The social lens : an invitation to social and sociological theory / Kenneth Allan, University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 573-580) and index.

Acknowledgments -- Modernity and the sociological response -- On theory -- The evolution of society : Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) -- Contradictions in capitalism : Karl Marx (1818-1883) -- The irrationality of rationality : Max Weber (1864-1920) -- The problem with diversity : Émile Durkheim (1858-1917) -- The modern person : George Herbert Mead and Georg Simmel -- The challenges of gender and race : Charlotte Perkins Gilman and W.E.B. du Bois -- Contemporary sociological theory -- Structural functionalism : Talcott Parsons, Robert K. Merton -- And Jeffrey C. Alexander -- Conflict theory : Lewis Coser, Ralf Dahrendorf, and Randall Collins -- What happened to class? : Erik Olin Wright, Daniel Bell, and Pierre Bourdieu -- Structures of racial and gender inequality : William Julius Wilson and Janet Saltzman Chafetz -- Exchange theory : George Homans, Peter Blau, and Randall Collins -- Self and situation : Erving Goffman, R.S. Perinbanayagam, and harold Garfinkel -- Contemporary new visions and critiques -- Problems in modernity : Jorgen Habermas and Anthony Giddens -- Globalizing systems : Immanuel Wallerstein and Manuel Castells -- Upsetting reality : Michel Foucault and Jean Baudrillard -- Politics of identity : Dorothy E. Smith, Patricia Hill Collins, and Cornel West -- References -- Index -- About the author.