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Rural Sociology: Some Inter-American Aspects

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Lowry Nelson
Lowry Nelson*
Affiliation:
Center for Advanced International Studies, University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida
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Extract

Rural sociology had its origin and growth as an academic discipline in the United States. The other social sciences—including general sociology, economics, political science, anthropology and historiography—were mainly imported from Europe and the British Isles. Rural sociology, however, was a United States “export” both to Europe and to Latin America.

This inverse process of diffusion deserves a brief explanation. Why did Rural sociology not originate in Europe? And, conversely, why did it take root in the United States? To answer the first question we may cite the following factors:

  1. 1. During the latter part of the nineteenth century when the social conditions of rural people in the United States were critical, Europe was relatively stable. The peasant revolts of the earlier centuries had faded into history, feudalism, in its worst features at least, was no more. There were still agrarian problems, of course, including land fragmentation, but they were not serious enough to cause widespread unrest. Moreover, the restless ones were free to migrate to the New World. Europe, in short, was in the happy condition of being able to export its “problem” mainly to the United States.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Inter-American Studies , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , July 1967 , pp. 323 - 338
Copyright
Copyright © University of Miami 1967

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References

1 Hofstee, E. W., “Rural Sociology in Europe,” Rural Sociology, 28 (December 1961), 329–341.Google Scholar

2 In reality, general sociology in the United States as represented by its founders— Franklin H. Giddings, William Graham Summer, Albion W. Small, E. A. Ross, F. W. Blackmar—was not empirically inclined. These men were more philosophically oriented.

3 Williams, James M. (1876) An American Town: A Sociological Study (New York: James Dempster Printing Co., 1906)Google Scholar; Wilson, Warren H. (1867-1937) Quaker Hill (Brooklyn, New York: W. H. Wilson, 1907, private printing)Google Scholar; Sims, Newell L. (1878-1965), A Hoosier Village (New York: Columbia University, 1912).Google Scholar

4 Butterfield held this position only one year until he became a College president. Although he spent his career in administrative work, he gave his continuous support to the promotion of rural sociology and agricultural economics in the Agricultural Colleges of the country.

5 Galpin, C. J., The Social Anatomy of an Agricultural Community (Madison, Wis.: The Agricultural Experiment Station, University of Wisconsin, Research Bulletin 34, 1915).Google Scholar

6 Space does not allow further historical treatment here. Those interested in the subject are advised that the author has prepared a volume Rural Sociology. Its Rise and Growth in the United States (in process of publication), University of Minnesota Press.

7 Buell, Raymond Leslie (ed) Problems of the New Cuba (New York: The Foreign Policy Association, 1935).Google Scholar

8 Lynn Smith, T. and Marchant, Alexander, Brazil: Portrait of Half a Continent (New York: The Dryden Press, 1951).Google Scholar His textbook, The Sociology of Rural Life has been translated into both Portuguese and Spanish.

9 Lynn Smith, T., Justo Díaz Rodriguez and Luis Roberto Garcia, Tabio: Estudio de la Organización Social Rural (Bogotá: Ministerio de la Economía Nacional, 1944).Google Scholar The English version, Tabio: A Study in Rural Social Organization (U.S. Department of Agriculture, Office of Foreign Agricultural Relations, 1945).

10 Orlando Fals-Borda used the instrument with appropriate modifications for interviewing 71 families, the results of which formed the body of his Peasant Society in the Colombian Andes (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1955).

11 Latin American Population Studies (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1961).

12 Examples: Current Social Trends and Problems in Latin America, Latin American Monographs 1 (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1957); Agrarian Reform in Latin America (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1965).

13 Taylor, Carl C., Rural Life in Argentina (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1948).Google Scholar Taylor has described the work of these five studies in his article “Early Rural Sociological Research in Latin America,” Rural Sociology, 25 (March 1960), 1-8.

14 Whetten, Nathan L., Rural Mexico (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1948).Google Scholar

15 Whetten, Nathan L., Guatemala (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961).Google Scholar

16 Leonard, Olen E., Bolivia: Land, People and Institutions (Washington, D.C.: The Scarecrow Press, 1952).Google Scholar Previous to the publication of the book, Leonard had made a number of local studies in Bolivia as follows: Canton Chullpas: A Socioeconomic Study in the Cochabamba Valley of Bolivia (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Report No. 27, 1947—also published in Spanish in La Paz by the Ministry of Agriculture); Santa Cruz: A Socioeconomic Study of an Area in Bolivia, publication as above. Also during his stay in Bolivia he was permitted to visit and make a sociological study in Ecuador. See his Pichilingue: A Study of Rural Life in Coastal Ecuador (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Foreign Agriculture Report No. 17, 1947).

17 Nelson, Lowry, Rural Cuba (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1950).Google Scholar See also the author's “Cuban Paradoxes,” in Curtis Wilgus, A. (ed.) The Caribbean at Mid-Century (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1951).Google Scholar

18 A partial bibliography of his works: “Extension work in Tingo María, Peru,” Applied Anthropology, 3 (December 1943), 18-34; (with Wilson Longmore) “Health Needs and Potential Colonization Areas of Peru,” Inter-American Economic Affairs, 3 (Summer 1949), 71-93; “Trial Use of Public Opinion Survey Procedures in Determining Immigration and Colonization Policies for Bolivia, Ecuador, and Peru,” Social Forces, 26 (October 1947), 30-35; (with Reed M. Powell) “Class status in rural Costa Rica,” in Crevenna, Theo R., Materiales para el-estudio de la clase media en la America Latina (Washington: Pan American Union, Vol. V, 1951).Google Scholar

19 The results of much of the research are reported in the volume Turrialba: Social Systems and the Introduction of Change, edited by Loomis, Julio O. Morales, Roy A. Clifford, and Olen Leonard (Glencoe: Free Press, 1953). Loomis also rendered an important service, assisted by Olen Leonard, in editing and publishing Readings in Latin American Social Organization and Institutions (East Lansing: Michigan State College Press, 1953).

20 The population characteristics, constituting one phase of this extensive study is reported in Allan Beegle, J., Goldsmith, Harold F., and Loomis, Charles P., “Demographic Characteristics of the United States-Mexican Border,” Rural Sociology, 25 (March 1960), 105–162.Google Scholar A further report on this project appeared in June of the same year. See Cumberland, Charles C., The United States-Mexican Border: A Selective Guide to the Literature of the Region, Supplement to Rural Sociology, Vol. 25, No. 2 (June 1960), pp. x, 236.Google Scholar

21 Among the individual papers published by Hill and his Venezuelan associates are the following: Hill, George W. and Beltrán, Gregorio, “Land Settlement in Venezuela with Special Reference to the Turen Project,” Rural Sociology, 17 (September 1952), 229–236 Google Scholar; with Beltrán, Gregorio and Marino, Cristmo, “Social Welfare and Land Tenure in the Agrarian Reform Program of Venezuela,” Land Economics, 28 (February 1952), 17–29.Google Scholar Buitrón, Anibal, Exodo rural en Venezuela (Washington: Pan American Union, 1955).Google Scholar The two most important works of Hill in Venezuela are El campesino venezolano (1959) and El Estado Sucre: sus recursos humanos (Caracas: Universidad Central de Venezuela).

22 Ford, Thomas, Man and Land in Peru (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1955)Google Scholar, Saunders, John V. D., Differential Fertility in Brazil (University of Florida Press, 1958)Google Scholar.

23 Fliegel, Frederick C., “Literacy and Exposure to Instrumental Information among Farmers in Southern Brazil,” Rural Sociology, 31 (March 1966), 15–28 Google Scholar; with Oliveira, Fernando C. Receptividade a ideias navas e exodo rural numa area colonial (Porto Alegre: Universidade do Rio Grande do Sul, Estudos e Trabalhos no. 14, 1963).Google Scholar

24 Blair, Thomas Lucien, “Social Structure and Information Exposure in Rural Brazil,” Rural Sociology, 25 (March 1960), 65–75.Google Scholar

25 The influence of his Wisconsin training is clearly manifest in his brief research note, “Defining the Boundaries of a Brazilian Rural Community,” Rural Sociology, 22 (September 1957), 270.

26 See Freitas Marcondes, J. V., “Mutirao or Mutual Aid,” Rural Sociology, 13 (December 1948), 374–384 Google Scholar; with Price, Paul H., “A Demographic Analysis of the Population of Sao Paulo,” Social Forces, 27 (May 1949), 381–389 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; with Lynn Smith, T., “The Caipira of the Paraitinga Valley, Brazil,” Social Forces, 31 (October 1952), 47–53;Google Scholar Rios, Jose Artur, “Assimilation of Emigrants from the Old South in Brazil,” Social Forces 26 (December 1947), 145–152 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Clase e Familia no Brasil, Digest Económico, Sao Paulo; “The Cities of Brazil,” in T. Lynn Smith and Alexander Marchant, Brazil: Portrait of Half a Continent.

27 “Rural Sociological Research in Brazil,” Rural Sociology, 29 (June 1964), 231.

28 Ray E. Wakeley, “Rural Sociology: Teaching and Research in Brazil,” Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization, 1952 (mimeo).

29 The most important center for the study of the social sciences, notably anthropology, sociology, and political science, is the Escola de Sociología e Política, in Sao Paulo; many field studies have been made under its sponsorship, mostly by anthropologists. It also publishes Sociología, since 1939.

30 Sariola, Sakari, “A Colonization Experiment in BoUvia,” Rural Sociology, 25 (March 1960), 76–90.Google Scholar

31 Alers-Montalvo, Manuel, “Social Systems Analysis of Supervised Agricultural Credit in an Andean Community,” Rural Sociology, 25 (March 1960), 51–64 Google Scholar; “Cultural Change in a Costa Rican Village,” Human Organization, 15 (Winter 1957), 2-7.

32 Solari, Aldo E., Sociología rural nacional (Montevideo: Universidad de Montevideo, 1953)Google Scholar; Vidart, Daniel D., La vida rural uruguaya (Montevideo: Ministerio de Ganadería y Agricultura, Departmento de Sociología Rural, Publicación 1, 1955).Google Scholar

33 Rama, Carlos M., Ensayo de sociología uruguaya (Montevideo: Editorial Medina, 1957).Google Scholar As a textbook in general sociology it should be an important influence in the development of the field.

34 Lucio Mendieta y Núñez et al. Efectos de la reforma agraria en tres comunidades de la República Mexicana (México: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1960).Google Scholar

35 Lucio Mendieta y Núfiez, Memoria del Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales de la Universidad Nacional de México 1939-1951 (México: Imprenta Universitaria, 1952). p. 12.Google Scholar

36 Congreso Nacional de Sociología, VI, 1955 (México: Instituto de Investigaciones Sociales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1956).

37 Fals-Borda, Orlando, El hombre y la tierra en Boy acá; bases sociológicas e históricas para una reforma agraria (Bogotá: Ediciones Documentos Colombianos, 1957). 259 pp.Google Scholar

38 The full account of this experiment is told in Orlando Fals-Borda (with the collaboration of Niña Chaves and Ismael Márquez), Acción comunal en una vereda colombiana (Bogotá: Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Departamento de Sociología, monografías sociológicas, 4, 1960).

39 In this regard, see Germani, Gino, “Una decada de discusiones metodológicas”, Ciencias Sociales, Vol. II, Nos. 11 and 12 (October-December 1951) Pan American Union, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar