Description
Theory for the Working Sociologist makes social theory easy to understand by revealing sociology's hidden playbook. Fabio Rojas argues that sociologists use four different types of theoretical "moves" when they try to explain the social world: how groups defend their status, how people strategically pursue their goals, how values and institutions support each other, and how people create their social reality. In doing so, Rojas reveals how areas of study within sociology that at first glance seem dissimilar are, in fact, linked by shared theoretical underpinnings.
About the Author
Fabio Rojas is professor of sociology at Indiana University Bloomington. He is the author of From Black Power to Black Studies: How a Radical Social Movement Became an Academic Discipline and the co-author with Michael T. Heaney of Party in the Street: The Antiwar Movement and the Democratic Party after 9/11.
Reviews
Theory for the Working Sociologist points the way forward for educators across the field of sociology, as it connects classical to contemporary theory, and both to essential findings and ongoing research programs. You may not find yourself agreeing with Rojas at all moments in the text, but that is the point-he sets up an arena of debate both sophisticated and accessible to students. -- Isaac Ariail Reed, University of Virginia This highly readable and accessible book will soon become required reading for upper-level undergraduate and doctoral students of sociology. Rather than merely revisiting and reinterpreting core texts of abstract sociological theory, Rojas identifies four core themes of sociological theory-power and inequality, strategic action, values and social structures, and social constructionism-that motivate empirical work and lead sociologists to generate explanations for why empirical patterns exist. -- Sarah Soule, Stanford University
Book Information
ISBN 9780231181655
Author Fabio Rojas
Format Paperback
Page Count 232
Imprint Columbia University Press
Publisher Columbia University Press