Full Description
"This is an eminently lucid, readable, and comprehensive survey of classical sociological theory. Adams and Sydie provide thoughtful summaries and assessments of the works of dozens of social thinkers....By significantly broadening the cannon and devoting special attention to call, gender, and race, they bring theory up to date even as they take seriously the rich legacy of the past. I have never read a more exciting introduction to the theories of our discipline."
--Mustafa Emirbayer, University of Wisconsin, Madison
A concise, yet surprisingly comprehensive theory text, given the range of ideas, historical context, and theorists discussed. Unlike other books of the type, Classical Sociological Theory focuses on how the pivotal theories contributed not only to the development of the field, but also to the evolution of ideas concerning social life.
Contents
Preface
A Note to Students
SECTION I. THE EUROPEAN ROOTS OF SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY
1. The Origins of Sociological Theory
The Contours of Sociological Theory
The Philosophical Precursors of Sociology
Final Thoughts on the Philosophical Precursors
References
2. Theorizing After the Revolution
Claude-Henri, Comte de Saint-Simon (1760-1825)
Auguste Comte (1798-1857)
Harriet Martineau (1802-1876)
Final Thoughts
References
SECTION II. CONSERVATIVE THEORIES
3. Evolutionism and Functionalism
Herbert Spencer (1820-1903)
William Graham Sumner (1840-1910)
Final Thoughts
References
4. Society as Sui Generis
Emile Durkheim (1858-1917)
Final Thoughts
References
SECTION III. RADICAL THEORY
5. Radical Anticapitalism
Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820-1895)
Final Thoughts
References
6. Marxism Extended
V.I. Lenin (1870-1924)
Rosa Luxemburg (1871-1919)
Final Thoughts
References
SECTION IV. SOCIOLOGICAL THEORIES OF COMPLEXITY AND FORM
7. Social Action and Social Complexity
Max Weber (1864-1920) and Marianne Weber (1870-1954)
Final Thoughts
References
8. The Sociology of Form and Content
Georg Simmel (1858-1918)
Final Thoughts
References
SECTION V. SOCIOLOGICAL THEORIES OF POLITICS AND ECONOMICS
9. Political Sociological Theories
Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923)
Robert Michels (1876-1936)
Final Thoughts
References
10. Economic Sociological Theories
Thorstein Veblen, (1857-1929)
Joseph Schumpeter, (1883-1950)
Final Thoughts
References
SECTION VI. OTHER VOICES IN SOCIOLOGICAL THEORIZING
11. Society and Gender
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935)
Beatrice Potter Webb (1858-1943)
Final Thoughts
References
12. Sociological Theory and Race
W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963)
Final Thoughts
References
13. Society, Self, and Mind
Charles Horton Cooley (1864-1929)
George Herbert Mead (1863-1931)
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)
Final Thoughts
References
14. Final Thoughts on Classical Sociological Theory
Nineteenth-Century Sociological Theory
Early Twentieth-Century Sociological Theory
Other Theoretical Issues
Sociological Theory by the 1930s
References
Credits
Index
