The third edition of this popular and established core textbook provides an invaluable guide to 24 of the most influential thinkers in Sociology. Written by leading academics in the field, Key Sociological Thinkers provides a clear and contextualised introduction to classical and contemporary theory. Each chapter offers an insightful assessment of a different theorist, exploring their lives, works and legacies, and in a much-valued 'Seeing Things Differently' section authors demonstrate how each thinker's ideas can be used to illuminate aspects of social life in new ways.
With frameworks for deep learning around group discussion, this continues be an essential text for undergraduate and postgraduate modules on sociological and social theory.
New to this Edition:
- Four new chapters, on Mead, Du Bois, Latour and Alexander
- Five chapters by new authors on existing key thinkers: Durkheim, Merton, Goffman, Bourdieu, and Giddens
- A major new introduction
- An updated, structured and annotated 'Further Reading' section for each thinker
- Extended accounts of 13 additional thinkers who have influenced, or been influenced by, the key thinkers
Ted Benton is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Essex, UK.
ROBERT J. HOLTON is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland.
Jason Hughes is Professor of Sociology at the University of Leicester, UK. His research interests span a range of concerns but include: the sociology of consumption; the sociology of the body and health; emotions, work and identity; figurational sociology and sociological theory; moral panics and regulation. His first book, Learning to Smoke (2003) was winner of the 2006 Norbert Elias prize. More recently he has completed, together with Eric Dunning, a major study of the work of Norbert Elias entitled Norbert Elias and Modern Sociology: Knowledge, Interdependence, Power, Process (2013). He has also recently published a number of edited books, including Visual Methods (2012) and Internet Research Methods (2012); and co-edited books, including Moral Panics and the Contemporary World (2013); Human Documents and Archival Research (2013) and Communities of Practice: Critical Perspectives (2007).
STEVE MATTHEWMAN is Senior Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand.
William Outhwaite is Chair and Professor of Sociology at Newcastle University, UK. His recent publications include The Future of Society (2006), European Society (2008), Habermas (2nd edn, 2009) and, with Larry Ray, Social Theory and Postcommunism (2005). His work focuses on social and political change in Europe since 1989, for which he was awarded a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship.
