How Did Du Dubois Contribute To Sociology

1155 Words5 Pages

Sociology can be defined as the study of human behavior as social beings, covering everything from the analysis of short contacts between strangers to global social interactions. Sociology as defined by Anthony Giddens (1989) is the study of human social life, groups and societies. Both these definitions explain that sociologist try to understand how interactions between people affect the society and how the society affects interactions between people, meaning that they both affect one another with or without our knowledge. By the words of Right Mills each individual who lives leaves out a biography and the fact that he is living he contributes however minutely to the shaping of this society and to the course of history. Sociology has developed from being “sciences of society” to try and understand how the society …show more content…

He was a descendant from an African heritage, French, and Dutch lineage, hence his name, an intellectual gifted student, doing very well in high school earning him a full scholarship to Fisk University in Tennessee, a black institution. Upon receiving his A.B. he attended Harvard University where he was to receive his B.A. graduating cum laude. Studying in Europe was a long life dream of DuBois' and after earning his M.A. in History at Harvard he saw his dream come true and went on to study at the University of Berlin with some of the great German minds in philosophy and sociology and economics. DuBois later returned to the United States to become the first man of African descent to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard University. Du Bois was married twice, first to Nina Gomer with whom they had two children a boy Burghardt who died as an infant and a daughter Yolanda. When his wife died in 1950 he married Shirley Graham who came with her son David Graham. David grew close to Du Bois and took his stepfather's name and he also worked for African-American