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Sociolog y, American
Amadiume and Oy\wùmí demonstrated across the spectrum of social, occupational, political, and economic
ordering in both contexts that “biology [did not and does
not] determine social position” (Oy\wùmí 1997, p. 17).
Both have inspired other African scholars to explore other
cultural contexts. Beyond scholarship, these works are
valuable for women’s rights struggles. Much of the androcentric power plays and diminution of women that is
often claimed in the name of “tradition” is not traditional.
SEE ALSO
African Studies; Sociology, Third World
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Adésínà, Jìmí O. 2002. Sociology and Yoruba Studies: Epistemic
Intervention, or Doing Sociology in the “Vernacular.”
African Sociological Review 6 (1): 91–114.
Adésínà, Jìmí O. 2006. Sociology, Endogeneity, and the
Challenge of Transformation: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered
on Wednesday, 16 August 2006, Rhodes University,
Grahamstown, South Africa.
Akìwowo, Akínsolá. 1983. Àjobí and Àjogbé: Variations on the
Theme of Sociation. Inaugural Lectures series no. 46. Ile-Ife,
Nigeria: University of Ife Press.
Akìwowo, Akínsolá. 1986. Contributions to the Sociology of
Knowledge from an African Oral Poetry. International
Sociology 1: 343–358.
Akìwowo, Akínsolá. 1988a. Indigenization of the Social Sciences
and Emancipation of Thought. Valedictory Lecture, 18
August. Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
Akìwowo, Akínsolá. 1988b. Universalism and Indigenisation in
Sociological Theory: Introduction. International Sociology 3:
155–160.
Akìwowo, Akínsolá. 1999. Indigenous Sociologies: Extending
the Scope of the Argument. International Sociology 14:
115–138.
Alatas, Farid Sayed. 2006. A Khadunian Exemplar for a
Historical Sociology for the South. Current Sociology 54 (3):
397–411.
Amadiume, Ifi. 1987. Male Daughters, Female Husbands: Gender
and Sex in an African Society. London: Zed Books.
Cabral, Amílcar. 1970. Brief Analysis of the Social Structure in
Guinea. In Revolution in Guinea: Selected Texts. New York:
Monthly Review.
Cabral, Amílcar. 1979. The Weapon of Theory: Presuppositions
and Objectives of National Liberation in Relation to Social
Structure. In Unity and Struggle: Speeches and Writings. Trans.
Michael Wolfers, 119–137. New York: Monthly Review.
Dhaouadi, Mahmoud. 1990. Ibn Khaldun: The Founding
Father of Eastern Sociology. International Sociology 5 (3):
319–335.
Ekeh, Peter P. 1975. Colonialism and the Two Publics in Africa:
A Theoretical Statement. Comparative Studies in Society and
History 17 (1): 91–112.
Fadipe, N. A. 1970. The Sociology of the Yoruba, ed. and with an
introduction by Francis Olu Okediji and Oladejo O. Okediji.
Ibadan, Nigeria: Ibadan University Press. (Orig. pub. 1939.)
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First, Ruth. [1970] 1972. The Barrel of a Gun: The Politics of
Coup D’état in Africa. Harmondsworth, U.K.: Penguin
Books.
Ibn Khaldún, ‘Adb al-Rahmán. [1378] 1967. The Muqaddimah:
An Introduction to History. Trans. Franz Rosenthal. London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Mafeje, Archie. 1977. Neocolonialism, State Capitalism, or
Revolution. In African Social Studies: A Radical Reader, eds.
Peter C. W. Gutkind and Peter Waterman, 412–422.
London: Heinemann. (Orig. pub. 1973.)
Mafeje, Archie. 1991. The Theory and Ethnography of African
Social Formations: The Case of the Interlacustrine Kingdoms.
London: Codesria.
Mafeje, Archie. 1997. Who Are the Makers and Objects of
Anthropology? A Critical Comment on Sally Falk Moore’s
Anthropology and Africa. African Sociological Review 1 (1):
1–15.
Magubane, Bernard. 1971. A Critical Look at the Indices Used
in the Study of Social Change in Colonial Africa. Current
Anthropology 12 (4–5): 419–445.
Magubane, Bernard. 2000. African Sociology: Towards a Critical
Perspective; The Collected Essays of Bernard Makhosezwe
Magubane. Trenton, NJ: Africa World.
Onoge, Omafume. 1977. Revolutionary Imperatives in African
Sociology. In African Social Studies: A Radical Reader, eds.
Peter C. W. Gutkind and Peter Waterman, 32–43. London:
Heinemann. (Orig. pub. 1971.)
Oy\wùmí, Oyèrónké. 1997. The Invention of Women: Making an
African Sense of Western Gender Discourse. Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press.
Oy\wùmí, Oyèrónké, ed. 2003. African Women and Feminism.
Trenton, NJ: Africa World.
Oy\wùmí, Oyèrónké, ed. 2005. African Gender Studies: A
Reader. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Jìmí O. Adésínà
SOCIOLOGY, AMERICAN
American sociology is generally viewed through the prism
of accomplishments made by native-born white males at
predominately white institutions in theory, methodology,
and various substantive areas of research. The history of
American sociology often begins by noting that William
Graham Sumner (1840–1910), during the 1872 to 1873
academic year, taught the first sociology course in this
nation, Principles of Sociology (Bernard 1948). Further
investigation into the history of the discipline highlights
Arthur B. Woodford, who, in 1885 at Indiana University,
became the first faculty member in the United States to
have the word sociology in his official title (Himes 1949).
While the first named department of sociology was established at the University of Kansas in 1889, it is generally
accepted that American sociology began in earnest upon
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Sociolog y, American
the emergence of the Chicago school of sociology, the
moniker bestowed on scholars led by Robert Park
(1864–1944) and Ernest W. Burgess (1886–1966), who
were engaged in sociological activity at the University of
Chicago between 1915 and 1930. Parallel with the origin
of the sociology department at the University of Chicago
in 1892 was the strengthening of the social gospel movement in the United States. The social gospel movement
placed the salvation and uplift of American society above
the salvation of one’s individual soul. While proponents of
the social gospel were interested in ameliorating urban
problems, early American sociologists were interested in
studying the demographic transition from rural to urban
society through scientific inquiry and practical sociology,
as practiced at Hull House in Chicago by Jane Addams
(1860–1935) and by the antilynching activity of Ida B.
Wells-Barnett (1862-1931). It was a common interest in
issues such as the expanding urban population that led a
group of like-minded sociologists to organize their own
professional association.
The American Sociological Society (now called the
American Sociological Association) was established in
1905 with Lester F. Ward (1841–1913) as its first president. Seeking to separate itself from closely related disciplines, men such as E. A. Ross, Albion Small (1854–
1926), and C. W. A. Veditz (1872–1926) spearheaded the
founding of this organization. While the accomplishments of early Chicago sociologists such as Park and
Burgess and notable early American sociologists such as
Ward, Small, Sumner, Ross, and Franklin H. Giddins are
laudable as they helped define this emerging field during
its infancy in the United States, few are aware that there
existed during this era a parallel world of unacknowledged
sociologists whose contributions to the discipline were
equally, if not more, significant than those traditionally
revered as the fathers of the American brand of sociology.
The teaching of sociology at black institutions began
in 1894 at Morgan State University. It is provident that
the emergence of this discipline in America coincided
with the birth of black colleges that, in many respects,
were borne from black Americans’ attempts to improve
their condition in this nation. According to L. L. Bernard,
“Sociology [in America] was first accepted by the smaller
institutions of the South and by the Negro colleges. The
reasons for the Negro interest is, I think, sufficiently evident in the fact that a minority group was trying honestly
to understand the social situation in which it found itself ”
(1948, p. 14). Ultimately, black American scholars viewed
sociology as a tool with which to challenge their secondclass citizenship through the establishment of research
programs designed to formulate strategies to ameliorate
the social, economic, and physical conditions uncovered
through objective scientific research. Foremost among the
institutions that established research programs on the
“Negro problem” were Tuskegee University, Howard
University, Fisk University, and Atlanta University.
Tuskegee University established the Department of
Records and Research, under the direction of Monroe N.
Work between 1904 and 1945, for the purpose of conducting research on black Americans. Foremost among Work’s
accomplishments as the director of this program was the
publication of the Negro Yearbook. This pamphlet periodically detailed the horrific and gruesome practice of lynching and other forms of violence against black Americans
and was instrumental in the eventual demise of the barbaric
practice. At Howard University, where Kelly Miller
(1863–1939) taught the institution’s first sociology course
in 1895, the leadership of E. Franklin Frazier (1894–1964)
during the 1930s was the driving force behind the “Howard
school of thought.” This concept refers to the school’s “transitional [theory] that broke away from the dominant biological/genetic [racial theory] paradigm” (Henry 1995, p.
49) that was influential in introducing a multiculturalist
perspective on race relations. Inquiry into the substantive
area of race was also undertaken at Fisk University during
the United States’s Jim Crow era. Under the direction of
Charles S. Johnson (1893–1956), the Race Relations
Department was established to develop effective strategies
by which relations between blacks and whites could be
strengthened. It was at the annual institutes held at Fisk
that, for one of the first times in the South, black and white
Americans were able to intelligibly discuss the “Negro problem” in a safe environment, where action plans directed at
bettering relations between blacks and whites were developed and implemented. While the research programs established at Tuskegee, Howard, and Fisk deserve increased
attention from contemporary sociologists analyzing significant contributions to the discipline by early American sociologists, to a growing number of scholars Atlanta University
stands alone as the most significant and important research
center, regardless of race, during the early years of American
sociology. In 1895 Atlanta University initiated a program of
research, directed by W. E. B. Du Bois between 1897 and
1914, into the social, economic, and physical condition of
black Americans. According to Earl Wright II (2002), the
Atlanta Sociological Laboratory, the name bestowed on the
group of scholars engaged in sociological activity at Atlanta
University between 1895 and 1924, rightfully deserves the
distinction of the first American school of sociology and
birthplace of urban sociological inquiry, given that the
establishment of the Atlanta school and its institutionalized
program of urban sociological inquiry predates the Chicago
school by almost twenty years.
In addition to serving as a resource in the struggle for
human rights in the United States, black colleges were
often the destination, and salvation, for many Jewish
scholars forced into exile upon Adolf Hitler’s ascension to
power in Germany in the early 1930s. Scapegoated for
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Sociolog y, Economic
Germany’s problems, Jewish sociologists such as Ernst
Borinski (Tougaloo College), John Herz (Howard
University), Viktor Lowenfeld (Hampton Institute), Ernst
Manasse (North Carolina Central University), Fritz
Pappenheim (Talladega College), and Donald Rasmussen
(Talladega College) obtained positions at black colleges
where their experience as minorities was an educational
asset in their professional and personal interactions with
black college students, faculty, and the community
(Cunnigen 2003).
The history of sociology has traditionally minimized
the contributions of people of color, women, gays and
lesbians, and other minorities. Consequently, it is of manifest importance that contemporary and future sociologists utilize alternative theoretical frames to support the
recognition and canonization of marginalized scholars.
Repudiation and revision of the traditional means of canonizing sociologists will result in the overdue and deserved
recognition of the contributions of scholars who, by virtue
of their race, sex or gender, or sexual preference, existed as
“outsiders within” their own profession.
SEE ALSO
Chicago School; Du Bois, W. E. B.; Sociology
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bernard, L. L. 1948. Sociological Trends in the South. Social
Forces 27 (1): 12–19.
Cunnigen, Donald. 2003. The Legacy of Ernst Borinski: The
Production of an African-American Sociological Tradition.
Teaching Sociology 31: 397–411.
Henry, Charles P. 1995. Abram Harris, E. Franklin Frazier, and
Ralph Bunche: The Howard School of Thought on the
Problem of Race. National Political Science Review 5: 36–56.
Himes, Sandy J. 1949. Development and Status of Sociology in
Negro Colleges. Journal of Educational Sociology 23 (1):
17–32.
Wright, Earl, II. 2002. Using the Master’s Tools: Atlanta
University and American Sociology, 1896–1924. Sociological
Spectrum 22 (1): 15–39.
Earl Wright II
SOCIOLOGY,
ECONOMIC
Economic sociology (ES) forms a specific sociological subfield. As with sociology—its genus—itself a multiparadigm discipline, there is some disagreement about what
exactly falls under ES’s rubric. To counter this difficulty
ES has been defined broadly as “the sociological perspective applied to economic phenomena” (Smelser and
Swedberg 2005, p. 3).
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While both ES and economics study the economy in
its multiple expressions, they are at variance with each
other. At the risk of oversimplification, the starting point
for economics is the isolated rational economic actor;
whereas for ES, actors always operate in social, thus relational, contexts and do so reflexively.
EARLIER PERSPECTIVES
The sociological look upon economic phenomena has
marked sociology from its outset, so it is meaningful to
distinguish ES into old and new segments. Old ES refers
largely to the relevant parts in the work of sociology’s
founding fathers, for example, Karl Marx, Émile
Durkheim, Max Weber, and Georg Simmel. Indeed, Marx
was concerned with the social designation of the commodity and with commodity fetishism. He also analyzed
capitalism’s origins as well as capital as a social relation.
Durkheim was directly interested in this field, which he—
along with Weber—named as such. He was particularly
concerned with the development of the division of labor
while he criticized economists for their tendency to construct an exclusive economic world, which was arbitrary
and one-sided because the social dimensions were
excluded or neglected, whereas he linked anomie to modern economic activity. For his part, Weber delved at length
in the sociological study of economic institutions and of
processes pointing out that economic action is a special
form of social action. Weber advocated considering both
the meaning with which actors imbue their economic
action (e.g., in his Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of
Capitalism [1904–1905]) as well as the social dimension
of economic phenomena. By contrast Simmel’s work is
not systematically concerned with ES and is only dotted
with references of an ES concern, such as analyses of interest, competition, and interlinkages between money and
modernity.
Sociological interest in the economy subsided during
the 1920s, although authors such as Joseph A.
Schumpeter, Talcott Parsons, Neil Smelser, and Karl
Polanyi offered contributions to the discussion. Since
the 1960s, the attempts of some economists to extend
economic interpretations into social phenomena—an
approach called economic imperialism—challenged the
established division of labor between economics and sociology. This provoked sociologists’ response, which culminated in the reemergence of ES. The wider frames of the
new ES, as Jens Beckert (1996) pointed out, are delineated by two parameters: It aims towards a sociological
understanding of economic processes and structures, and
critiques established economic types of analysis. In the
meantime, increasingly, mainstream economics has come
to accept a role for the social dimension, although conceptualized quite differently than it is in ES.
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