SOC 200: SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY, FALL 2005

Professor Christian Smith

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

151 Hamilton Hall, M&W 1:15-2:30, T 4:35-5:25

Course Purposes

This seminar is an introduction to the major issues, problems, positions, and thinkers defining and organizing sociological theory both historically and today. Having successfully completed this course, students should be able to:

1. Locate any specific sociological argument or debate in the larger context of the key intellectual problems, issues, and positions of sociological theory.
2. Identify the significant philosophical and meta-theoretical issues and commitments that underlay different theoretical approaches and positions in sociology.
3. Think and talk clearly and critically about the characteristic intellectual strengths and weaknesses of various theoretical sociological traditions and approaches.
4. Relate the central significance of sociological theory to the practice of empirical sociological research and scholarship in their own empirical analysis and writing.

Course Requirements

1. Regular attendance and active participation in class discussions, including Tuesday discussion sessions.
2. Daily 3-6 pages of notes (typed, 1.5-spaced, Times Roman, 1” margins) summarizing, engaging, and/or evaluating the day’s assigned readings. There is no formula for correctness in this; simply read well and think hard and let that show in your notes.
3. A written final exam covering the material of the course. The final exam may be in-class or a take-home essay or set of essays.

Grad seminar grades are (H) high pass, (P) pass, and (L) low pass. Compared to the undergraduate level, grades are much less important in grad school than is truly learning the material in an engaged and stimulating way and using that as a springboard for doing creative, smart research. Focus on learning intellectually and performing professionally, not on your grades. The standard grade is a P. Rare is the H grade.

Required Readings

All assigned articles and chapters are available for download and printing from the Internet on our course in blackboard.unc.edu (type your onyen and password, choose Soc 200, and go to location in Course Readings). Note that some but not all of the recommended readings are on blackboard. All of the assigned books are worth purchasing if you do not already own them; they are available upstairs in Student Stores (across from the Pit). Assigned books to purchase are:

• Andrew Abbott, 1988, The System of Professions, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Berth Danermark et al., 2002, Explaining Society: Critical Realism in the Social Sciences, New York: Routledge.
• Emile Durkheim, 1982, Rules of Sociological Method, New York: Free Press.
• Emile Durkheim (Karen Fields 1995 translation!), The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Free Press, 1995 (not another version).
• Anthony Giddens, 1984, The Constitution of Society, California.
• Irving Goffman, 1959, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, New York: Anchor.
• Peter Hedström and Richard Swedberg, 1998, Social Mechanisms, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, 1979, The Marx-Engels Reader (Robert Tucker, ed.), New York: W.W. Norton.
• Max Weber, 2002, (Peter Baehr and Gordon Wells, translators), The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, New York: Penguin Books (not another version).

Suggested Background Reading

Sociological Theory

• Robert Nisbet, 1966, The Sociological Tradition, New York: Basic Books.
• George Ritzer, Sociological Theory, New York: Knopf.
• Jeffrey Alexander, 1987, Twenty Lectures, New York: Columbia University Press.
• Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann, 1967, The Social Construction of Reality, New York: Doubleday Anchor.
• Anthony Giddens, The Constitution of Society, California, 1984.
• James Rule, 1997, Theory and Progress in Social Science, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Donald Brown, 1991, Human Universals, New York: McGraw-Hill.

Introductions to Philosophy of Social Science

• Ted Benton and Ian Craib, 2001, Philosophy of Social Science: the Philosophical Foundations of Social Thought, New York: Palgrave.
• Alexander Rosenberg, 1995 (second edition), Philosophy of Social Science, Boulder, CO: Westview.
• Martin Hollis, 2002, The Philosophy of Social Science: An Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Daniel Little, 1991, Varieties of Social Explanation, Boulder: Westview.

Course Meetings, Topics, and Reading Schedule

Class 1: Wed Aug 31 – WHAT IS SOCIOLOGY?

• C. Wright Mills, 1959, “The Promise,” in Mills The Sociological Imagination, New York: Oxford, pp. 3-13.
• Orlando Patterson, 2002, “The Last Sociologist,” New York Times, May 19, 2002, Section 4, Page 15, Column 2.
• Jonathan Turner, 1985, “In Defense of Positivism,” Sociological Theory, 3(2) (Autumn): 24-30.
• David Snow, 1999, “The Value of Sociology,” Sociological Perspectives, 42(1): 1-22.
• Robert Merton, 1967, “On Sociological Theories of the Middle Range,” in Merton, On Theoretical Sociology, New York: Free Press.
• Steven Seidman, 1991, “The End of Sociological Theory: The Postmodern Hope,” Sociological Theory, 9:2 (Fall): 131-146.

• (Recommended) Bent Flyvbjerg, 2001, Making Social Science Matter: Why Social Inquiry Fails and How it Can Succeed Again, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• (Recommended) Robert Lynd, 1939, Knowledge for What? The Place of Social Science in American Culture, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• (Related) George Ritzer and Douglas Goodman, 2001, “Postmodern Social Theory,” Chapter 8 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 151-169 and Norman Denzin, 1986, “Postmodern Social Theory,” Sociological Theory, 4 (Fall): 194-204.

Class 2: Mon Sept 5 – WHAT IS SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY?

• George Ritzer, 1983, “A Historical Sketch of Sociological Theory,” Chapters 1 and 2 of Ritzer, Sociological Theory, New York: Knopf.
• L. Mjøset, 2001, “Theory: Conceptions in the Social Sciences,” in Neil Smelser and Paul Baltes (eds.), International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, Vol. 23, Amsterdam: Elsevier.
• Jonathan Turner, 2001, “Sociological Theory Today,” Chapter 1 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 1-17.
• Jonathan Turner and David Boyns, 2001, “The Return of Grand Theory,” Chapter 18 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 353-378.
• Andrew Abbot, 2004, “Basic Debates and Methodological Practices,” Chapter Two (pp. 41-79) in Abbott, Methods of Discovery: Heuristics for the Social Sciences, New York: Norton.

• (Recommended) Craig Calhoun, 2001, “The Critical Dimension in Sociological Theory,” Chapter 5 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 85-111.
• (Recommended) Pp. xi-73 in James Rule, 1997, Theory and Progress in Social Science, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• (Recommended) John Gerring, 2001, pp. xi-31, Social Science Methodology: A Criterial Framework, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• (Recommended) Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, 1994, “Chapter 2: Descriptive Inference,” in Designing Social Inquiry, Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Class 3: Wed Sept 7 – WHAT IS AN “EXPLANATION?”

• Brian Fay and J. Donald Moon, 1977, “What Would an Adequate Philosophy of Social Science Look Like?,” pp. 209-227 in Fay and Moon, Philosophy of Social Science, 7: 209-227; reprinted in Michael Martin and Lee McIntyre (1994), Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 21-35.
• Jon Elster, 1983, pp. 15-88 of Explaining Technical Change, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (read/skim as necessary)
• Charles Kurzman, 2004, “Can Understanding Undermine Explanation?,” Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 34(2) (Sept): 328-351.

Class 4: Mon Sept 12 – DO SOCIAL LAWS EXIST?

• Carl Hempel, 1942, “The Function of General Laws in History,” pp. 35-48 in Journal of Philosophy, vol. 39; reprinted in Michael Martin and Lee McIntyre (1994), Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 43-53.
• Brian Fay, 1983, “General Laws and Explaining Human Behavior,” pp. 103-128 in Daniel Sabia and Jerald Wallulis (eds.), Changing Social Science, Albany: SUNY Press; also reprinted in Michael Martin and Lee McIntyre (1994), Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 91-110.
• Daniel Little, 1998, “On the Scope and Limits of Generalization in the Social Sciences,” Chapter 12 of Microfoundations, Method, and Causation, New Brunswick: Transaction.
• Anthony Giddens, 1984, pp. 343-347 of Giddens, The Constitution of Society, California.
• Mario Bunge, 1998, “The Nomothetic/Ideographic Dichotemy,” Pp. 21-33 in Bunge, Social Science Under Debate, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Jeffrey Lucas, 2003, “Theory-Testing, Generalization, and the Problem of External Validity,” Sociological Theory, 21(3) (Sept): 236-253.

• (Recommended) Christian Smith, “Looking for Laws in All the Wrong Places—And Causes Too,” not yet published manuscript.
• (Recommended) Christian Smith, “On Sociological Generalizations,” unpublished manuscript.
• (Recommended) Maureen Hallinan, 1998, “Sociology and the Goal of Generalization,” Contemporary Sociology, 27(1) (Jan): 21-24.
• (Recommended) Stephen Turner, 1987, “Cause, Law, and Probability,” Sociological Theory, 5 (Spring): 15-40.

• (Recommended) Anthony Giddens, 1978, “Positivism and Its Critics,” Chapter 7 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

Class 5: Wed Sept 14 – WHAT IS CAUSALITY/CAUSATION?

• Judea Pearl, 2000, “Epilogue: The Art and Science of Cause and Effect,” in Pearl, Causality, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• John Goldthorpe, 2000, “Chapter 7: Causation, Statistics, and Sociology,” On Sociology: Numbers, Narratives, and the Integration of Research and Theory, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Christopher Winship and Stephen Morgan, 1999, “The Estimation of Causal Effects from Observational Data,” Annual Review of Sociology, 25: 659-707.
• Stanley Lieberson, 1985, “Rethinking Causality,” Chapter 9 in Lieberson’s Making it Count, Berkeley: California, pp. 174-199.
• Donald Davidson, 2001, “Actions, Reasons, and Causes,” in Davidson Essays on Actions and Events, Oxford: Clarendon Press.

• (Recommended) Michael Sobel, 1996, “An Introduction to Causal Inference,” Sociological Methods and Research, 24(3) (Feb): 353-379.
• (Recommended) Charles Ragin, 2000, Fuzzy Set Sociology, Chicago: Chicago, esp. Part I.
• (Recommended) Christian Smith, “Looking for Laws in all the Wrong Places—and Causes Too,” unpublished manuscript.
• (Recommended) Mariam Thalos, 2003, “Searle’s Fool: How a Constructionist Account of Society Cannot Substitute for a Causal One,” American Journal of Economics and Sociology, 62(1) (January): 105-122. 
• (Recommended) Paul Holland, 1986, “Statistics and Causal Inference,” Journal of the American Statistical Association, 81(396) (Dec): 945-960.
• (Recommended) Gary King, Robert Keohane, and Sidney Verba, 1994, “Chapter 3: Causality and Causal Inference,” in Designing Social Inquiry, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• (Recommended) Christopher Bernert, 1983, “The Career of Causal Analysis in American Sociology,” British Journal of Sociology, 34(2) (June): 230-254.
• (Helpful historical context) Stephen Turner, 2003, “Cause, the Persistence of Teleology, and the Origins of the Philosophy of Science,” Chapter 1 in Stephen Turner and Paul Roth (eds.), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Malden, MA: Blackwell, pp. 21-41.
• (Recommended) Vaughn McKim and Stephen Turner (eds.), 1997, Causality in Crisis?: Statistical Methods and the Search for Causal Knowledge in the Social Sciences, Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press.
• (Recommended) Nancy Cartwright, 1983, “Causal Laws and Effective Strategies,” Essay 1 in Cartwright, How the Laws of Physics Lie, Oxford: Clarendon.

Class 6: Mon Sept 19 – CAUSAL MECHANISMS

• Jon Elster, 1989, “Mechanisms,” pp. 3-10 in Elster, Nuts and Bolts for the Social Sciences, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Peter Hedström and Richard Swedberg, 1998, Social Mechanisms, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Read chapters 1, 3, 4, 8, 9, 10.
• Charles Tilly, 1998, “Of Essences and Bonds,” Chapter 1 in Tilly, Durable Inequality, Berkeley: California.

Class 7: Wed Sept 21 – CRITICAL REALISM

• Berth Danermark et al., 2002, Explaining Society: Critical Realism in the Social Sciences, New York: Routledge.

• (Recommended) Margaret Archer, 1995, Realist Social Theory: A Morphogenetic Approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• (Recommended) George Steinmetz, 1998, “Critical Realism and Historical Sociology,” Comparative Studies of Society and History, 40(1) (Jan): 170-186.
• (Recommended) Andrew Sayer, 2000, Realism in Social Science, Sage.
• (Recommended) Andrew Sayer, 1992, Method in Social Science: A Realist Approach, New York: Routledge.
• (Recommended) Margaret Archer et al., 1998, Critical Realism: Essential Readings, New York: Routledge.
• (Recommended) Roy Bhaskar, 1998, The Possibility of Naturalism: A Philosophical Critique of Contemporary Human Sciences, New York: Routledge.

Note: Class meeting times next week are compressed into Wednesday the 28th; no class meeting on Monday the 26th.

Class 8: Wed Sept 28, regular class time – METHODOLOGICAL INDIVIDUALISM

• Joseph Heath, 2005, “Methodological Individualism,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Internet).
• Raymond Boudon, 1979, pp. 1-85 in Boudon, The Logic of Social Action, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
• James Coleman, 1986, “Social Theory, Social Research, and a Theory of Action,” American Journal of Sociology, 91(6) (May): 1309-1335.
• Anthony Giddens, 1984, “Critical Notes: ‘Structural Sociology’ and Methodological Individualism,” Pp. 207-226 in Giddens, The Constitution of Society, California,
• Ira Cohen, 2000, “Theories of Action and Praxis,” pp. 73-111 in Bryan Turner (ed.), Blackwell Companion to Social Theory (second edition), Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishers.

• (Recommended) Alan Dawe, 1978, “Theories of Social Action,” Chapter 10 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

Class 9: Wed Sept 28, 5:30-6:45PM – WHAT IS A “SOCIAL STRUCTURE?” PART 1

• Steven Rytina, 2000, “Social Structure,” in Edgar Borgatta (ed.), Encyclopedia of Sociology, 2nd Edition, New York: MacMillan Reference, pp. 2822-2828.
• Jose Lopez and John Scott, “Conceputalizing Social Structure,” Pp. 7-17, chapter 2 in Lopez and Scott’s Social Structure, Philadelphia: Open University Press.
• Pierre Bourdieu, 1977, “Structures, Habitus, Power: Basis for a Theory of Symbolic Power,” pp. 159-197 in Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• W. Richard Scott, 2001, “Constructing an Analytical Framework I: Three Pillars of Institutions,” Chapter 3 in Scott, Institutions and Organizations, Thousand Oaks: Sage.

• (Recommended) Jose Lopez and John Scott, Social Structure, Philadelphia: Open University Press, entire.
• (Recommended) Joseph Whitmeyer, 1994, “Why Actor Models are Integral to Structural Analysis,” Sociological Theory, 12(2) (July): 153-165.

Class 10: Mon Oct 3 – WHAT IS A “SOCIAL STRUCTURE?” PART 2

• Anthony Giddens, 1984, The Constitution of Society, California, pp. xv-40, 60-64, 162-193, 256-262, 327-334.
• William Sewell, Jr., 1992, “A Theory of Structure: Duality, Agency, and Social Transformations,” American Journal of Sociology, 89: 1-29.
• Margaret Archer, 1995, pp. 108-114 of Realist Social Theory: A Morphogenetic Approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

• (Recommended) Anthony Giddens, New Rules of Sociological Method, California, 1993.
• (Recommended) Anthony Giddens, Central Problems in Social Theory, California, 1979.
• (Recommended) the entirety of Margaret Archer, 1995, Realist Social Theory: A Morphogenetic Approach, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Class 11: Wed Oct 5 – MEANING AND INTERPRETATION

• Wilhelm Dilthey, 1989 [1883], “The Status of Our Knowledge of Socio-Historical Reality,” pp. 87-91 in Dilthey, Introduction to the Human Sciences, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Charles Taylor, 1985, “Introduction,” “What is Human Agency?,” “Self-Interpreting Animals,” and “The Concept of a Person,” pp. 1-76, 97-114 in Taylor, Human Agency and Language, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

• (Recommended) Peter Winch, 1990 [1958], The Idea of a Social Science, London: Routledge.
• (Recommended) Kurt Wolff, 1978, “Phenomenology and Sociology,” Chapter 13 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.
• (Recommended) John Searle, 1995, The Construction of Social Reality, New York: Free Press.
• (Recommended) Clifford Geertz, 1971, The Interpretation of Cultures, New York: Basic Books.
• (Recommended) Clifford Geertz, 1983, Local Knowledge, New York: Basic Books.
• (Recommended) Paul Ricoeur, 1981, Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• (Recommended) Elena Esposito, 1996, “Observing Interpretation: A Sociological View of Hermeneutics,” MLN-Modern Language Notes, 111: 593-619.

Class 12: Mon Oct 10 – EMILE DURKHEIM AND SOCIAL FACTS

• Emile Durkheim, 1982, Rules of Sociological Method, New York: Free Press.

• (Recommended reading on Durkheim’s social ontology) Harry Alpert, 1961, “Independence: Relational Social Realism,” pp. 131-163 in Alpert, Emile Durkheim and His Sociology, New York: Russell and Russell.

Class 13: Wed Oct 12 – MAX WEBER ON ANALYSIS AND EXPLANATION

• Max Weber (Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich eds.), 1978, pp. 3-62 of Economy and Society, Berkeley: California.
• Max Weber, “‘Objectivity in Social Science and Social Policy,” pp. 49-112 in Weber (Edward Shils and Henry Finch translators) The Methodology of the Social Sciences, New York: Free Press.

• (Recommended) Julien Freund, 1978, “German Sociology in the Time of Max Weber,” Chapter 5 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

Classes14 & 15: Mon Oct 17 & Wed Oct 19 – NORMATIVE THEORY

• Jon Elster, 1989, “Social Norms,” pp. 97-151 in Elster, The Cement of Society: A Study of Social Order, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Christian Smith, 2003, Moral, Believing Animals: An Essay on Human Personhood and Culture, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

FALL BREAK

Classes 16 & 17: Mon Oct 24 & Wed Oct 26 – FUNCTIONALISM

• Talcott Parsons, 1951, “The Major Points of Reference and Structural Components in the Social System,” pp. 24-58 in Parsons The Social System, New York: Free Press.
• Kingsley Davis and Wilbert Moore, 1945, “Some Principles of Stratification,” American Sociological Review, 10(2) (April): 242-249.
• Lewis Coser, 1956, The Functions of Social Conflict, New York: Free Press, Chapters 2, 3, 5, and 7.

• (Recommended) Robert K. Merton, “Manifest and Latent Functions,” in Social Theory and Social Structure, Glencoe: Free Press, 1957, pp. 60-69.
• (Recommended) Emile Durkheim, 1997, The Division of Labor in Society, New York: Free Press.
• (Recommended) Wilbert Moore, 1978, “Functionalism,” Chapter 9 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

Classes 18 & 19: Mon Oct 31 & Wed Nov 2 – EMILE DURKHEIM, COLLECTIVE RITUAL, AND THE SOCIAL SOURCES OF KNOWLEDGE

• Emile Durkheim, 1995 (Karen Fields translation!), The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, New York: Free Press (not another version) – follow Chris Smith’s Reading Guide.

Classes 20 & 21: Mon Nov 7 & Wed Nov 9 – MARXISM

• Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels, The Marx-Engels Reader (Robert Tucker, ed.), New York: W.W. Norton, 1978. Read: 469-500, 294-361, 53-65, 143-145, 146-186, 594-617 (“Manifesto of the Communist Party,” “The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte,” “Theses on Feuerbach,” “Capital, Vol. 1,” “Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right: Introduction”).

• (Recommended) Tom Bottomore, 1978, “Marxism and Sociology,” Chapter 4 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

Class 22: Mon Nov 14 – NEO-MARXISMS

• Christopher Chase-Dunn, 2001, “World-System Theory,” Chapter 27 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 289-612.
• Michael Burawoy and Erik Olin Wright, 2001, “Sociological Marxism,” Chapter 22 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 459-486.

Class 23: Wed Nov 16 – EVOLUTIONARY/ECOLOGICAL CONFLICT THEORY

• Stephen Sanderson, 2001, “Evolutionary Theorizing,” Chapter 21 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 435-455.
• Andrew Abbott, 1988, The System of Professions: An Essay on the Division of Expert Labor, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 1-113.

• (Recommended) Anthony O’Hear, 1999, Beyond Evolution: Human Nature and the Limits of Evolutionary Explanation, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• (Recommended) John Dupré, 2001, Human Nature and the Limits of Science, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• (Recommended) Jared Diamond, 1999, Guns, Germs, and Steel: the Fate of Human Societies, New York: W.W. Norton.

Class 24: Mon Nov 21 – RATIONAL CHOICE THEORY

• Peter Hedsröm and Richard Swedberg, 1996, “Rational Choice, Empirical Research, and the Sociological Tradition,” European Sociological Review, 12(2): 127-146.
• Siegwart Lindenberg, 2001, “Social Rationality versus Rational Egoism,” Chapter 29 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 635-668.
• John Goldthorpe, 2000, “Chapter 5: The Quantitative Analysis of Large-scale Data Sets and Rational Action Theory: For a Sociological Alliance” and “Chapter 6: Rational Action Theory for Sociology,” On Sociology: Numbers, Narratives, and the Integration of Research and Theory, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

• (Recommended) Marshall Sahlins, 1976, Culture and Practical Reason, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, Preface and Chapter 4. 
• (Recommended) Barry Schwartz, 1986, The Battle for Human Nature: Science, Morality, and Modern Life, New York: W.W. Norton.
• (Recommended) Robert K. Merton, 1936, “The Unanticipated Consequences of Purposive Social Action,” American Sociological Review, 1(6) (December): 894-904.

THANKSGIVING

Classes 25 & 26: Mon Nov 28 and Wed Nov 30 – MAX WEBER ON IDEAS AND SOCIAL CHANGE

• Max Weber, 2002, (Peter Baehr and Gordon Wells, translators), The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, New York: Penguin Books (not another version).

Class 27: Mon Dec 5 – ROLES, INTERACTION, IDENTITY, AND SI:

• Sheldon Stryker, 2001, “Traditional Symbolic Interactionism, Role Theory, and Structural Symbolic Interactionism,” Chapter 11 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 211-231.
• Ralph Turner, 2001, “Role Theory,” Chapter 12 in Jonathan Turner (ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory, New York: Kluwer/Plenum, pp. 233-254.
• Irving Goffman, 1959, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, New York: Vintage Books.

• (Recommended) Herbert Blumer, 1969, Symbolic Interactionism, Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.

Class 28: Wed Dec 7 – CONCLUSION, RETROSPECT, AND PROSPECTS

              - no reading

FINAL EXAMS

Significant Issues We Do Not Have Time to Address:

WHAT ARE “VARIABLES,” THEORETICALLY SPEAKING?

• Emile Durkheim, 1979, Suicide: A Study in Sociology, New York: Free Press.
• Herbert Blumer, 1969, “Sociological Analysis and the ‘Variable,’” Chapter 7 in Blumer, Symbolic Interactionism, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.
• Andrew Abbott, 1997, “Of Time and Space: The Contemporary Relevance of the Chicago School,” Social Forces, 75(4) (June): 1149-1182.
• Andrew Abbot, 1992, “What Do Cases Do? Some Notes on Acivity in Sociological Analysis,” Chapter 2 in Charles Ragin and Howard Becker (eds.), What is a Case? Exploring Foundations of Social Inquiry, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Hartmut Esser, 1996, “What is Wrong with ‘Variables Sociology’?,” European Sociological Review, 12(2): 159-166.
• Stanley Lieberson, 1985, Making it Count, Berkeley: California.

SOCIAL COGNITION

• Zerubavel, Eviatar, 1999, Social Mindscapes, Cambridge: Harvard. 
• Zerubavel, Eviatar, 2003, Time Maps, Chicago: Chicago. 
• DiMaggio, Paul, 1997, “Culture and Cognition,” Annual Review of Sociology 23:263.
• Kunka, Ziva, 1999, Social Congnition, Cambridge: MIT Press.
• Bless, Herbert, 2003, Social Cognition, UK: Psychology Press.

TEMPORALITY, HISTORY, AND SOCIOLOGY

• Larry Griffin, 1992, “Temporality, Events, and Explanation in Historical Sociology,” Sociological Methods and Research, 20, pp. 403-427.
• Larry Griffin, 1993, “Narrative, Event-Structure Analysis, and Causal Interpretation in Historical Sociology,” American Journal of Sociology, 98, pp. 1094-1133.
• John Lewis Gaddis, 2002, The Landscapes of History: How Historians Map the Past, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Tilly, Charles. 1984. Big Structures, Large Processes, Huge Comparisons. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.
• William Sewell, Jr., 1996, “Historical Events as Transformations of Structures,” Theory and Society, 25: 841-881.
• William Sewell, Jr., 1996, “Three Temporalities: Toward an Eventful Sociology,” in Terrence McDonald (ed.), The Historic Turn in the Human Sciences, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
• James Mahoney, 2004, “Revisiting General Theory in Historical Sociology,” Social Forces, 83(2) (December): 459-489 (and Alan Sica “Reply” in same issue).
• Andrew Abbott, 1992, “From Causes to Events: Notes on Narrative Positivism,” Sociological Methods & Research, 20(4) (May): 428-55.
• Terrence McDonald (ed.), 1996, The Historic Turn in Human Sciences, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

HUMAN AGENCY

• Margaret Archer, 2000, Being Human: The Problem of Agency, Cambridge: Cambridge.
• Hans Joas, 1996, The Creativity of Action, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Mustafa Emirbayer and Ann Mische, 1998, “What is Agency?,” American Journal of Sociology, 103: 962-1023.
• Donald Davidson, 2001, “Agency,” in Davidson Essays on Actions and Events, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• John Dupré, 2001, “Freedom of the Will,” Chapter 7 in Dupré, Human Nature and the Limits of Science, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

POWER

• Steven Lukes, 2005, Power: A Radical View, London: Palgrave.
• Steven Lukes, 1986, Power, New York: New York University Press.
• Max Weber (Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich eds.), 1978, Economy and Society, Berkeley: California, pp. 50-56, 212-307, 901-939.
• Anthony Giddens and David Held (eds.), 1982, Classes, Power, and Conflict, Berkeley: California. 
• Michel Foucault, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972-1977, (Colin Gordon ed.), New York: Pantheon, 1980.
• David Swartz, 1998, Culture and Power, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

COOLEY, MEAD, THE SOCIAL SELF, AND SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY:

• George Herbert Mead, 1977 [1934], On Social Psychology, Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• George Herbert Mead, 1972 [1938], Philosophy of the Act (Works of George Herbert Mead Volume 3), Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Charles Horton Cooley, Human Nature and Social Order, New Brunswick: Transaction Press, esp. Ch 3.
• Charles Horton Cooley, 1998 On Self and Social Organization, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 

EXCHANGE THEORY

• George Homans, 1974, Social Behavior: Its Elementary Forms, New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
• Peter Blau, 1986, Exchange and Power in Social Life, New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Books.
• Karen Cook, 1987, Social Exchange Theory, Sage Publications.
• Karen Cook and Richard Emerson, 1978, “Power, Equity, and Commitment in Exchange Networks," American Sociological Review, 43: 721-739.
• Richard Emerson, 1976, “Social Exchange Theory,” Annual Review of Sociology, Vol. 2: 335-362.
• Harry Bredemeir, 1978, “Exchange Theory,” Chapter 11 in Tom Bottomore and Robert Nisbet (eds.), A History of Sociological Analysis, New York: Basic Books.

SOCIAL IDENTITY THEORY

• Michael Hogg and Dominic Abrams, 1998, Social Identifications: A Social-Psychology of Intergroup Relations and Group Processes, New York: Routledge.
• Dominic Abrams and Michael Hogg (eds.), 1990, Social Identity Theory: Constructive and Critical Advances, New York: Springer-Verlag.
• Henri Tajfel, 1981, Human Groups and Social Categories, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Henri Tajfel et al. (eds.), 1997, Social Groups and Identities, Butterworth-Heinemann.

MODERNITY

• Peter Berger, Bridget Berger, Hanfried Kellner, 1973, The Homeless Mind: Modernization and Consciousness, New York: Vintage.
• Charles Taylor, 1989, Sources of the Self: The Making of Modern Identity, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
• Anthony Giddens, 1990, The Consequences of Modernity, Stanford: Stanford University Press.
• Anthony Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity, Stanford, 1991.

RELATIONAL/STRUCTURAL SOCIOLOGY

• Mustafa Emirbayer, 1997, “A Manifesto for a Relational Sociology,” American Journal of Sociology, 103(2) (Sept): 281-317.
• Mustafa Emirbayer and Ann Mische, 1998, “What is Agency?,” American Journal of Sociology, 103: 962-1023.
• Bonnie Erickson, 1997, “Social Networks and History: A Review Essay,” Historical Methods 30:149-157.
• Bonnie Erickson, 2001, “Social Networks,” pp. 314-326 in Judith Blau (ed.), The Blackwell Companion to Sociology, Malden, MA: Blackwell.
• Harrison White, Scott Boorman, and Ronald Breiger, 1976, “Social Structure from Social Networks. I. Blockmodels of Roles and Positions,” American Journal of Sociology, 81: 730-750.
• Lynn Smith-Lovin and J. Miller McPherson, 1993, “You are Who You Know: A Network Approach to Gender,” pp. 223-251 in Paula England (ed.), Theory on Gender/ Feminism on Theory, New York: Aldine De Gruyter.
• Harrison White, 1992, Identity and Control: A Structural Theory of Social Action, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• Mark Granovetter, 1973, “The Strength of Weak Ties,” American Journal of Sociology, 78:1360-80.
• Joseph Whitmeyer, 1994, “Why Actor Models are Integral to Structural Analysis,” Sociological Theory, 12(2) (July): 153-165.
• Georg Simmel, 1955, Conflict and the Web of Group Affiliations, Glencoe: Free Press, pp. 125-95.
• Stanley Wasserman and Katherine Faust, 1994, Social Network Analysis: Methods and Applications, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

FEMINIST THEORY

• Paula England (ed.), 1993, Theory on Gender/Feminism on Theory, New York: Aldine de Gruyter.
• Ruth Wallace, 1989, Feminism and Sociological Theory. Newbury Park: Sage.
• Patricia Hill Collins, 1990, Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness and the Politics of Empowerment, Boston: Unwin Hyman.
• Dorothy Smith, 1987, The Everyday World as Problematic: A Feminist Sociology. University of Toronto Press.
• Kathy Ferguson, 1993, The Man Question: Visions of Subjectivity in Feminist Theory. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Rosemary Hennessy, 1993, Materialist Feminism and the Politics of Discourse. New York: Routledge.
• Rosemarie Tong, 1989, Feminist Thought: A Comprehensive Introduction, Boulder: Westview Press.
• Terry Kandal, 1988, The Woman Question in Classical Sociological Theory. Miami: Florida International University Press.
• Judy Grant, 1993, Fundamental Feminism: Contesting the Core Concepts of Feminist Theory, New York: Routledge.

MICHEL FOUCAULT

• Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (translated by Alan Sheridan),New York: Pantheon, 1978.
• Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, Vol. 1: An Introduction (translated by Robert Hurley), New York: Pantheon, 1978.
• Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge and the Discourse on Language (A. M. Sheridan Smith, translator), New York: Pantheon, 1972.
• Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences, New York: Pantheon, 1970.
• Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason (translated by Richard Howard), New York: Pantheon, 1965.