Why Don't I Know About These Women

The Integration of Early Women Sociologists in Classical Theory Courses

Bibliographic Data

ID7104590
AuthorsJan E Thomas (Jan E. Thomas is an assistant professor of sociology at Kenyon College. In addition to her class on women sociologists she also teaches courses on social movements, health and illness, institutions and inequalities, and research methods. Her research is primarily in the area of women's health.), Jan Thomas (Men's Health Forum, corresponding author), Annis Kukulan (Annis Kukulan graduated from Kenyon College in 2002 with a Bachelor's degree in sociology.)
Year2004
Volume32
Issue3
Pages252-263
Publication date2004-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueTeaching Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0092-055X • E-ISSN: 1939-862X
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0092055x0403200301
OpenAlexW2101527627
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited25

In recent years, early women sociologists such as Harriet Martineau, Ida B. Wells, and Jane Addams have begun to appear in some introductory textbooks and theory books. Usually, they appear in a box, as a sidebar, or as selected “others.” So why do we not know more about these women? Our research seeks to answer this question. Given the availability of books by and about these women, we hypothesized that one explanation might lie in the training of theory instructors. If graduate students were not exposed to the work of early women sociologists, then it seemed unlikely they would incorporate them into their own teaching, research, and analyses. To assess this theory, we collected theory syllabi from 40 graduate schools. Since we were most interested in early women sociologists, we focused our analysis on “classical” theory syllabi. Our findings indicate that Marx, Weber, and Durkheim still dominate classical theory syllabi. The writings of women were assigned on 17 percent of the syllabi in our sample. We believe this indicates a weak but visible indication that the diffusion of their work has begun

Epistemology · Feminism · Graduate students · Pedagogy · Sample (material · Sociology · Sociology of Education · Syllabus · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Gender Studies · Philosophy · Psychology · Social and Cultural Dynamics · Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory

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