The Most Famous

SOCIOLOGISTS from United States

This page contains a list of the greatest American Sociologists. The pantheon dataset contains 79 Sociologists, 25 of which were born in United States. This makes United States the birth place of the most number of Sociologists.

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary American Sociologists of all time. This list of famous American Sociologists is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of American Sociologists.

1. Robert K. Merton (1910 - 2003)

With an HPI of 72.42, Robert K. Merton is the most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 47 different languages on wikipedia.

Robert King Merton (born Meyer Robert Schkolnick; July 4, 1910 – February 23, 2003) was an American sociologist who is considered a founding father of modern sociology, and a major contributor to the subfield of criminology. He served as the 47th president of the American Sociological Association. He spent most of his career teaching at Columbia University, where he attained the rank of University Professor. In 1994 he was awarded the National Medal of Science for his contributions to the field and for having founded the sociology of science. Merton's contribution to sociology falls into three areas: (1) sociology of science; (2) sociology of crime and deviance; (3) sociological theory. He developed notable concepts, such as "unintended consequences", the "reference group", and "role strain", but is perhaps best known for the terms "role model" and "self-fulfilling prophecy". The concept of self-fulfilling prophecy, which is a central element in modern sociological, political, and economic theory, is one type of process through which a belief or expectation affects the outcome of a situation or the way a person or group will behave. More specifically, as Merton defined, "the self-fulfilling prophecy is, in the beginning, a false definition of the situation evoking a new behavior, which makes the originally false conception come true". Merton's concept of the "role model" first appeared in a study on the socialization of medical students at Columbia University. The term grew from his theory of the reference group, the group to which individuals compare themselves but to which they do not necessarily belong. Social roles were central to Merton's theory of social groups. Merton emphasized that, rather than a person assuming just one role and one status, they have a status set in the social structure that has, attached to it, a whole set of expected behaviors.

2. Talcott Parsons (1902 - 1979)

With an HPI of 70.97, Talcott Parsons is the 2nd most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 54 different languages.

Talcott Parsons (December 13, 1902 – May 8, 1979) was an American sociologist of the classical tradition, best known for his social action theory and structural functionalism. Parsons is considered one of the most influential figures in sociology in the 20th century. After earning a PhD in economics, he served on the faculty at Harvard University from 1927 to 1973. In 1930, he was among the first professors in its new sociology department. Later, he was instrumental in the establishment of the Department of Social Relations at Harvard. Based on empirical data, Parsons' social action theory was the first broad, systematic, and generalizable theory of social systems developed in the United States and Europe. Some of Parsons' largest contributions to sociology in the English-speaking world were his translations of Max Weber's work and his analyses of works by Max Weber, Émile Durkheim, and Vilfredo Pareto. Their work heavily influenced Parsons' view and was the foundation for his social action theory. Parsons viewed voluntaristic action through the lens of the cultural values and social structures that constrain choices and ultimately determine all social actions, as opposed to actions that are determined based on internal psychological processes. Although Parsons is generally considered a structural functionalist, towards the end of his career, in 1975, he published an article that stated that "functional" and "structural functionalist" were inappropriate ways to describe the character of his theory. From the 1970s on, a new generation of sociologists criticized Parsons' theories as socially conservative and his writings as unnecessarily complex. Sociology courses have placed less emphasis on his theories than at the peak of his popularity (from the 1940s to the 1970s). However, there has been a recent resurgence of interest in his ideas. Parsons was a strong advocate for the professionalization of sociology and its expansion in American academia. He was elected president of the American Sociological Association in 1949 and served as its secretary from 1960 to 1965.

3. Immanuel Wallerstein (1930 - 2019)

With an HPI of 66.28, Immanuel Wallerstein is the 3rd most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 40 different languages.

Immanuel Maurice Wallerstein (; September 28, 1930 – August 31, 2019) was an American sociologist and economic historian. He is perhaps best known for his development in sociology of world-systems approach. He was a Senior Research Scholar at Yale University from 2000 until his death in 2019, and published bimonthly syndicated commentaries through Agence Global on world affairs from October 1998 to July 2019. He was the 13th president of International Sociological Association (1994–1998).

4. C. Wright Mills (1916 - 1962)

With an HPI of 61.64, C. Wright Mills is the 4th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 46 different languages.

Charles Wright Mills (August 28, 1916 – March 20, 1962) was an American sociologist, and a professor of sociology at Columbia University from 1946 until his death in 1962. Mills published widely in both popular and intellectual journals, and is remembered for several books, such as The Power Elite, White Collar: The American Middle Classes, and The Sociological Imagination. Mills was concerned with the responsibilities of intellectuals in post–World War II society, and he advocated public and political engagement over disinterested observation. One of Mills's biographers, Daniel Geary, writes that Mills's writings had a "particularly significant impact on New Left social movements of the 1960s era." It was Mills who popularized the term New Left in the U.S. in a 1960 open letter, "Letter to the New Left".

5. Daniel Bell (1919 - 2011)

With an HPI of 60.09, Daniel Bell is the 5th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 36 different languages.

Daniel Bell (May 10, 1919 – January 25, 2011) was an American sociologist, writer, editor, and professor at Harvard University, best known for his contributions to the study of post-industrialism. He has been described as "one of the leading American intellectuals of the postwar era". His three best known works are The End of Ideology (1960), The Coming of Post-Industrial Society (1973), and The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism (1976).

6. Robert E. Park (1864 - 1944)

With an HPI of 58.04, Robert E. Park is the 6th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 24 different languages.

Robert Ezra Park (February 14, 1864 – February 7, 1944) was an American urban sociologist who is considered to be one of the most influential figures in early U.S. sociology. Park was a pioneer in the field of sociology, changing it from a passive philosophical discipline to an active discipline rooted in the study of human behavior. He made significant contributions to the study of urban communities, race relations and the development of empirically grounded research methods, most notably participant observation in the field of criminology. From 1905 to 1914, Park worked with Booker T. Washington at the Tuskegee Institute. After Tuskegee, he taught at the University of Chicago from 1914 to 1933, where he played a leading role in the development of the Chicago School of sociology. Park is noted for his work in human ecology, race relations, human migration, cultural assimilation, social movements, and social disorganization. He played a large role in defining sociology as a natural science and challenged the belief that sociology is a moral science. He saw sociology as "...a point of view and a method for investigating the processes by which individuals are inducted into and induced to cooperate in some sort of permanent corporate existence, society."

7. Howard S. Becker (1928 - 2023)

With an HPI of 57.99, Howard S. Becker is the 7th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 20 different languages.

Howard Saul Becker (April 18, 1928 – August 16, 2023) was an American sociologist who taught at Northwestern University. Becker made contributions to the sociology of deviance, sociology of art, and sociology of music. Becker also wrote extensively on sociological writing styles and methodologies. Becker's 1963 book Outsiders provided the foundations for labeling theory. Becker was often called a symbolic interactionist or social constructionist, although he did not align himself with either method. A graduate of the University of Chicago, Becker was considered part of the second Chicago School of Sociology, which also includes Erving Goffman and Anselm Strauss.

8. Harold Garfinkel (1917 - 2011)

With an HPI of 57.36, Harold Garfinkel is the 8th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 27 different languages.

Harold Garfinkel (October 29, 1917 – April 21, 2011) was an American sociologist and ethnomethodologist, who taught at the University of California, Los Angeles. Having developed and established ethnomethodology as a field of inquiry in sociology, he is probably best known for Studies in Ethnomethodology (1967), a collection of articles. Selections from unpublished materials were later published in two volumes: Seeing Sociologically and Ethnomethodology's Program. Moreover, during his time at University of Newark, which became Rutgers University, he enrolled in Theory of Accounts, a course that covered accounting and bookkeeping procedures. Where from this class "even in setting up an accounting sheet, he was theorizing the various categories into which the numbers would be placed" which furthered his understanding of accountability.

9. W. I. Thomas (1863 - 1947)

With an HPI of 57.26, W. I. Thomas is the 9th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 23 different languages.

William Isaac Thomas (August 13, 1863 – December 5, 1947) was an American sociologist, understood today as a key figure behind the theory of symbolic interactionism. Collaborating with Polish sociologist Florian Znaniecki, Thomas developed and influenced the use of empirical methodologies in sociological research and contributed theories to the sociology of migration. Thomas went on to formulate a fundamental principle of sociology, known as the Thomas theorem (aka Thomas dictum), whereby he would contend that "if men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences." This microsociological concept served as a theoretical foundation for the field of symbolic interactionism which was developed by Thomas's younger peers—primarily at the University of Chicago.

10. Herbert Blumer (1900 - 1987)

With an HPI of 56.01, Herbert Blumer is the 10th most famous American Sociologist. His biography has been translated into 20 different languages.

Herbert George Blumer (March 7, 1900 – April 13, 1987) was an American sociologist whose main scholarly interests were symbolic interactionism and methods of social research. Believing that individuals create social reality through collective and individual action, he was an avid interpreter and proponent of George Herbert Mead's social psychology, which he labeled symbolic interactionism. Blumer elaborated and developed this line of thought in a series of articles, many of which were brought together in the book Symbolic Interactionism. An ongoing theme throughout his work, he argued that the creation of social reality is a continuous process. Blumer was also a vociferous critic of positivistic methodological ideas in sociology.

People

Pantheon has 27 people classified as American sociologists born between 1863 and 1953. Of these 27, 7 (25.93%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living American sociologists include Mark Granovetter, Randall Collins, and Jeffrey C. Alexander. The most famous deceased American sociologists include Robert K. Merton, Talcott Parsons, and Immanuel Wallerstein. As of April 2024, 2 new American sociologists have been added to Pantheon including Rodney Stark, and John Bellamy Foster.