August 17, 2001

'Liberation Sociology'

By NINA C. AYOUB

What's the best way to describe Joe R. Feagin and Hernán Vera, the authors of Liberation Sociology (Westview Press)? Well, it might make them chuckle, but here's a try: traditionalists. True, their advocacy of activism by sociologists on behalf of the oppressed is radical. But they would argue it's radical in the original sense of that word. It goes to the roots.

For the scholars, liberation sociology is a new term for an old tradition. They say sociology's origins in the 19th