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| Chicago school (sociology) | 1/3 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_school_(sociology) | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T15:21:47.761909+00:00 | kb-cron |
The Chicago school (sometimes known as the ecological school) refers to a school of thought in sociology and criminology originating at the University of Chicago whose work was influential in the early 20th century. Conceived in 1892, the Chicago school first rose to international prominence as the epicenter of advanced sociological thought between 1915 and 1935, when their work would be the first major bodies of research to specialize in urban sociology. This was considered the Golden Age of Sociology, with influence on many of today's well known sociologists. Their research into the urban environment of Chicago would also be influential in combining theory and ethnographic fieldwork. Major figures within the first Chicago school included Nels Anderson, Ernest Burgess, Ruth Shonle Cavan, Edward Franklin Frazier, Everett Hughes, Roderick D. McKenzie, George Herbert Mead, Robert E. Park, Walter C. Reckless, Edwin Sutherland, W. I. Thomas, Frederic Thrasher, Louis Wirth, and Florian Znaniecki. The activist, social scientist, and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jane Addams also forged and maintained close ties with some of the members of the school. Following the Second World War, a "second Chicago School" arose, whose members combined symbolic interactionism with methods of field research (today known as ethnography), to create a new body of work. Luminaries from the second Chicago school include, Howard S. Becker, Richard Cloward, Erving Goffman, David Matza, Robert K. Merton, Lloyd Ohlin and Frances Fox Piven.
== Theory and method == The Chicago school is best known for its urban sociology and for the development of the symbolic interactionist approach, notably through the work of Herbert Blumer. It has focused on human behavior as shaped by social structures and physical environmental factors, rather than genetic and personal characteristics. Biologists and anthropologists had accepted the theory of evolution as demonstrating that animals adapt to their environments. As applied to humans who are considered responsible for their own destinies, members of the school believed that the natural environment, which the community inhabits, is a major factor in shaping human behavior, and that the city functions as a microcosm: "In these great cities, where all the passions, all the energies of mankind are released, we are in a position to investigate the process of civilization, as it were, under a microscope." Members of the school have concentrated on the city of Chicago as the object of their study, seeking evidence whether urbanization and increasing social mobility have been the causes of the contemporary social problems. By 1910, the population exceeded two million, many of whom were recent immigrants to the U.S. With a shortage in housing and a lack of regulation in the burgeoning factories, the city's residents experienced homelessness and poor housing, living, and working conditions with low wages, long hours, and excessive pollution. In their analysis of the situation, Thomas and Znaniecki (1918) argued that these immigrants, released from the controls of Europe to the unrestrained competition of the new city, contributed to the city's dynamic growth.
Like the person who is born, grows, matures, and dies, the community continues to grow and exhibits properties of all of the individuals who had lived in the community.Ecological studies (among sociologists thus) consisted of making spot maps of Chicago for the place of occurrence of specific behaviors, including alcoholism, homicide, suicides, psychoses, and poverty, and then computing rates based on census data. A visual comparison of the maps could identify the concentration of certain types of behavior in some areas. Correlations of rates by areas were not made until later.For W. I. Thomas, the groups themselves had to reinscribe and reconstruct themselves to prosper. Burgess studied the history of development and concluded that the city had not grown at the edges. Although the presence of Lake Michigan prevented the complete encirclement, he postulated that all major cities would be formed by radial expansion from the center in concentric rings which he described as zones, i.e. the business area in the center; the slum area (aka "the zone in transition") around the central area; the zone of workingmen's homes farther out; the residential area beyond this zone; and then the bungalow section and the commuter's zone on the periphery. Under the influence of Albion Small, the research at the school mined the mass of official data including census reports, housing/welfare records and crime figures, and related the data spatially to different geographical areas of the city. Criminologists Shaw and McKay created statistical maps: spot maps to demonstrate the location of a range of social problems with a primary focus on juvenile delinquency; rate maps which divided the city into block of one square mile and showed the population by age, gender, ethnicity, etc.; zone maps which demonstrated that the major problems were clustered in the city center. Thomas also developed techniques of self-reporting life histories to provide subjective balance to the analysis. Park, Burgess, and McKenzie (1925) are credited with institutionalizing, if not establishing, sociology as a science. They are also criticized for their overly empiricist and idealized approach to the study of society but, in the inter-war years, their attitudes and prejudices were normative. Three broad themes characterized this dynamic period of Chicago studies: