Published in association with the ISA, and part of the SAGE Studies in International Sociology series, this is a passionate and stimulating exploration of how the work of Georg Simmel can help revitalise and focus the aims of sociology today.

This comprehensive collection of classical sociological theory is a definitive guide to the roots of sociology from its undisciplined beginnings to its current influence on contemporary sociological debate. Explores influential works of Marx, Durkheim, Weber, Mead, Simmel, Freud, Du Bois, Adorno, Marcuse, Parsons, and Merton Editorial introductions lend historical and intellectual perspective to the substantial readings Includes a new section with new readings on the immediate "pre-history" of sociological theory, including the Enlightenment and de Tocqueville Individual reading selections are updated throughout

"This text is intended for a one-semester introductory course."--Page 1.

We are living in a turbulent world marked by fast, continuous social changes that affect the lives of individuals, families, communities, organizations, businesses, nation-states, and international networks. This fundamentally commits contemporary sociology to being a science of change. This collection effectively mirrors this diversity and variety of transformations underway in today′s societies and transnational spaces. Written by a group of internationally renowned sociologists, it offers a cutting edge understanding of what is happening in our life worlds, work lives and frames of social existence. Bringing up issues such as political turbulence, cultural and artistic dynamics, family changes, gender roles, migration flows and social movements, it is a timely contribution that discusses transformation and globalization and their consequences in both theoretical and substansive terms. Illuminating and comprehensive, this book will be of immense use for sociology students on all levels, as well as lecturers, researchers and others who are interested in social life and the consequences of human action. Arnaud Sales is Emeritus Proessor of Sociology at the University of Montreal, Canada.

Introduction to Sociology distills decades of distinguished work in sociology by one of this century’s most influential thinkers in the areas of social theory, philosophy, aesthetics, and music. It consists of a course of seventeen lectures given by Theodor W. Adorno in May-July 1968, the last lecture series before his death in 1969. Captured by tape recorder (which Adorno called “the fingerprint of the living mind”), these lectures present a somewhat different, and more accessible, Adorno from the one who composed the faultlessly articulated and almost forbiddingly perfect prose of the works published in his lifetime. Here we can follow Adorno’s thought in the process of formation (he spoke from brief notes), endowed with the spontaneity and energy of the spoken word. The lectures form an ideal introduction to Adorno’s work, acclimatizing the reader to the greater density of thought and language of his classic texts. Delivered at the time of the “positivist dispute” in sociology, Adorno defends the position of the “Frankfurt School” against criticism from mainstream positivist sociologists. He sets out a conception of sociology as a discipline going beyond the compilation and interpretation of empirical facts, its truth being inseparable from the essential structure of society itself. Adorno sees sociology not as one academic discipline among others, but as an over-arching discipline that impinges on all aspects of social life. Tracing the history of the discipline and insisting that the historical context is constitutive of sociology itself, Adorno addresses a wide range of topics, including: the purpose of studying sociology; the relation of sociology and politics; the influence of Saint-Simon, Comte, Durkheim, Weber, Marx, and Freud; the contributions of ethnology and anthropology; the relationship of method to subject matter; the problems of quantitative analysis; the fetishization of science; and the separation of sociology and social philosophy.