Science & invention
Charles Horton Cooley
1864–1929 · sociologist
Pioneer of American sociology who coined the 'looking-glass self'; he spent his whole life in Ann Arbor and taught the University of Michigan's first sociology course.
- Born
Ann Arbor, Michigan- Died
Ann Arbor, Michigan
aged 64- Also known as
- Charles Cooley
- Detroit years
- 1864–1929
- Field
- Science & invention
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Cooley was born in Ann Arbor in 1864, the son of Thomas M. Cooley, a justice of the Michigan Supreme Court and one of the founding professors of the University of Michigan's law school; Detroit's Cooley High School was later named for the judge. Charles entered the university at sixteen, graduated in 1887 and, after a year of mechanical engineering and doctoral work in economics, joined its faculty. In 1899 he taught the university's first course in sociology, and he stayed in Ann Arbor for the rest of his life. His books Human Nature and the Social Order (1902) and Social Organization (1909) described the self as formed through the imagined judgments of others, the 'looking-glass self', and introduced the idea of primary groups. He was a founding member of the American Sociological Association and its president in 1918.
Highlights
- Coined the 'looking-glass self' in Human Nature and the Social Order (1902)
- Taught the University of Michigan's first sociology course, 1899
- Introduced the concept of primary groups in Social Organization (1909)
- President of the American Sociological Association, 1918
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 1
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Worked here · 1880s–1929
University of Michigan
He studied here and taught economics and then sociology for more than three decades.