Talcott Parsons

Roland Robertson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Pittsburgh. His books include International Systems and the Modernization of Societies (with J P Nettl, 1968) The Sociological Interpretation of Religion (1970) Meaning and Change: Explorations in the Cultural Sociology of Modern Societies (1978), Religion and Global Order (co-edited with William R Garrett, 1991) and Talcott Parsons: Theorist of Modernity (co-edited with Bryan S Turner Bryan S. Turner is Professor of Sociology in the Asian Research Institute (ARI) at the National University of Singapore. Previously he was Professor of Sociology in the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Cambridge from 1998-2005. His research interests include globalization and religion, concentrating on such issues as religious conflict and the modern state, religious authority and electronic information, religious, consumerism and youth cultures, human rights and religion, the human body, medical change, and religious cosmologies. He is Joint Chief Editor of the journal Citizenship Studies and serves on the editorial boards of several prestigious journals.

An Introduction to Talcott Parsons - Roland Robertson and Bryan S Turner Theory, Politics and Humanity The American Value System - Victor Lidz A Commentary on Talcott Parsons's Perspective and Understanding A Tentative Outline of American Values - Talcott Parsons Practice Against Theory in American Sociology - Harold J Bershady an Exercise in the Sociology of Knowledge The Structure of Social Action - Mark Gould At Least Sixty Years Ahead of Its Time Influence and Solidarity - Victor Lidz Defining a Conceptual Core for Sociology The Central Significance of 'Religion' in Social Theory - Roland Robertson Parsons as an Epical Theorist Parsons and Modernity - Frank J Lechner An Interpretation Simmel and Parsons Reconsidered - Donald N Levine From Sick Role to Health Role - Arthur W Frank Deconstructing Parsons The Political Orientation of Talcott Parsons - Jens Kaalhauge Nielsen the Second World War and its Aftermath Neo-functionalism and the 'New Theoretical Movement' - Bryan S Turner The Post-Parsonian Rapprochement between Germany and America How to Read Parsons - Bryan S Turner and Roland Robertson

`It is a compendium of thirteen original papers, including some unpublished work by Parson's himself, which goes well beyond providinga coda to his work. The authors reopen a new postfunctionalist phase in which Parsons is put into perspective as new emendations are constructed on the basis provided by his work...For those interested in sociocultural dimensions of the group process and the integration of group members outside society, the book provides considerable food for thought' - Group Analysis