The Tradition of the Chicago School of Sociology

298 Pages·1998·5.717 MB·English

by  Luigi Tomasi (editor)

THE TRADITION OF THE
CHICAGO SCHOOL OF SOCIOLOGY
This book is dedicated to Professor Filippo
Barbano, co-founder of contemporary Italian
sociology, from whom I learned so much,
and to the memory of my master
Professor Edward A. Shils, the disciple
of Robert E. Park, who taught me sociology
at the University of Chicago.
The Tradition of the
Chicago School of Sociology
Edited by
LUIGI TOMASI
University of Trento, Italy
First published 1998 by Ashgate Publishing
Published 2017 by Routledge
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
The tradition of the Chicago school of sociology
1.Chicago school of sociology
I.Tomasi, Luigi
301’0973
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The tradition of the Chicago school of sociology / Luigi Tomasi,
(ed).
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Chicago school of sociology-History. 2. Sociology-United
States-History. I. Tomasi, Luigi.
HM22.U5T69 1998
30r.09—dc20 98-20661
CIP
ISBN 13: 978-1-84014-464-2 (hbk)
Contents
Introduction
Luigi Tomasi 1
PART I: THEORETICAL PROBLEMATIC
1 The Gothic foundation of Robert E. Park’s conception
of race and culture
Stanford M. Lyman 13
1. Capitalism, imperialism, and Gothic sociology 13
2. Robert Park’s Congo. A Gothic analysis of capitalist imperialism 14
3. Capitalism and Gothicism: Small and Park 20
2 The contribution of Georg Simmel to the foundation of theory
at the Chicago School of Sociology
Luigi Tomasi 25
Introduction 25
1. Albion W. Small and Georg Simmel: the ‘common intent’ to found sociology
as an independent science 27
2. Robert E. Park: sociology as ‘an approach to substantive problems’ 31
3. The search for ‘subject matter’ in sociology by the Chicago sociologists 33
3 The neighbourhood and deviance in the Chicago School.
A relationistic interpretation
Filippo Barbano 37
1. The concept of deviance between the systematics and history of sociology 37
2. The concept of ‘neighbourhood’ : disorganization and the relational nature
in the natural area 40
3. Robert E. Park and Ernest W. Burgess: at the sources of relationism in the early
Chicago School 43
V
The Tradition of the Chicago School of Sociology
Vi
4. ‘Ethnographic’ relationism in the early Chicago School and metropolitan
differences in current urban deviance 45
4 The place of the Chicago School of Sociology in the study of
nationality and ethnicity
Steven Grosby 51
PART II: METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH
5 Chicago sociology and the empirical impulse: its implications
for sociological theorizing
Martin Bulmer 75
6 Chicago methods: reputations and realities
Jennifer Platt 89
Introduction 89
1. Prewar Chicago methods 90
2. Postwar Chicago methods 95
3. The construction of disciplinary memory 101
7 Seventy years of fieldwork in sociology.
From Nels Anderson’s The Hobo to Elijah Anderson’s Streetwise
Jean-Michel Chapoulie 105
Introduction 105
1. The Hobo or Hobohemia? 106
2. Fieldwork in The Hobo 117
3. Elijah Anderson’s Streetwise 120
4. Fieldwork and the way information is analyzed in Streetwise 124
Conclusion 127
8 One hundred years of methodological research.
The example of Chicago
Lawrence A. Young and Lynn J. England 129
Introduction 129
1. The institutional importance of Chicago sociology 129
2. Early influences on sociological methods at Chicago 133
3. The inappropriate reduction of Chicago sociology to qualitative sociology 140
4. The legacy of Chicago sociology’s research methodologies 142
Contents vii
PART III: IMPORTANT SOCIOLOGISTS FROM CHICAGO AND
THE ACTUALITY OF THE CHICAGO APPROACH
9 George Herbert Mead’s transformation of his intellectual context
Anthony J. Blasi 149
Introduction 149
1. Mead’s interlocutors 150
2. Adam Smith 152
3. Josiah Royce 156
4. William James 158
5. Wilhelm Max Wundt 160
6. John Dewey 165
7. Francis Herbert Bradley 169
8. Conway Lloyd Morgan, James Mark Baldwin, and James Rowland Angell 170
9. Charles Horton Cooley 175
10 Erving Goffman: a symbolic interactionist?
Horst J. Helle 179
1. The theoretical approach of Erving Goffman 179
2. Is Erving Goffman a symbolic interactionist? 185
11 Persistence and change: fundamental elements
in Herbert Blumer’s metatheoretical perspective
Thomas J. Morrione 191
Introduction 191
1. Situated 198
2. Dual character 199
202
3. Indeterminate
12 The sociology of ‘going concerns’. Everett Hughes’
interpretive institutional ecology
Richard C. Helmes-Hayes 217
Introduction 217
1. Hughes as a theorist 220
2. Interpretive institutional ecology: Choosing the label 227
3. Institutions, going concerns, careers, social interaction 230
4. The structuralist side of the frame of reference: ecological competition
233
and social functions
5. The interpretive side of the frame of reference: interaction, process,
241
interpretation, agency, and careers
246
6. Brief assessment
249
Conclusion
viii The Tradition of the Chicago School of Sociology
13 The Chicago School of Sociology’s heritage in Polish sociology
Krzysztof Czekaj 251
Introduction 251
1. The Chicago School, Znaniecki, and institutionalization of Polish sociology
before 1939 253
2. The Chicago School in Polish sociology, 1945-1989 265
2.1. From negation to ideologization: 1945-1956 265
2.2. The influence of the Chicago School upon the development
of Polish sociology in the years 1957-1976 267
3. The sociological trend of Polish social ecology 267
3.1. In the footsteps of Florian Znaniecki’s sociology: towards
the Polish edition of 'The Polish Peasant 1957-1976 269
3.2. From The Polish Peasant to The Young Generation
of Peasants: 1976-1984 272
3.3. From qualitative sociology to the renaissance of interest
in the Chicago School: 1984-1990 274
3.4. The tradition of the Chicago thought in the investigation of transformation
processes in Poland: 1991-? 276
Conclusion 279
Index 281
Contributors 287
Introduction
LUIGI TOMASI
The reasons why a school of sociology developed at Chicago1 belong to the
relatively remote past and can be identified in a set of concomitant factors.
First, the obligatory reference is to the commitment of the newly-founded
university to the solution of contingent social problems. Chicago was a
1 Among Luigi Tomasi’s various essays on the Sociological School of Chicago see “La
Scuola sociologica di Chicago: elaborazione teorica ed investigazione empirica”, “Studi
di Sociologia”, 4, 1989, pp. 89-97; “Città, crimine e disorganizzazione sociale. II
contributo della Scuola sociologica di Chicago”, “Animazione Sociale”, nos. 19-20,
1989, pp. 181-92; “Analisi ecologica, metodi di ricerca e dinamica religiosa nella Scuola
sociologica di Chicago”, in Massimo Ampola - Stefano Martelli (eds.), Questioni e
metodi in sociologia della religione, Pisa, Tacchi, 1991, pp. 85-104; ‘The Influence of
Religion on the Chicago School of Sociology”, in Clinical Sociology, 1993, pp. 17-31;
“L’actualité de l'elaboration théorique de Robert E. Park”, in “Sociétés”, 52, 1996, pp.
109-18; “Rilettura dei concetti teorici di Robert E. Park in funzione dell'attuale “melting
pot” europeo”, Renzo Gubert - Luigi Tomasi (eds.), Robert E. Park e la teoria del
“melting pot”, Trento, Reverdito, 1994, pp. 117-29; “Il territorio nell'interpretazione
della Scuola sociologica di Chicago”, in Paolo Guidicini - Emanuele Sgroi (eds.), Valori,
territorio, ambiente, Milano, Angeli, 1997, pp. 199-204. See also the following papers
presented at international congresses and conferences on the Chicago School: L’apporto
di Frédéric Le Play all*elaborazione teorica ed aWinvestigazione empirica nella
sociologia americana contemporanea,, paper presented at International Seminar on
“L’influence de Frédéric Le Play et de son école sur la sociologie contemporaine” (Italy,
Trento, 14-15 April, 1989); Ecological Analysis and Religious Dynamic in the
Sociological School of Chicago, paper presented at the “XX International Conference for
the Sociology of Religion” (Finland, Helsinki, 21-25 August, 1989); The Religious
Dynamics in the Sociological School of Chicago, paper presented at the XII World
Congress of Sociology (Spain, Madrid, 9-13 July, 1990); The Social Ecology of Robert E.
Park and the Current Phenomenon of Immigration in Europe, paper presented at the
XXX Congress of the “International Institute of Sociology” (Japan, Kobe, 3-4 August,
1991); L'influence de Georg Simmel sullécole sociologique de Chicago au debout du
siècle, paper presented at the XXXI Congress of the International Institute of Sociology
(France, Paris, 21-25 June, 1993); The Sociology of Religion of Albion W. Small. His
Influence on the Chicago School of Sociology, paper presentend at XIII World Congress
of Sociology (Germany, Bielefeld, 18-23 July, 1994); The Influence of European Theory
on The Chicago School of Sociology at the Beginning of The Century: Frédéric Le Play,
Georg Simmel, Gustav Ratzenhofer, Ludwig Gumplowicz, paper presented at the Annual
Meeting of the American Sociological Association (USA, Los Angeles, 5-9 August,
1994); Le territoire tel qu ’il est interprété par VEcole de Chicago, paper presented at the
Congress “Le territoire, lieu ou frontière? Identités, conflicts ethnique, enjeux et
recompositions territoriales” (France, Paris, 2-4 October, 1995); The Influence of
Frédéric Le Play on Contemporary American Sociology, paper presented at the
Conference of “Research Committee on the History of Sociology” (Holland,
Amsterdam, 16-18 May, 1996).
1