Videos on the Internet

Which inspiring sociologist, psychologist, or linguist have you met in your backyard?

Max Weber Visits North Carolina -- Undergraduate Classes' Passion and Investigations

Today I was wandering around the Internet, looking for videos about these fields I love. I stumbled upon one made by the North Carolina Sociological Society about Professor Larry Keeter at Appalachian State University in North Carolina. (Before my stint here, I worked at a college near App State and lived a few miles down the road, so I do love Appalachia.)

Apparently early in Keeter's teaching career, students asked whether Max Weber had ever visited the United States and where. Quite a bit of research by him and the student led to the exciting information that Max Weber and his wife Marianne had visited relatives in North Carolina Appalachia. The students interviewed folks who were still alive and the rest became history.

This is a marvelous video of how inspiring study and history can become. Of course, it helps that some kind of miracle happens. Like that someone amazing, the figure from your field happened to land next door. Especially when you live in a neighborhood that is dismissed and denigrated by most of the other neighborhoods.

The video also discusses interesting historical info about how the folks viewed Weber right before WWI. Unfortunately, we don't have Keeter's article about the students investigation and oral history. Order it through InterLibrary Loan or let me know and I'll do it for you.

Keeter, Larry (spring-summer, 1981) Max Weber's Visit to North Carolina. The Journal of the History of Sociology, 3(2). 108-114.