What Happened , Sociologically Speaking , During the Twentieth Century ?

Century of Difference: How America Changed in the Last One Hundred Years by Claude Fischer and Michael Hout is a notable contribution to the long and venerable tradition of sociological scholarship on long-term social trends. In the 1930s, William Ogburn and Howard Odum were the leading authors of the volumes published by the President’s Research Committee on Recent Social Trends. In the 1960s, Otis Dudley Duncan, Eleanor Sheldon, and Wilbert Moore were among the leaders who launched the social indicators movement. Century of Difference is a broad, empirically informed survey of social change in twentieth-century America. With a century of decennial census data, the authors measure trends in educational attainment, ethnic composition, family structure, work, socioeconomic status, and residential mobility. Fischer and Hout also mine survey data to address questions about wealth holding, consumption, religious beliefs and affiliations, and the changing cultural landscape of popular attitudes and beliefs. Each chapter begins with a discussion of a significant social topic which draws upon the relevant literature in sociology, economics, social history, and related disciplines. In addition to the scholarly literature, they often turn to the popular press (such as newspapers and magazines), especially from the early twentieth century, to convey a vivid portrait of how much American society has changed. Although the volume is deeply empirical, readers are not overwhelmed by statistical tables and graphs. In addition to interesting theoretical and historical setups in each chapter, the authors have cleverly designed compact charts to covey the essence of long-term social change. The standard presentation consists of a plot of the 80th, 50th, and 20th percentiles for each decade of the twentieth century (or for shorter periods if data are lacking). This allows for simultaneous consideration of trends in central tendency (the median) and variance, so that readers can see whether gaps between the top and bottom have narrowed or widened. The result is an interesting, and often compelling, sociological account of major social trends. The authors modestly state that their primary goal is to “describe historical trends, not explain them” (p. 8), but the overall weight of the study casts new light on many sociological debates. There is much to praise in this volume, including the authors’ ambition and analytical skills as well as their contribution to sociological knowledge. Very few sociologists have the bravado, let alone the competence, to knowledgeably analyze and interpret social trends on such a broad variety of topics. The authors do not hesitate to develop new methods (or adapt methods from other fields) to summarize complexity and to illuminate underlying patterns. These methods are carefully described (and additional data presented) in almost 100 pages of endnotes and three methodological appendices. There are many original findings sprinkled throughout the volume. Here are a few of my favorites: