of as social theory: namely, judge-made law produced in Federal appellate courts. We argue that judges engage in social theorizing on a routine basis, and that they arrive at some of their theoretical claims through a process of theorizing that has features in common with sociological theorizing. The social theorizing of judges holds up a mirror to our own. By recognizing and examining judicial social theorizing as a form of structured, social theorizing, we aim to facilitate a clearer understanding of the social conditions enabling (and constraining) the production of social theory within sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Quality & Quantity was established in 1967 and in 2017 it completed its half century. The journal is interdisciplinary in nature and it mainly discusses methodological application of mathematics and statistics in the social sciences, particularly sociology, economics, and social psychology. It was created with the idea of advancing methodology of the various social studies. This study looks back journey of the journal from 1967 to 2017 aims to develop a bibliometric analysis of all the publications of the journal. Web of Science Core Collection database is used to collect data. The present study discovered the significant contributions of the journal in terms of impact, topics, authors, universities and countries. Utrecht University of Netherlands is the most productive university. Asian Universities are emerging and growing quickly in the recent years. Although USA leads among the countries but Europe leads among the six supranational regions. Finally, the visualization of similarities viewer software is used to present network visualization of the bibliographic coupling, co-citation, citation, co-authorship and co-occurrence of keywords. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When Park died, he left his theory of the human habitat not only incomplete, but in considerable disarray. Although few present-day scholars have demonstrated much interest in building on this critical body of Park’s work, which he based on dominance, it probably represents his most important contribution to American sociology. I argue that the key to systemizing his highly discursive account of the human habitat is to view it from an emergent social evolutionary perspective, which makes it possible to differentiate his notion of “community” from “society,” as well as explain how the two concepts can logically be viewed as both separate and unified entities. A community is not only a necessary stage in the social evolutionary process of producing a society, but it also provides the habitat needed for a society’s later emergence. Among other things, Park’s theory of the human habitat is also criticized for its failure to (1) distinguish dominance from domination, (2) identify the reciprocal relationship existing between power and domination, (3) accurately characterize the nature of the economic order operating in communities, and (4) demarcate a pre-lingual, lingual and literate communal stages that precedes in the social evolutionary process the possible development of a society. In passing, I also point out critical, but often overlooked aspects of Park’s theory of the human habitat that contradict popular characterizations of his work as being purblind to the operation of dominance and power, social Darwinist, conservative, sexist, and racist. Finally, I deduce the implications of his theory for the future emergence of a “world society.” [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An editorial is presented which offers reflections and researches on the economic sociology. Topics include efforts to become political relevant in sociology with a vision of the best path; examines the important issue of how to use pilot studies in sociological research; and discussion on importance of symbol Gino Germani for the development of sociology in Argentina.

In addition to providing critical medical services to communities, hospitals are also forces of broader change when seen from the perspective of neighborhood development. Over the past few decades the obligation on the part of U.S. nonprofit hospitals to positively impact the communities in which they are located has become entrenched in both U.S. tax law and the practices of many hospitals. This article presents findings from a grounded theory qualitative study of the relationship between a non-profit children's hospital in Columbus, Ohio, and the neighborhood in which it is located. Based on in-depth interviews with local residents and community leaders, findings suggest that community members often interpret distance, safety, and transportation in different, and often counter-intuitive ways. Drawing upon literature from medical geography and sociology, the authors argue that hospitals may benefit from working closely with community members to determine how space is understood and constructed when planning community health interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Population aging has driven a spate of recent research on later-life cognitive function. Greater longevity increases the lifetime risk of memory diseases that compromise the cognitive abilities vital to well-being. Alzheimer's disease, thought to be the most common underlying pathology for elders' cognitive dysfunction (Willis and Hakim 2013), is already the sixth leading cause of death in the United States (Alzheimer's Association 2016). Understanding social determinants of pathological cognitive decline is key to crafting interventions, but evidence is inconclusive for how social factors interact over the life course to affect cognitive function. I study whether early-life exposure to the Great Depression is directly associated with later-life cognitive function, influences risky behaviors over the life course, and/or accumulates with other life-course disadvantages. Using growth curve models to analyze the Health and Retirement Study, I find that early-life exposure to the Great Depression is associated with fluid cognition, controlling for intervening factors-evidence for a critical period model. I find little support for a social trajectory model. Disadvantage accumulates over the life course to predict worse cognitive function, providing strong evidence for a cumulative inequality model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, population health research has focused on understanding the determinants of later-life health. Two strands of that work have focused on (1) international comparisons of later-life health and (2) assessing the early-life origins of disease and disability and the importance of life course processes. However, the less frequently examined intersection of these approaches remains an important frontier. The present study contributes to the integration of these approaches. We use the Health and Retirement Study family of data sets and a cohort dynamic approach to compare functional health trajectories across 12 high-income countries and to examine the role of life course processes and cohort dynamics in contributing to variation in those trajectories. We find substantial international variation in functional health trajectories and an important role of cohort dynamics in generating that variation, with younger cohorts often less healthy at comparable ages than the older cohorts they are replacing. We further find evidence of heterogeneous effects of life course processes on health trajectories. The results have important implications for future trends in morbidity and mortality as well as public policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mass migration of African Americans out of the South during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century represents one of the most significant internal migration flows in U.S.History: Those undertaking the Great Migration left the South in search of a better life, and their move transformed the cultural, social, and political dynamics of African American life specifically and U.S. society more generally. Recent research offers conflicting evidence regarding the migrants' success in translating their geographic mobility into economic mobility. Due in part to the lack of a large body of longitudinal data, almost all studies of the Great Migration have focused on the migrants themselves, usually over short periods of their working lives. Using longitudinally linked census data, we take a broader view, investigating the long-term economic and social effects of the Great Migration on the migrants' children. Our results reveal modest but statistically significant advantages in education, income, and poverty status for the African American children of the Great Migration relative to the children of southerners who remained in the South. In contrast, second-generation white migrants experienced few benefits from migrating relative to southern or northern stayers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a follow-up to our 2016 study, this article presents new findings examining the relationship between same-sex family structure and child health using the 2008-2015 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). After discussing NIHS data problems, we examine the relationship between family structure and a broad range of child well-being outcomes, including school days lost, behavior, parent-rated health, emotional difficulties, and activity limitations. We find both similarities (school days lost, behavior, parent-rated health) and differences (emotional difficulties and activity limitations) across our two studies using different survey years, but our overall conclusions are robust. We further discuss the implications of our findings for future research on this topic, including how to account for biological relatedness in a study on child health in same-sex families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the National Organization for Women (NOW) has endured over time, it has faced significant internal factionalism. In this article, I ask why some of these factions resulted in schisms, while other factions persisted in NOW over time. This is a critical question for understanding how organizational location and factional collective identities combine to produce different outcomes when internal conflict breaks out. My analysis of interview, archival, and secondary data indicates that organizational location influences factions' independent collective identities, shaping what they want and their perceptions of opportunities to change their organization. Compared to national level factions, local factions also lack the ability to use NOW's hierarchical structure to their advantage in their effort to stay. This sheds lights on the distinct patterns of factionalism and schism in formalized groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While cognitive sociology is a relatively new area in U.S. sociology, the subfield has a lengthy history in French sociology. Developing a typology based upon the existing literature, we identify three branches of cognitive sociology in France. The first was initiated by Raymond Boudon, one of the scholars most responsible for popularizing the area, who envisioned cognitive sociology as helping delineate the role of beliefs in rational action. Second, another group of researchers seeks to found sociology upon a naturalistic basis, thus drawing upon the disciplines constitutive of cognitive science (e.g., psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and cognitive anthropology). Finally, the third approach to cognitive sociology in France takes inspiration from linguistics as a foundation for sociological investigations. We conclude the paper by discussing the relationship between these three sub-fields and by examining the relationship between French and American cognitive sociologies in order to identify fruitful directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social Network Analysis (SNA) is a sociology based on interaction that visualizes and models relations between actors. Whereas interaction is approached by classical scholars, we had to wait until the 1970s and the birth of computer science to see social networks analysis develop. This article investigates the influence of SNA in France from the 1980s and wonder if there is a French school of SNA? To do so, we first resume social networks history and highlight its contribution to sociology. Second, we analyze the trajectory and profile of five 'disciplinary entrepreneurs,' whose role in the field is important as they master three necessary languages for SNA: English, Mathematics and Computer Science. Third, in order to put back those individuals in their social structures, we cross SNA with the different French sociological tradition(s) (according to topics and methods). Last, we wonder if the institutionalization process succeeded in the creation of institutions from which a French SNA would be able to expand? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In France over the last four decades increasing interest in the small, the specific and the subjective can be observed. This involves a shift away from a holist approach towards social analysis focused on the individual and often carried out by researchers as specified and reflexive individuals. To be understood, this movement must be situated in the context of the development of French sociology, largely dominated at its origins by Durkheimian sociology. Thus, when the individual has appeared this is often not in his or her own right, but as representative of a social trend or group. As from the 1980s, new perspectives, very often imported from American sociology bring into play individual action, emotions and bodies, often studied as socially shaped. More recently, individual characteristics have been examined as a constraint on the possibilities of action, and discussion has also revolved around the reality of the person as an autonomous subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Christian Smith's paper 'The Incoherence of 'Culture' in American Sociology' is a valuable provocation that can prompt us to reflect on the role of concepts and on the role of agreement on the definition of concepts in scientific research. In this comment paper, I raise questions about Smith's empirical expectation that sociologists should agree on a concept of culture based on debates in the sociology of science. I also suggest that in terms of the future agenda for the sociology of culture, we should distinguish between dialogue and clarification on the one hand, which I agree is needed, and standardization on the other hand, which seems incompatible with open-minded empirical research. Rather than work on agreement on what culture is, we might work on clarifying relevant distinctions among dimensions of culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The meaning of the concept 'culture' as used in American sociology is incoherent. Despite the advances and maturing of cultural sociology, the central idea of 'culture' itself remains conceptually muddled. This article demonstrates this critical point by analyzing the definitions, meanings, and uses of the word 'culture' in the field of cultural sociology's most significant, recent edited volumes, handbooks, readers, companions, annual review chapters, and award-winning books and journal articles. Arguing for the scholarly importance of conceptual coherence, this article calls for more disciplined and cooperative theoretical work to clarify and move toward a more standardized meaning of 'culture' in American sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been common for studies presented as about American sociology as a whole to rely on data compiled from leading journals ( American Sociological Review [ASR] and American Journal of Sociology [AJS]), or about presidents of the American Sociological Association [ASA], to represent it. Clearly those are important, but neither can be regarded as providing a representative sample of American sociology. Recently, Stephen Turner has suggested that dominance in the ASA rests with a 'cartel' initially formed in graduate school, and that it favors work in a style associated with the leading journals. The adequacy of these ideas is examined in the light of available data on the last 20 years, which show that very few of the presidents were in the same graduate schools at the same time. All presidents have had distinguished academic records, but it is shown that their publication strategies have varied considerably. Some have had no ASR publications except their presidential addresses, while books and large numbers of other journals not normally mentioned in this context have figured in their contributions, as well as being more prominent in citations. It seems clear that articles in the leading journals have not been as closely tied to prestigious careers as has sometimes been suggested, and that if there is a cartel it has not included all the presidents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a commentary on Christian Smith's 'The Conceptual Incoherence of 'Culture' in American Cultural Sociology.' This paper accepts Smith's finding of conceptual incoherence at the disciplinary level and argues that it is a symptom of empiricism in American sociology. The paper suggests we employ conceptual analysis as practiced by analytical philosophy and proceeds to show how the use of that methodology can resolve the problem regarding the meaning of culture. In the end, the paper defends a conception of culture along the lines of Archer's (1996) intelligibilia, interpreted as action and its products bearing social reasoning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The first part is an autoethnographer's account of a madcap journey through America's disciplinary institutions, ranging from a Mennonite colony and prison to the counterculture and mental hospitals, and on to political organizations and universities. Using Goffman's distinction between front stage and backstage as a metaphor, the author is an embodied and embedded eyewitness-covertly conducting institutional ethnographies (Merleau-Ponty 2012 [1945]). With a backstage perspective, this rogue researcher pierces the front-stage veneer of social-control institutions. The second part is an audacious revisionist history of American sociology, a confounding counter-narrative that demystifies mainstream sociology's hegemonic tale of self-congratulation. The author narrates and deciphers the successive sociological generations of the founders, scientific professionals, Sixties' insurgents, and the new, poseur public sociologists. The article concludes with a renewed vision of a populist sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Article publication in the field of sociology has proliferated. Data are presented on change in the number of sociology journals over time, the patterns of publication productivity by faculty in differently ranked sociology programs, and the patterns of article output by faculty of different age cohorts located in top-, middle-, and bottom-ranked sociology departments in the United States. Data are inconsistent with findings from the sociology of science, which elaborate a pattern of generally low productivity, and which describe sharp differences in publication by the age and organizational location in which academics work. The reasons for proliferation, attributable to historic shifts that have affected the terms of academic work in the late 20th century, are discussed. Proliferation of publication is not unique to sociology, but neither are its effects on fields monolithic. Comparisons and contrasts to other fields are made throughout the discussion. The proliferation of publication poses significant implications for the status of sociology and sociologists. While increased output may be associated with the advancement of science and scholarship in some disciplines, it is both a consequence and cause of demise in others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term 'pure sociology' reflects some of the most important disciplinary concerns that have helped shape the intellectual development of sociology in the United States, particularly in the effort to establish disciplinary boundaries and achieve academic legitimacy. To flesh out the thesis, the current paper recounts briefly the early discussions associated with pure sociology before examining the various usages in the U.S. since the establishment of the discipline. While selected classical theorists employed the concept in framing their discussions, pure sociology represents a distinctively American idiom. The etymological history coincides with the institutionalization of sociology in U.S. universities, while informing key debates about the nature of sociological analysis throughout the past 120 years. Drawing upon an electronic search of multiple databases, a content analysis highlights the prevalence of the different meanings that mainly U.S. social scientists have attached to the concept. The paper then traces the varying trajectories of the many different usages over time, concluding with a discussion of the ascendance of Donald Black's theoretical paradigm that has appropriated the term with considerable success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Submitting articles to journals has become a difficult and time-consuming process, as has reviewing and re-reviewing articles that too often get the dreaded R&R letter. The underlying problem here is as old as the discipline, particularly in American sociology. Very different criteria are used in producing scholarship and reviewing its merits for publication; and current ways of editing journals aggravate this fundamental problem. The Big Divide in sociology is between a discipline that seeks to be a science and one that does not; and there is no easy reconciliation among those on either side of this divide. In this paper, the effects of this divide on journal publishing are reviewed in terms of the consequences of the Big Divide for the discipline. A simple but radical proposal is offered at the end for how sociologists can be put out over their misery in having to deal with the consequences of this Big Divide in their departments, in professional meetings, and most importantly, in publishing their intellectual products in journals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While there has been an escalating trend in the number of smokeless tobacco uses, mainly snuff, in the United States, it is unclear whether smokeless tobacco users are a homogenous class. The present investigation examines this question and identifies subtypes of smokeless tobacco users in order to better understand the characteristics of these individuals and guide appropriate intervention. Data on smokeless tobacco users (N = 2504) derived from the National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions was employed. A range of antisocial behaviors, from reflecting non-violent deviant acts, irresponsibility, and a disengaged lifestyle, to aggression and violence were used to estimate the number of subtypes of smokeless tobacco users using latent class analysis. Four latent classes emerged: Normative Class (50.2 %), Deviant Class (21.9 %), Disengaging Class (17.2 %), and Antisocial Class (10.5 %). Logistic regression shows that major depression, alcohol use disorder, and marijuana use disorder were associated with Deviant Class (OR's from 2.0 to 10.5). The same array of psychiatric disorders and general anxiety disorder were associated with greater odds of membership in the Disengaging Class (OR's from 2.6 to 7.4). Aforementioned psychiatric disorders and illicit drug use disorder were associated with the Antisocial Class (OR's from 3.8 to 38.1). Findings indicate that smokeless tobacco users are a heterogeneous population that may benefit from differential intervention strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

American sociology has consistently leaned toward the political Left. This ideological skew hinders sociological insight in three ways. First, the scope of research projects is constrained: sociologists are discouraged from touching on taboo topics and ideologically unpalatable facts. Second, the data used in sociological research have been limited. Sociologists neglect data that portray conservatives positively and liberals negatively. Data are also truncated to hide facts that subvert a liberal narrative. Third, the empathic understanding of non-liberal ideologies is inhibited. Sociologists sometimes develop the erroneous belief that they understand alternative ideologies, and they fail to explore non-liberal ways of framing sociological knowledge. Some counterarguments may be raised against these theses, and I address such counterarguments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tracks Mead's induction into the sociological canon, focusing in particular on American sociologists who made a concerted effort to reconstruct Mead as a systematic social theorist and apply his ideas to empirical research. It distinguishes two interpretive strategies of framing the classic and constructing the canon -- the politics of orthodoxy and politics of the open canon. The politics of orthodoxy aims to ascertain the original meaning and close the textual canon, creating a template relative to which alternative interpretations are judged incomplete, unorthodox, or wrongheaded. The politics of the open canon proceeds on the assumption that the classic text lends itself to conflicting interpretations, that room for the honest difference of opinion must be safeguarded, and that the capacity to further productive inquiry rather than the adherence to an orthodox view recommends a particular construal as viable and canon-worhty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I emphasize the usefulness of American sociology that follows the pragmatic structural-functionalism of the 1930's, heavily influenced by the Chicago School of Sociology, by doing a major critique of Hans Gerth and C. Wright Mills, Character and Social Structure: The Psychology of Social Institutions, emphasizing its holistic and pragmatic qualities, as well as its relation to the work of Max Weber. I then follow up with a critique of French and German social theory, based to a large extent on Louis Dumont, Essays on Individualism: Modern Ideology in Anthropological Perspective. I suggest the usefulness of supplementing what I consider to be their unpragmatic tendencies, particularly with their approaches to the relation between social structure and self-fulfillment, and here I consider the work of Jűrgen Habermas to be only a partial corrective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the ideas of progress and social change in the sociology of Robert Nisbet. It contends that Nisbet is a unique figure in US sociology given his conservative political views, his historicist understanding of social and political thought and his interest in the moral texture of sociological ideas. In terms of structure, the article proceeds in three steps. Firstly, it reconstructs the central tenets of Nisbet's conception of social change, history and progress by looking at the role of metaphors and analogies in the construction of scientific statements. Secondly, the piece revisits his analysis of the rise of modern social institutions in America as an empirical application of sociology's key distinction between community and society. Here, I pay special attention to Nisbet's assessment of America's transformation after WWI, as in his view the Great War paved the way for the definitive modernisation of American society. Finally, the article compares Nisbet's arguments, as developed in the previous two sections, with Karl Löwith and Strauss's critique of modern thought. I contend that mutual lessons can be learnt through an engagement between these philosophical critique of modern social science and Nisbet's own critique of sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nisbet's conception of sociology practiced as an art form: multivocality, tolerance for uncertainty, wealth of invention, reservation of judgement. Tocqueville as exemplar. Nisbet's own writings evaluated in the light of his best insights. A southern white perspective on the central state, shaped in later years by quest for recognition in a rising conservative movement. Lesson to be gleaned: discernment in the deployment of wit, and cultivation of 'caritas', essential features of sociological writing capable of enduring the test of time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Published in 1899, The Philadelphia Negro provides an important template to examine both the use and promise of heterogeneity as one of the earliest pillars in the establishment of American sociology. In this paper, I locate the notion of heterogeneity within W.E.B. Du Bois's classic The Philadelphia Negro to demonstrate both the historical roots of the concept and also Du Bois's use of the concept as key to his production of new sociological knowledge. As will be shown, Du Bois explicitly and implicitly disrupts existing notions of heterogeneity and of a monolithic Black population by emphasizing the intraracial variation thereof; thus Du Bois's The Philadelphia Negro intervention amplifies the role of heterogeneity as a tool for uncovering variation that produces incisive sociological theorization and analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between 1915 and the late 1930s W.I. Thomas developed a theory of human motivation steering a middle course between determinism (biological or social) and unfettered free will. The theory of the four wishes posited that all human beings, across time and place, are driven by a set of connected wishes mediated by the social and physical environment. These are the wish for new experience, the wish for security, the wish for recognition, and the wish for response. Between 1917 when Thomas first published the wishes and the early 1930s when the wishes fell out of use, they were the dominant micro theory of motivation invoked by sociologists in the United States (particularly those associated with the Chicago School). This paper explores the rise and fall of Thomas's wishes in the context of the sociology of ideas, with particular emphasis on fluctuations in Thomas's professional status. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Peter Baehr, Katelin Albert, Eleanore Townsley and Neil Gross raise a variety of issues in relation to American Sociology: From Pre-Disciplinary to Post-Normal (). In response, I defend the claim that the revival of sociology enrollments after the 1980s owes something to the concentration on gender issues and the feminization of sociology. I defend the claim that the response to the enrollment crisis was a rational strategy which succeeded. I also consider challenges to my depiction of the caste system in American sociology against the idea that there is a continuous distribution of merit. I argue that the changes in American sociology during this period need to be understood against the larger backdrop of the transformation to post-normal science and the acceptance of openly partisan academic fields. Although I attempted to record rather than evaluate these developments, I respond to Baehr and Townsley's attempt to discern an evaluative stance, and provide a context for this response in relation to the problem of expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stephen Turner's book, American Sociology, is valuable contribution to the history of the field. In this comment paper, however, I raise questions about two of its core claims: that the feminization of American sociology prevented its collapse, and that the discipline has a two-tiered status structure, with activist scholarship located primarily in the lower tier. We should be sure that Turner is right about these points before we accept his evaluation of the current state of the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stephen Turner's rich and informative history navigates the complex and changing landscape of American Sociology. He discusses how political, social, and academic conditions enabled varying forms of sociology and what epistemological and methodological impacts these conditions had on different schools of sociology. Turner's book asks readers to reflect on what sociology is and what place elite and nonelite sociology should have in the discipline. Turner emphasizes the role of feminist sociology and 'activist scholarship,' arguing that current sociology is one where we have in part returned to our early 20th century reformist roots. This paper expands Turner's conversation about the contributions of feminist sociology. I offer this critique to function as an entry point through which to contemplate what elite sociology is, and how it relates to feminist sociology. I argue that Turner under-explores the contributions of feminist sociology by reducing its contributions to advocacy-based scholarship. By placing feminist sociology in opposition to elite sociology, he simplifies the important discussion of elite sociology, and loses sight of feminist sociology's theoretical and methodological strengths. Highlighting aspects of intersectional theory and institutional ethnography, I argue that new elites have emerged in opposition, contrast, and conjunction to the elite that Turner describes, and I hope to further a dialogue on what constitutes 'elite' sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stephen Turner's brief history of American sociology culminates in a description of its current state and prospects. The collapse of the behavioral science ideal, and the aversion to big theory, Turner argues, suggests that sociology is ever more approximating what it was in its early reformist days: a partisan endeavor, oriented to social justice, guided by and legitimized by fact-producing techniques of broadly sociological provenance. The demographic ascendancy of women in the discipline, Turner continues, is likely to accentuate this development and will parallel, rather than transform, the caste-like exclusivity of the top twenty sociology departments and the AJS/ASR nexus. This article examines Turner's analogy of previous partisan expertise with its contemporary manifestations. It argues that the analogy is misleading, and that the 'post-normal' sociology Turner sketches is of doubtful expertise precisely because of its antipathy to serious critical thought and open enquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical binaries constrain Turner's narrative, American Sociology: From Pre-Disciplinary to Post-Normal. The identification of mid-20th century American sociology as a gold standard for judging predisciplinary and post-normal sociology paints the epistemological challenges of the 1960s and 1970s in an unnecessarily negative light. The conflation of feminization with feminism reduces the contributions of Sociologists for Women in Society and collapses them into a narrative about a generational struggle between men. The focus on the elite-mass dynamics of academic labor markets misses the vibrancy of the broader disciplinary project of contemporary sociology. The prospects for 21st century sociology are more positive than Turner imagines. Rather than a scientific failure with a damaged brand, 21st century sociology offers a more reflexive and culturally nuanced form of sociology appropriate for the deeply unequal, global and mediatized social world we inhabit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]