Mead’s Legacy in Sociology: Faris, Morris, Blumer and the Manufacture of Symbolic Interactionism

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This lecture traces the ways in which G. H. Mead’s ideas were interpreted and popularized by his students and colleagues. Understanding this process is key to explaining how Mead became canonized as a founder of "Symbolic Interactionism" in sociology, despite never having taught a course in that discipline. Huebner shows how Ellsworth Faris was the gatekeeper to Mead’s ideas for University of Chicago sociology students, how Charles Morris constructed a body of materials attributed posthumously to Mead, and how Herbert Blumer claimed authority over the interpretation of Mead’s work in sociology.

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Daniel R. Huebner is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. He completed his PhD in Sociology at the University of Chicago in 2012. His thesis was published as "Becoming Mead: The Social Process of Academic Knowledge" in 2014. Together with Hans Joas he edited "Mind, Self, and Society: The Definitive Edition. By George H. Mead" and "The Timeliness of George Herbert Mead" (all: University of Chicago Press). His research investigates how knowledge is produced in social practices and stratified in social institutions, which provides a critical, reflective, and comparative-historical vantage point on interdisciplinary domains including higher education, culture, work, and social inequalities.