Sociological Studies of American Life in the 1920s

Abstract

The 1920s in the USA was an era characterized by the conflicting social themes epitomized by Prohibition and its polar incarnation—the Jazz Age. Mainstream American sociology was also drawn to divergent styles. Pitirim Sorokin of Harvard wrote his seminal Social Mobility in an attempt to generalize about patterns of inequality and ranking in society, establishing the groundwork for studies in social stratification ever since. Robert and Helen Lynd, invited to study religion in American life, expanded their inquiry into two heralded accounts of the American way of life in a small, Midwestern city—Muncie, IN. Together, these works established a recognition that the American Dream encapsulated different experiences, but often the same dreams, for Americans from different classes.