This book provides insight into the lives and contributions of eigth master sociologists as perceived by their outstanding students. It provides perspectives on evolving cognitive traditions and the oral transmission of knowledge, the emergence of new ideas, the role of continuity and discontinuity in the developments of science, and the relations of these to social change.

Institutions play a pivotal role in structuring economic and social transactions, and understanding the foundations of social norms, networks, and beliefs within institutions is crucial to explaining much of what occurs in modern economies. This volume integrates two increasingly visible streams of research--economic sociology and new institutional economics--to better understand how ties among individuals and groups facilitate economic activity alongside and against the formal rules that regulate economic processes via government and law.
"Reviews"
"This volume is a welcome addition to the expanding literature on institutional analysis. . . . Besides sociologists, we are afforded the pleasure of contributions from anthropologists, economists, historians, political scientists, and scholars located in schools of law and education. . . . One of the pleasures of the volume is the wide range of topics, times, and locales addressed by the authors. . . . In all these diverse situations, the application of institutional queries and approaches enhances our understanding and appreciation of the endlessly rich and diverse nature of social life."--"Contemporary Society"
"This admirable book makes a strong contribution to institutional theory, has many excellent chapters . . . and is a model for interdisciplinary exchange and cross-fertilization. . . . It is dense with interesting ideas and points for debate, and I heartily recommend it."--"Sociological Research Online"

While other academic disciplines claim a focus around specific subject matter, sociologists think of their field as an approach to understanding the often invisible forces and social contexts that shape the way people conduct their lives. How these forces and contexts are structured is central to sociology. But how do sociologists analyze these invisible structures? This book contributes to our understanding by bringing together a remarkable set of master essays about modern sociology written by some of the leading figures of the field. Each author describes a vision of sociological inquiry or offers an example of research that illustrates approaches and problems encountered in doing sociological work. The collection is rounded out with a prologue by Kai Erikson, an epilogue by Paul DiMaggio, and an extraordinary autobiographical essay by Robert K. Merton. The book is introduced by its editor as a set of reflections, a gathering of visions. But the range of topics and the variety of authors represented make it a valuable introduction to sociology as a discipline and as a way of thinking.

Robert K. Merton is unarguably one of the most influential sociologists of his time. A figure whose wide-ranging theoretical and methodological contributions have become fundamental to the field, Merton is best known for introducing such concepts and procedures as unanticipated consequences, self-fulfilling prophecies, focused group interviews, middle-range theory, opportunity structure, and analytic paradigms.
This definitive compilation encompasses the breadth and brilliance of his works, from the earliest to the most recent. Merton's foundational writings on social structure and process, on the sociology of science and knowledge, and on the discipline and trajectory of sociology itself are all powerfully represented, as are his autobiographical insights in a fascinating coda. Anchored by Piotr Sztompka's contextualizing introduction, Merton's vast oeuvre emerges as a dynamic and profoundly coherent system of thought, a constant source of vitality and renewal for present and future sociology.

"The exploration of the social conditions that facilitate or retard the search for scientific knowledge has been the major theme of Robert K. Merton's work for forty years. This collection of papers [is] a fascinating overview of this sustained inquiry. . . . There are very few other books in sociology . . . with such meticulous scholarship, or so elegant a style. This collection of papers is, and is likely to remain for a long time, one of the most important books in sociology."--Joseph Ben-David, "New York Times Book Review"
"The novelty of the approach, the erudition and elegance, and the unusual breadth of vision make this volume one of the most important contributions to sociology in general and to the sociology of science in particular. . . . Merton's Sociology of Science is a magisterial summary of the field."--Yehuda Elkana, "American Journal of Sociology"
"Merton's work provides a rich feast for any scientist concerned for a genuine understanding of his own professional self. And Merton's industry, integrity, and humility are permanent witnesses to that ethos which he has done so much to define and support."--J. R. Ravetz, "American Scientist"
"The essays not only exhibit a diverse and penetrating analysis and a deal of historical and contemporary examples, with concrete numerical data, but also make genuinely good reading because of the wit, the liveliness and the rich learning with which Merton writes."--Philip Morrison, "Scientific American"
"Merton's impact on sociology as a whole has been large, and his impact on the sociology of science has been so momentous that the title of the book is apt, because Merton's writings represent modern sociology of sciencemore than any other single writer."--Richard McClintock, "Contemporary Sociology
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"Curiosity, wonder, openness--these cohabit, comfortably, in that marvelous coinage of Walpole, serendipity. And they mark as well Merton and Barber's ebullient journey in search of all the meanings of the word. A romp of minds at play!"--Roald Hoffmann, Department of Chemistry, Cornell University, and Nobel Laureate in Chemistry

"One definition of serendipity is: 'The faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident.' Notice that 'faculty' and don't you wish you had it. Merton had it--oh boy, did he--and this treat of a book exemplifies just that. Here is one of those cases where the voyage is even more fun than the destination. There are off-beat nuggets about discovery and scholarship, and about the sociology of discovery and scholarship, and then there are ironical comments about the whole enterprise as it occurs. You will experience serendipity even while you are being educated about it, and you will learn to combine fun and profit."--Robert M. Solow, Institute Professor Emeritus, Department of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Nobel Laureate in Economic Sciences

"What a splendid book! "The Adventures and Travels of Serendipity" is not only a guide to the extraordinary history and present-day usefulness of the blessings that can come from those unplanned, accidental events which, sagaciously employed, can shape one's life. But equally, the volume is an exemplification of superb scholarship presented in graceful style. Indeed, while reading the book one realizes that one perceives its unique subject matter from the vantage of standing on the shoulders of giants."--Gerald Holton, Harvard University

"Merton and Barber's work, "The Travels andAdventures of Serendipity," is a highly original sociological essay and a great work of literature at the same time. Decades ago, when I first heard about this manuscript, I wanted to read it. To have it now, as if as a gift from the late Robert K. Merton, is a pleasure long awaited. Generations of scholars to come will enjoy it and learn from it."--Wolf Lepenies, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin

"This book exceeded my expectations, both for erudition and for entertainment. Its broad-gauged inquiry offers fascinating material for readers of many kinds. Like "On the Shoulders of Giants," this book floods readers with information of every imaginable kind, introduces fantastic characters, and describes bizarre and wonderful books. It also offers something that "On the Shoulders of Giants" could not: explicit reflections on the meaning of Merton's work. The publication of this book is a fitting tribute to a great scholar but also an intervention in current scholarly and scientific debates."--Anthony Grafton, Princeton University

With playfulness and a large dose of wit, Robert Merton traces the origin of Newton's aphorism, "If I have seen farther, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Using as a model the discursive and digressive style of Sterne's "Tristram Shandy," Merton presents a whimsical yet scholarly work which deals with the questions of creativity, tradition, plagiarism, the transmission of knowledge, and the concept of progress.
"This book is the delightful apotheosis of donmanship: Merton parodies scholarliness while being faultlessly scholarly; he scourges pedantry while brandishing his own abstruse learning on every page. The most recondite and obscure scholarly squabbles are transmuted into the material of comedy as the ostensible subject is shouldered to one side by yet another hobby horse from Merton's densely populated stable. He has created a "jeu d'esprit" which is profoundly suggestive both in detail and as a whole."--Sean French, "Times Literary Supplement"

Originally published in German in 1935, this monograph anticipated solutions to problems of scientific progress, the truth of scientific fact and the role of error in science now associated with the work of Thomas Kuhn and others. Arguing that every scientific concept and theory--including his own--is culturally conditioned, Fleck was appreciably ahead of his time. And as Kuhn observes in his foreword, Though much has occurred since its publication, it remains a brilliant and largely unexploited resource. To many scientists just as to many historians and philosophers of science facts are things that simply are the case: they are discovered through properly passive observation of natural reality. To such views Fleck replies that facts are invented, not discovered. Moreover, the appearance of scientific facts as discovered things is itself a social construction, a made thing. A work of transparent brilliance, one of the most significant contributions toward a thoroughly sociological account of scientific knowledge.--Steven Shapin, Science

Additional Contributors Are George N. Shuster, Detlev W. Bronk, Lewis Galantiere, Alfred A. Knopf, Archibald MacLeish, And Leo Rosten.

Additional Contributors Are George N. Shuster, Detlev W. Bronk, Lewis Galantiere, Alfred A. Knopf, Archibald MacLeish, And Leo Rosten.

The 1956 edition of this book may be regarded as seminal within sociology, spawning a whole field of qualitative opinion research that has continued to evolve through half a century of inquiry. This is a reissue of the book, with a new preface by Merton, a select bibliography of writings on the focused interview and focus group research, and a new introduction that traces the diffusion of Merton's technique from sociology to other fields, including history, psychology, mass media and marketing research.