Sociology, Department of
Document Type
Article
Date of this Version
2005
Citation
Centennial Bibliography Project Committee, ASA Section on the History of Sociology. 2005. A Brief Centennial Bibliography of Resources on the History of the American Sociological Society/Association. Committee members: Michael R. Hill (co-chair), Susan Hoecker- Drysdale (ex-officio), Jack Nusan Porter (co-chair), Pamela A. Roby, Kathleen Slobin, and Roberta Spalter-Roth.
Abstract
Celebrating the centennial of the American Sociological Association provides the ritual occasion and reinforces the intellectual rationale for collectively exploring our professional and organizational roots. To guide us on our way, we have compiled a brief bibliography of relevant materials and exemplars that explicate the early history of the American Sociological Society and – to some degree – its subsequent evolution (the line separating “history” from “current events” is not always easily drawn). Practicing extreme parsimony, we have intentionally excluded literally thousands of otherwise important and instructive published works that focus primarily on specific departments of sociology, the ideas and accomplishments of individual sociologists, the development of sociological theories, the general intellectual history of the discipline as a whole, and myriad other matters of obvious historical and disciplinary interest. We hasten to add, however, that the structure and practical scope of a much more inclusive bibliography is now under consideration and is soon to be implemented. In the interim, we provide here a small down payment: a narrowly defined set of references for selected articles – and still fewer monographs – that specifically address, in various ways, the founding era and subsequent evolution of the American Sociological Society as a professional organization. To these citations, we add lists of relevant journals, abstracts, indexes and databases, and append the locations of archival deposits for the first ten presidents of the American Sociological Society, with the hope of encouraging ever more scholarship on the early history of the ASS/ASA per se. Corrections and suggested additions to this bibliography, focused specifically on the history of the ASS/ASA, are welcomed by the committee. [Submitted December 2004 by the Centennial Bibliography Project Committee].
Comments
Copyright 2004 by the American Sociological Association Section on the History of Sociology.