This Article Full Text (PDF) References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Dickens, P. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Society, Space and the Biotic Level: An Urban and Rural Sociology for the New Millennium

Faculty of Social and Political Sciences University of Cambridge

Urban and rural sociology is currently dominated by two relatively separate approaches. One perspective emphasises political economy and increasing globalisation. Another focuses on the meaning of urban and rural areas in people's lives. This paper argues for a fusion between these two views. Urban and rural sociology should be concerned with the relations between political economy on the one hand and the biological and psychological bases of human behaviour on the other. Recent developments in the human sciences and psychology assist in making this link. They can be used to extend the original insights of the early Chicago School of sociology, particularly as regards the formation of human identities. Nevertheless, there remain substantial arguments as to how `the Chicago School's biotic level' should be conceptualised and how we envisage its links to the more conscious, pre-planned, aspects of human behaviour. Early Marx and Williams's now somewhat neglected work on the country and the city offer provocative yet helpful ways forward.

Key Words: biology • economy • identity • politics • rural • society • urban

Sociology, Vol. 34, No. 1, 147-164 (2000)
DOI: 10.1177/S0038038500000109


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?

This article has been cited by other articles:

				D. Denney, J. Gabe, and M. O'Beirne Anglican Clergy as Victims of Routinized Violent Activities in Urban and Rural Localities Sociology, February 1, 2008; 42(1): 83 - 99. [Abstract] [PDF]