"How Many Are We?".

The article provides statistical information regarding sociologists in the U.S. as of 1972. The U.S. Office of Education annually undertakes a survey of earned degrees in each academic field by each institution of higher learning. Their latest report includes data for 1969-70 based on a total of 1,617 institutions. The entry for sociology in this report provides one operational definition of the number of sociology departments in the U.S. As a conservative estimate, then, there are at least 988 departments of sociology in the 1,617 institutions of higher learning in the U.S. presumably, sociology is also offered in most of the other colleges and universities but no degrees were reported as conferred from these schools in 1969-70. It should also be noted that these data do not include reference to community or junior colleges. Another source of data on the number of departments can be found in the 1972-73 edition of the Guide to Graduate Departments of sociology published by the American Sociological Association. The Guide reports the number of graduate departments in the U.S. and Canada. Over the four editions, the Guide has listed the following number of departments in the two countries: 1969--169; 1970--178; 1971--184; 1972--175.