Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of the book. The book provides a general view of Robert E. Park and the Chicago school of American sociology. It focuses on the contribution that Park and those working within the Chicago school tradition have made to the area of urban race and ethnicity. The book expresses that the original perspective and the special style of social research developed by Park, along with W. I. Thomas and their students, are of equal importance in ensuring him a place among those social scientists whose ideas remain crucial to contemporary scholarship and current political and policy oriented debate. It explores how current thinking among sociologists, anthropologists, social historians, and social geographers might usefully be amalgamated with the ongoing tradition originating with Park at Chicago. Park's durability has been facilitated by the remarkably fruitful and prescient nature of his perspective on race and ethnicity.