Faculty Books
Gary Alan Fine
Professor
Director of Graduate Student Affairs
Director of Ethnography Workshop
1810 Chicago Avenue, Room 221
Phone: (847) 491-3495
g-fine@northwestern.edu
Office Hours: (Winter 2012)
Thursday 2:00-3:00
Areas of Interest
Social Psychology
Cultural Sociology
Qualitative Methodology
Biography
Ph.D., Harvard University, 1976. Areas of interest include social psychology, sociology of culture, sociology of science, qualitative sociology, social theory, and collective behavior. Before coming to Northwestern, Fine was on the faculty of the University of Georgia and the University of Minnesota, and was a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study in the Social Sciences, and the Russell Sage Foundation. His current research has three distinct streams.
First, he is interested in the development of reputations of individuals with "difficult reputations" by means of reputational entrepreneurs (Warren Harding, Benedict Arnold, John Brown, Henry Ford). This research was recently published in Difficult Reputations: Collective Memories of the Evil, Inept and Controversial (University of Chicago Press, 2001).
His current research on reputations deals with reputations and memories of the American left and right during the 1935-1955 period, including McCarthy era and the way that Adolf Hitler is remembered in the United States.
As an ethnographer, he is currently examining the multiple social worlds of chess as a leisure and competitive activity, examining the role of technological change and changes in global-political politics (e.g., the breakup of the Soviet Union) on chess as a community.
Collaboration with Graduate Students:
I am delighted to work with students on my research on historical reputations. My research focuses on negative or difficult reputations, and at the moment my attention deals with the reputations involved in contentious politics and also on images of sedition in the United States. This research is such that students can work jointly on these projects, and the research has been quite successful in terms of publication placement (AJS, Social Problems, Poetics, Sociological Quarterly, Sociological Forum, and Social Forces)...
Courses Taught
SOCIOL 476: Special Topics: Collective Memory Syllabus
SOCIOL 476: Special Topics: Microsociology Syllabus
Books
Sticky Reputations: The Politics of Collective Memory in Midcentury America
Routledge, 2012
Authors of the Storm: Meteorology and the Culture of Prediction
Chicago Press, 2010
Everyday Genius: Self-Taught
Chicago Press, 2004
Whispers on the Color Line: Rumor and Race in America
(with Patricia Turner), Chicago Press, 2004
Gifted Tongues: High School Debate and Adolescent Culture
Princeton Press, 2001
Morel Tales: The Culture of Mushrooming
Harvard Press, 1998
Kitchens: The Culture of Restaurant Work
California Press, 1996
Publications
The Sociology of the Local: Action and its Publics
Sociological Theory, 2010
DUST: A Study in Sociological Miniaturism
With Tim Hallett; Social Psychology, 2008
The Chaining of Social Problems: Solutions and Unintended Consequences in the Age of Betrayal
Social Problems, 2006
Tiny Publics: Small Groups and Civil Society
With Brooke Harrington; Sciological Theory, 2004
Opening the "Black" Box: Small Groups and Twenty-First-Century Sociology
With Brooke Harrington; Social Psychology, 2000
Sociology Robert F. Winch Awards for 2011
Outstanding Graduate Student Lecturer: Marina Zaloznaya
Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Assistants: Fiona Chin and Christopher Carroll
Outstanding Graduate Student Second-Year Paper: Jaimie Morse
Outstanding Graduate Student Paper Published or Presented:
Upcoming Events
Colloquium: Nicola Beisel, PhD - Sociology
February 23, 2012 • 12:30 PM - 2:00 PM
Culture and Society Workshop: Simone Ispa-Landa, Human Development and Social Policy
February 23, 2012 • 3:30 PM - 5:30 PM
