Overview

Being Urban examines the dynamic interplay between what theoretical perceptions tell us about urban life and how ordinary people interpret and respond to the actual experience of living in cities. A major focus of inquiry is the strategies people use to create community in an environment where, many theorists believe, only alienation and progressive disintegration are possible. In the second edition of this important work, the authors have expanded their commitment to interdisciplinary perspectives and have also included chapters on significant topics that have been largely neglected in urban sociology. Part I provides a review of the themes of urban sociology developed by nineteenth-century classic theorists and early American social scientists. In Part II, the authors look at selected aspects of everyday city life, including the bases of community, the primacy of social interaction for an understanding of urban life, and conditions that produce the breakdown of urban tolerance for diversity of cultures and lifestyles. A new chapter in Part II studies women's experiences in cities. Part III explores institutional structures of urban life and broad patterns of cultural change, including a fascinating chapter on the distribution of power, stratification, and class structure in cities. Included in Part III is another new chapter, analyzing the role of sports in urban life. The final chapter discusses urban life in the postindustrial era, and the demographic, cultural, and historical factors that lie behind the ongoing transformation of American cities. This new edition offers a balanced treatment that avoids the anti-urban bias characteristic of much that has been written on the subject. Being Urban is appropriate for professionals and academics concerned with urban life, as well as for courses in urban sociology.

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9780275932923

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?I welcome the (second edition) of Being Urban and hope it will continue to introduce students to the dynamic character of social interaction in cities and the active role of individuals in constructing their urban social worlds. Karp, Stone, and Yoels light the path, now it is up to us...to explore the way.?-Symbolic Interaction

Author Information

DAVID A. KARP is Professor of Sociology at Boston College and co-author of the first edition of Being Urban. He also co-authored (with William C. Yoels) Symbols, Selves, and Society and Experiencing the Life Cycle. Dr. Karp has published articles in Qualitative Sociology, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, International Journal of Aging and Human Development, The Gerontologist, and Symbolic Interaction. The late GREGORY P. STONE was Professor of Sociology at the University of Minnesota and co-authored the first edition of Being Urban. He co-edited Social Psychology Through Symbolic Interaction and published numerous articles in The American Journal of Sociology, The American Sociological Review, and Sociological Quarterly. WILLIAM C. YOELS is Professor of Sociology at the University of Alabama, Birmingham and co-authored the first edition of Being Urban. He also co-authored Sociology and Everyday Life, Experiencing the Life Cycle, and Symbols, Selves, and Society. Dr. Yoels has published articles in Qualitative Sociology, Sociology and Social Research, Sociological Quarterly, and The American Journal of Sociology.

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