R. A. Sydie

"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.

`The strengths of this text are the breadth of theories covered; the integration of gender-related topics - family, work, religion; the use of substantial quotes from primary texts; the consistent inclusion of methodological issues.…I have no doubt that it will find a solid position in the field of theory texts' - Kathleen Slobin, North Dakota State University The popular Pine Forge Press textbook, Sociological Theory, has been broken into two volumes, to meet the needs of lecturers and students. Contemporary Sociological Theory covers developments in the discipline from the 1930s and includes important new voices in social theory, including 14 female theorists. The treatment of individual theories and theorists is balanced with the development of key themes and ideas about social life, including race, class and gender.

This book connects theorists and their work to larger themes and ideas. All too often, in the opinion of the authors, theory texts focus too much on individual theorists and insufficiently on the relationship between their theories, and how these have contributed, in turn, to the evolution of ideas concerning social life. Treatment of individual theories and theorists is balanced with the development of key themes; ideas about social life (introduced in Chapter 1) which then reappear in the discussion of individual theorists and their work. A key organizing principle of this text is to trace major schools of thought over the past 150 years as they appear and reappear in different chapters. Section 1 introductions help remind students of the "big picture" within which any given theory or theorist is only one part. A consistent organization and presentation within chapters helps provide students with a context for learning and a means of much more easily comparing and contrasting theorists and their ideas. Important, new voices in a text for social theory: In Chapter 2, Harriet Martineau is introduced as one of sociology's founders. From then on, the views of women theorists and others are represented in far more than token fashion. Examples include W. E. B. DuBois, Marianne Weber, Charlotte Gilman, Rosa Luxemburg, Joseph Schumpeter, V. I. Lenin, Niklas Luhmann, Theda Skocpol, Erik Wright, Elman Service, Arlie Hochschild, Dorothy Smith, Patricia Hill Collins, and Immanual Wallerstein. · A timeline showing when social theorists lived and wrote and connecting their biographies to important social events over 300 years is at the back of the text. "The organization of every chapter along similar lines provides a consistency in presentation that encourages comparisons among the theorists…[The authors] do a very good job presenting overlooked theorists and making their relevance to social theorizing /doing sociology clear." --Joan Alway, formerly University of Miami "The strengths of this text are the breadth of theories covered, the integration of gender-related topics--family, work, religion; the use of substantial quotes from primary texts; the consistent inclusion of methodological issues; …and the goals of the project to provide an expansive and readable theory text. I have no doubt that it will find a solid position in the field of popular theory texts for undergraduate course use." --Kathleen Slobin, North Dakota State University

Published for the first time in paperback, Rosalind Sydie's critically acclaimed study examines the work and thought of Durkheim, Weber, Marx, Engels, focusing on what these influential thinkers had to say about the nature of gender relationships. She brings to light assumptions at the foundation of classical social theory, and the effect that these assumptions have had on the perception of women.

This book examines the work of the classical social theorists --Durkheim, Weber, Marx, Engels and Freud -- from a feminist perspective. The focus is on the theoretical approach adopted by each theorist inhis examination of the nature of human nature and, more specifically,the nature of sex relationships. In general, the dichotomized,hierarchical view of sex relationships common to each of the theoristsforms the framework for the discussions and critiques. More recent critical commentaries by feminists are included, as wellas a brief exegesis on sociobiology as representative of many of theviews found in the work of the five sociological "fathers". Theconcluding remarks consider suggestions for the direction of a feministsocial theory.