Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines

Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.

Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.

We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.

To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).

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Person Name

School

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential people in Sociology,

#1551

Raymond Paternoster

#61306

Overall Influence

1952 - 2017 (65 years)

Raymond "Ray" Paternoster was an American criminologist who taught at the University of Maryland from 1982 until his death in 2017, spending some of this time as a Distinguished Professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice there.

#1552

Roy R. Suddaby

#138466

Overall Influence

#1553

Rong Tsao

#138646

Overall Influence

#1554

Communities

#138654

Overall Influence

#1555

Melanie Bartley

#43114

Overall Influence

Melanie Jane Bartley, FBA, is a medical sociologist and retired academic. She was Professor of Medical Sociology at University College London from 2001 to 2012. Career and research Bartley completed her undergraduate studies in sociology and philosophy at the University of Reading. After several years of research, she completed a master of science degree in medical sociology at Bedford College, London, and worked outside of academia for a number of years, including time as a research assistant at the British Regional Heart Study. She then completed a doctorate at the University of Edinburgh un...

#1556

Robert Dentler

#80204

Overall Influence

1928 - 2008 (80 years)

Robert A. Dentler was an American sociologist who co-authored and oversaw the controversial court-ordered busing plan to desegregate Boston's public schools in the 1970s through the 1980s. He was involved in the school desegregation plans for at least sixteen other northern American cities and the University of North Carolina system.

#1557

Geoffrey Alpert

#69257

Overall Influence

1948 - Present (76 years)

Geoffrey Philip Alpert is a professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of South Carolina. Education Alpert received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Oregon in 1969 and 1970, respectively. For one year he attended the University of Oregon School of Law. In 1975, he received his Ph.D. from Washington State University.

#1558

Frederick J. Angulo

#138935

Overall Influence

#1559

Fran H., Norris

#139009

Overall Influence

#1560

Miranda Lubbers

#116774

Overall Influence

Miranda J. Lubbers is a Dutch social scientist specializing in the analysis of migration, segregation, and social identity through personal networks. She is Professor in Anthropology at the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, and director of the COALESCE Lab.

#1561

Frederick L. Whitam

#114392

Overall Influence

1933 - 2009 (76 years)

Frederick Lee "Fred" Whitam was an American sociologist who studied homosexuality from a cross-cultural perspective. Scholar Paul Vasey described Whitam as "an essentialist during a time of rampant social constructionism."

#1562

Mark Regnerus

#90273

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (54 years)

Mark Daniel Regnerus is a sociologist and professor at the University of Texas at Austin. His main fields of interest are sexual behavior, relationship dynamics, and religion. Education Regnerus graduated from McBain Rural Agricultural High School in McBain, Michigan, in 1989. He then attended Trinity Christian College, where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology in 1993. He then earned his Master of Arts degree in 1997 and his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 2000 from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His doctoral dissertation, Adolescent Socialization and Avoidi...

#1563

Stefanie DeLuca

Stefanie DeLuca

#68522

Overall Influence

2000 - Present (24 years)

Stefanie Deluca is a sociologist and the James Coleman Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. She co-wrote the book, Coming of Age in the Other America. Deluca received her Ph.D. in Human Development and Social Policy at Northwestern University in 2002 and bachelor’s degrees in Psychology and Sociology at the University of Chicago.

#1564

Charles Marwick

#139281

Overall Influence

#1565

Patricia Marie Griffin

#139443

Overall Influence

#1566

William P. Barnett

#67834

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

William P. Barnett is an American organizational theorist, and is the Thomas M. Siebel Professor of Business Leadership, Strategy, and Organizations at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He is the BP Faculty Fellow in Global Management; Senior Fellow, Woods Institute for the Environment at Stanford; Director of the Center for Global Business and the Economy; Director of the Business Strategies for Environmental Sustainability Executive Program; and Codirector of the Executive Program in Strategy and Organization.

#1567

Seymour Itzkoff

#30249

Overall Influence

1928 - Present (96 years)

Seymour William Itzkoff is an American psychologist and writer who has published research on intelligence. He has taught at Smith College since 1965 where he is professor emeritus of education and child study.

#1568

Jack Trammell

#55308

Overall Influence

1964 - Present (60 years)

John "Jack" Kent Trammell is a college professor and was the Democratic candidate in the 2014 general election for Virginia's 7th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives, which was held on November 4, 2014. Trammell faced Dave Brat, who defeated incumbent Eric Cantor in the Republican primary; and Libertarian nominee James Carr. Both Trammell and Brat are professors at Randolph–Macon College.

#1569

Jo Phelan

#42747

Overall Influence

Jo Carol Phelan is a Special Research Scientist in the Department of Sociomedical Sciences and Co-Director of the Center for the Study of Social Inequalities and Health at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. She is known for working with Bruce Link to develop the theory of fundamental causes of social inequalities in health. She was a Russell Sage Foundation Visiting Scholar from 2012 to 2013. She also received a Health Policy Investigator Award from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 1996, and the 1999 book Handbook of the Sociology of Mental Health, which she co-edited,...

#1570

Richard Q. Bell

#139655

Overall Influence

#1571

Alondra Nelson

#18319

Overall Influence

1968 - Present (56 years)

Alondra Nelson is an American academic, policy advisor, non-profit administrator, and writer. She is the Harold F. Linder chair and professor in the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study, an independent research center in Princeton, New Jersey. From 2021 to 2023, Nelson was deputy assistant to President Joe Biden and principal deputy director for science and society of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy , where she performed the duties of the director from February to October 2022. She was the first African American and first woman of color to lead OSTP.

#1572

Joseph Hodara

#95307

Overall Influence

1938 - Present (86 years)

Joseph Hodara is an Israeli sociologist and journalist. Hodara teaches at Bar-Ilan University. Academic and media career Between 1976 and 1990, he worked for the Mexican newspaper El Universal as a correspondent in the Middle East and Europe.

#1573

Alberto Febbrajo

Alberto Febbrajo

#120027

Overall Influence

1944 - Present (80 years)

Alberto V. Febbrajo is an Italian legal scholar and sociologist. Febbrajo studied under the political philosopher Bruno Leoni at the University of Pavia and graduated in Law with a thesis on Max Weber’s sociology of law. He continued his studies at the Universities of Berlin and Freiburg im Breisgau and at the German University of Administrative Sciences in Speyer. He is Professor of Sociology of Law at the University of Macerata, Italy.

#1574

Jo Carol Phelan

#139783

Overall Influence

#1575

David R. Williams

#39427

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (70 years)

David Rudyard Williams is the Florence Sprague Norman and Laura Smart Norman Professor of Public Health at the Harvard School of Public Health, as well as a professor of African and African American Studies and of Sociology at Harvard University.

#1576

George Katsiaficas

#11554

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (75 years)

George Katsiaficas is a Greek-American historian and social theorist. He is known for his many writings on social movements, including The Imagination of the New Left: The Global Analysis of 1968 and The Subversion of Politics: European Autonomous Social Movements and the Decolonization of Everyday Life. He was a professor of humanities and sociology at the Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston from 1985 up to his retirement in 2015. He sits on the Editorial Board of New Political Science, published by the Caucus for a New Political Science.

#1577

Anne Denise Elixhauser

#140049

Overall Influence

#1578

Roger E. Tourangeau

#140098

Overall Influence

#1579

Miriam Glucksmann

#46927

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (78 years)

Miriam A. Glucksmann FBA is a British sociologist and academic, emeritus professor of sociology at the University of Essex, and visiting professor of sociology at the London School of Economics. Early life She studied at the London School of Economics.

#1580

Charles Brennan

#102945

Overall Influence

1967 - Present (57 years)

Charles Brennan is a professor of food science at RMIT University where he is the dean of the School of Science. He previously worked at Lincoln University as a member of the Faculty of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

#1581

Shelton H. Davis

Shelton H. Davis

#56986

Overall Influence

1942 - 2010 (68 years)

Shelton H. Davis was an American cultural anthropologist and activist for the rights of indigenous peoples. His academic and organizational work with Latin American indigenous communities contributed to the late 20th century public interest anthropology movement.

#1582

Morten Levin

#70629

Overall Influence

1946 - 2023 (77 years)

Morten Levin is a Norwegian sociologist and Professor of Organization and Work Science at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology . He has formerly been a Research Director at SINTEF and has worked for the Royal Norwegian Defense Research Establishment and universities throughout Scandinavia and at Cornell University. His research focuses on change in organizations, especially with a view to the importance of the interaction between technology and organization. He has contributed to the epistemological and methodological basis of action research, and has published books and article...

#1583

Graeme Kirkpatrick

#107371

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (61 years)

Graeme Kirkpatrick is Professor of Social and Cultural Theory at the University of Manchester. He has also worked as Professor in media arts, aesthetics and narration at the University of Skövde in Sweden, and been a visiting Professorial fellow of the Digital Cultures Research Programme at Flinders University in Adelaide.

#1584

M. Williams Calnan

#140615

Overall Influence

#1585

Rowland Atkinson

#108042

Overall Influence

1972 - Present (52 years)

Rowland Atkinson is a British academic, urban sociologist, and author. Career He directed the Housing and Community Research Unit at the University of Tasmania from 2005 to 2008. In 2009, he became a Reader in Urban Studies and Criminology at the University of York. He has been working as a Research Chair in Inclusive Societies at the University of Sheffield since 2014.

#1586

John D. Kasarda

#140853

Overall Influence

#1587

David H. J. Morgan

#141003

Overall Influence

#1588

Bonnie J. Morris

#95630

Overall Influence

1961 - Present (63 years)

Bonnie J. Morris is an American scholar of women's studies. She completed a PhD in women's history at Binghamton University in 1989 and has taught at various universities including Georgetown University, George Washington University, and University of California, Berkeley.

#1589

Julian Samora

#61009

Overall Influence

1920 - 1996 (76 years)

Julian Samora was an American teacher, scholar and community activist who helped to pioneer the field of Latino Studies. Samora was the first Mexican-American to ever receive a doctorate in sociology; and, by the end of his academic career, he was named Professor Emeritus at the University of Notre Dame. He received numerous honors across his career, including the order of the Aztec Eagle, the highest honor Mexico bestows on non-Mexican citizens.

#1590

Xavier Briggs

#57302

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

Xavier de Souza Briggs is an American educator, social scientist, and policy expert, known for his work on economic opportunity, social capital, democratic governance, and leading social change. He has influenced housing and urban policy in the United States, contributing to the concept of the "geography of opportunity," which examines the consequences of housing segregation, by race or economic status, for the well-being and life prospects of children and families . He is a former member of the Harvard and MIT faculties, currently a senior fellow of the Brookings Institution. He is an electe...

#1591

Darrell Steffensmeier

#87472

Overall Influence

1942 - Present (82 years)

Darrell John Steffensmeier is an American criminologist and Liberal Arts Research Professor of Sociology and Criminology at Pennsylvania State University. Education After receiving his bachelor's degrees in philosophy and history from St. Ambrose University, Steffensmeier received his M.A. and Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Iowa in 1970 and 1972, respectively.

#1592

Ronald Gordan Buttery

#141627

Overall Influence

#1593

John B. Stephenson

#101628

Overall Influence

1937 - 1994 (57 years)

John B. Stephenson was a sociologist and scholar of Appalachia, a founder of the Appalachian Studies Conference, and president of Berea College from 1984 to 1994. Early life and education John B. Stephenson was born in Staunton, Virginia, on September 26, 1937.

#1594

Yair Galily

#78204

Overall Influence

1970 - Present (54 years)

Prof. Yair Galily is a behavioural scientist, head of the Sport, Media and Society Research Lab at the Sammy Ofer School of Communications and a senior researcher at the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at Reichman University .

#1595

Brian Loader

#72888

Overall Influence

1958 - Present (66 years)

Brian D. Loader is currently Co-Director of the Centre for Political Youth Culture and Communication at the University of York, UK. Brian joined the Department of Sociology at York in January 2006 to pursue his scholarly interests into digital media communication and democratic governance. His overarching interest is in new media communications technologies, and the social, political and economic factors shaping their development and diffusion, and their implications for social, economic, political and cultural change. He has published widely in these areas and is the founding Editor of the ...

#1596

Irene Tinker

#62666

Overall Influence

1927 - Present (97 years)

Irene Tinker , is professor emerita in the Departments of City and Regional Planning & Women's Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, teaching from 1989 to 1998. She was the founding Board president of the International Center for Research on Women, founder and director of the Equity Policy Center and co-founder of the Wellesley Center for Research on Women.

#1597

Zelda F. Gamson

#115056

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (88 years)

Zelda Gamson is an American sociologist, writer and activist. Her scholarly work has primarily focused on the sociology of higher education, in particular innovation and change. Personal life and education Born Zelda Finkelstein in Philadelphia, Gamson is the daughter of Jewish immigrants from Ukraine. She attended public schools in Philadelphia, and studied at the University of Pennsylvania and Antioch College before completing her undergraduate degree at University of Michigan in 1958. She received a Master's Degree in Sociology from the University of Michigan in 1959 and a PhD from the Department of Social Relations at Harvard University in 1965.

#1598

Norman Dennis

#46265

Overall Influence

1929 - 2010 (81 years)

Norman Dennis was a British sociologist. Biography Born one of four sons to a tram driver, Norman Dennis was educated at Bede Collegiate Boys' School and was offered a place at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, but declined it in favour of the London School of Economics, where he achieved a first-class honours degree in economics. He held academic posts at Leeds, Bristol and Birmingham, before finally holding a long-term post as a lecturer and reader in Social Studies at Newcastle University, where he worked for 35 years.

#1599

Nora Cate Schaeffer

#67408

Overall Influence

Nora Cate Schaeffer is an American sociologist and survey statistician. She is Sewell Bascom Professor of Sociology, Emerita, and was director of the Survey Center at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and president of the American Association for Public Opinion Research.

#1600

Sonia Sanchez

#4857

Overall Influence

1934 - Present (90 years)

Sonia Sanchez is an American poet, writer, and professor. She was a leading figure in the Black Arts Movement and has written over a dozen books of poetry, as well as short stories, critical essays, plays, and children's books. In the 1960s, Sanchez released poems in periodicals targeted towards African-American audiences, and published her debut collection, Homecoming, in 1969. In 1993, she received Pew Fellowship in the Arts, and in 2001 was awarded the Robert Frost Medal for her contributions to the canon of American poetry. She has been influential to other African-American poets, includ...

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