William Foote Whyte

William Foote Whyte (* June 27, 1914, † 16 July 2000) was an eminent American sociologist. He is considered a pioneer in industrial sociology and was 72nd president of the American Sociological Association.

As a pioneer of participant observation, he spent four years of his life in an Italian section of Boston, USA to study end to the social relations of street gangs in Boston's North. The result was his most famous work, The Street Corner Society, an ethnographic study of urban society, in 1943 published as a dissertation. The plant is a classic example of participant observation and is widely used textbook-like, in particular its located in the appendix of different executions for the method.

Whyte, who grew up in a family of academics in the upper middle class showed an early interest in the writing, economic and social reforms. Between 1932 and 1936 he studied in Philadelphia at Swarthmore College. After completion of The Street Corner Society, he taught for a year at the University of Oklahoma, however, suffered from polio. Even two years rehabilitation could not prevent that Whyte was dependent for the rest of his life on crutches.

In 1944 he returned to the University of Chicago to go in 1948 at the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University, New York - and to spend the rest of his career. It dealt with the topics henceforth social reforms, Social change and tried to "strengthen the disenfranchised and to reduce the gap between rich and poor ." His preferred area of ​​research included the mergers of industrial and agricultural workers in Venezuela, Peru, Guatemala and the Basque Country. He has authored hundreds of scientific articles and 20 books.