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1 - Introduction

Whose Social Problems?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2020

Philippe Fontaine
Affiliation:
École normale supérieure Paris–Saclay
Jefferson D. Pooley
Affiliation:
Muhlenberg College, Pennsylvania
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Summary

At first glance, the 1961 collection Contemporary Social Problems is indistinguishable from dozens of similarly named textbooks. The volume, edited by Robert Merton and Robert Nisbet, was the latest installment in a long-running genre of works aiming to orient American sociology undergraduates to a range of “social problems.” Like its predecessors, the Merton and Nisbet collection featured a chapter-by-chapter march through a succession of named problems such as crime, drug addiction, and family disorganization.

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