C. Wright Mills
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Short Profile Major Works of C.W. Mills Other Works Books About C.W. Mills Links |
Charles Wright Mills was a radical intellectual of the 1950's, a social scientist and
merciless critic of ideology, and a writer of scrupulous, robust & generous mind.
His ideas continue to resonate today.
He was born at Waco, TX on 28 August 1916. He did well at the University of Texas, graduating in philosophy in 1939. He received his PhD degree at the University of Wisconsin in 1941; his heroes were Max Weber [1864-1920] & Karl Marx, his dissertation was on pragmatism. After a short stint at the University of Maryland, he moved to Columbia University in New York City in 1945. He was promoted to assistant professor [of sociology] in 1946; though he was not given a full professorship until 1956, he nonetheless turned down other offers and stayed at Columbia out of belief that New York City was the center of U.S. intellectual activity.
The ambitious three works on stratification for which he is most famous are "The New Men of Power: America's Labor Leaders" (1948), "White Collar: The American Middle Classes" (1951), and his best-known & most controversial work, "The Power Elite" (1956). Later works included a scathing book on sociological practice, "The Sociological Imagination" (1959).
He had three wives, who each bore one child.
He died on 20 March 1962, in Nyack, N.Y. His two daughters published a book of his collected letters in May 2000.
The major search engines bring up dozens of serious & important links about C. Wright Mills, by sociologists busy using his concepts today, in a multitude of languages; some are included here.
C. Wright Mills Links
official C. Wright Mills website
C. Wright Mills entry at Wikipedia
Frank Elwell's C.W. Mills essay
Alan Banks' C.W. Mills Page
online etext of portions of "The Power Elite"
Howard Becker's essay on C.W. Mills
Todd Gitlin's article "Free Radical"
S.S.S.P.'s C. Wright Mills Book Award [est. 1964]
Corey Shdaimah's C.W. Mills essay
Stanley Aronowitz essay in Logos {Summer 2003)
Max Weber Links
Frank Elwell's Max Weber Page
Max Weber entry at Wikipedia
browse Max Weber books at Amazon
Major Works of C. Wright Mills
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"New Men of Power: America's Labor Leaders" with Helen Schneider [Harcourt Brace 1948] Univ IL Press pb [9/2001] for $17.95 Univ IL Press 8½x5¾ hardcover [9/2001] for $40.00 A.M. Kelley hardcover [1/71] for $46.99 |
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"White Collar: The American Middle Classes" [1951]
Oxford Univ Press 8x6.4 pb [9/2002] for $12.57 Oxford Univ Press 8x5 pb [7/83] out of print/used |
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"The Power Elite" [1956]
Oxford Univ Press pb [1/2000] for $13.27 Oxford Univ Press pb [2/93] out of print/used Oxford Univ Press pb [1/60] out of print/used |
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"The Sociological Imagination" [1959]
Oxford Univ Press 8x5¼ pb [7/2000] for $10.47 Oxford Univ Press pb [2/90] out of print/used Oxford Univ Press 8x5 pb [12/67] out of print/used |
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"C. Wright Mills: Letters & Autobiographical Writings" [2000] Edited by Kathryn Mills & Pamela Mills Univ CA Press 9½x5½ pb [8/2001] for $13.27 Univ CA Press 9½x6½ hardcover [5/2000] for $40.00 |
Other Works
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"From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology" [1946] Edited & translated by Hans Gerth & C. Wright Mills Oxford Univ Press hardcover [12/58] for $26.95 |
"The Puerto Rican Journey: New York's Newest Immigrants" [1950]
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"Character and Social Structure: The Psychology of Social Institutions" [Harcourt Brace 1953] by Hans Gerth & C. Wright Mills Harvest Books 8½x5½ pb [10/99] for $26.00 |
"Images of Man: The Classic Tradition in Sociological Thinking" [1960]
George Braziller hardcover [1/60] out of print/used
"Listen, Yankee: The Revolution in Cuba" [1960]
McGraw-Hill / Ballantine [12/60] out of print/used
"The Marxists" [1962]
Dell / Delta pb [various] out of print/used
"Power, Politics & People: Collected Essays of C. Wright Mills" [1963]
Edited by Irving Louis Horowitz
Oxford Univ Press pb [2/93] out of print/used
Oxford Univ Press pb [12/63] out of print/used
"Sociology and Pragmatism" [written 1945; published 1964]
"Situated Actions & Vocabularies of Motive"
Irvington Publg pb [8/93] for $6.99
"Who Controls America: Opposing Viewpoints"
Greenhaven Press pb [12/88] out of print/used
Books about C. Wright Mills
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"Radical Nomad: C Wright Mills & His Times" [2006] by Tom Hayden, with Stanley Aronowitz, Richard Flacks & Charles C. Lemert Paradigm pb [6/2006] for $19.95 Paradigm hardcover [6/2006] for $67.00 |
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"Veblen, Dewey, and Mills: An Intellectual Relationship" [2003] by Rick Tilman Rowman & Littlefield 9x6 hardcover [12/2003] for $65.00 |
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"C. Wright Mills and the Ending of Violence" [2003] by John D. Brewer Palgrave Macmillan 9x5½ hardcover [10/2003] for $65.00 |
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"Collaboration, Reputation, and Ethics in American Academic Life: Hans H. Gerth & C. Wright Mills" [1999] by Guy Oakes & Arthur J. Vidich Univ IL Press 9x6 pb [10/99] for $16.95 Univ IL Press hardcover [11/99] for $39.49 |
"C. Wright Mills: A Native Radical & His American
Intellectual Roots" [1984] by Rick Tilman
Penn State Univ Press hardcover [2/84] out of print/used
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"C. Wright Mills: An American Utopian" [1983] by Irving Louis Horowitz Free Press 9x6 pb [4/85] for $23.95 Free Press hardcover [7/83] out of print/used |
"C. Wright Mills" [1983] by John Eldridge
Routledge hardcover [5/83] out of print/used
"C. Wright Mills" [1978] by Howard Press
Twayne Publrs [1978] out of print/used
"The World of C. Wright Mills" [1976] by Herbert Aptheker
Periodicals Service hardcover [4/76] out of print/used
"The Sociological Theory of C. Wright Mills" [1977]
by Joseph Scimecca
Associated Faculty Press hardcover [1/77] out of print/used
"C. Wright Mills & the Power Elite" [1969]
Compiled by G. William Domhoff & Hoyt B. Ballard
Beacon Press pb [6/68] out of print at Amazon.com
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