Reuben Lorenzo Hill Jr. (July 4, 1912 – September 26, 1985) was an American sociologist. He specialized in the

sociology of the family Sociology of the family is a subfield of sociology in which researchers and academics study family structure as a social institution and unit of socialization from various sociological perspectives. It can be seen as an example of patterned soci ...

. He was the seventh president of the

International Sociological Association The International Sociological Association (ISA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to scientific purposes in the field of sociology and social sciences. It is an international sociological body, gathering both individuals and national sociol ...

(1970–1974). He has been called "the founding father of family sociology".

Biography

Hill was born on July 4, 1912, in

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

. In his youth he served as a missionary in Europe for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. After his mission he was not involved in that Church in any meaningful participatory way. He received his PhD in 1938 from the

University of Wisconsin A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Uni ...

. He later taught at the

University of South Dakota The University of South Dakota (USD) is a public research university in Vermillion, South Dakota, United States. Established by the Dakota Territory legislature in 1862, 27 years before the establishment of the state of South Dakota, USD is t ...

(1942–1945),

Iowa State University Iowa State University of Science and Technology (Iowa State University, Iowa State, or ISU) is a Public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Ames, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1858 as the Iowa Agricult ...

(1945–1949),

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the Public university, public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referre ...

(1949–1957) and

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

(1957–1983). At Minnesota, he held the title of the Regents’ Professor of family sociology from 1973. He was also a visiting professor at the

University of Puerto Rico The University of Puerto Rico (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Universidad de Puerto Rico;'' often shortened to UPR) is the main List of state and territorial universities in the United States, public university system in the Commonwealth (U.S. i ...

(1953–1954),

University of Louvain UCLouvain (or Université catholique de Louvain , French for Catholic University of Louvain, officially in English the University of Louvain) is Belgium's largest French-speaking university and one of the oldest in Europe (originally establishe ...

(1961–1962) and others. He retired in 1983 as an emeritus professor. Hill died in Norway on September 26, 1985.

Research and impact

Hill specialized in the

. He was influenced by works of Ernest W. Burgess, Evelyn Duvall, Howard Becker, Clifford Kirkpatrick, and Willard W. Waller. Through his career he authored 20 books and over 150 articles and gave lectures in over 40 countries. Bert N. Adams described him as "one of the leading scholars in the field of marriage and the family". David H. Olson and Pauline Boss went even further, noting that Hill "was considered the founding father of family sociology". He was one of the first sociologists in the United States specializing in studying family and marriage. John Mogey noted that one of his early books, ''When you marry'' (1945) a textbook on sociology of family, "set a national standard for functional courses in family life education" for many years. The Reuben Hill Research Award, given annually in his name by

National Council on Family Relations The National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) is an American nonprofit, multidisciplinary learned society dedicated to research on all aspects of the family. Founded in 1938 as the National Conference on Family Relations, it was renamed to its ...

(NCFR), was established in 1980 and is awarded for the best research or theory paper in the field of family sociology. Wesley R. Burr described Hill's contribution as follows:

veloping a model to study family crises, conducting theory-based field experiments, organising the first bibliographic storage system in the field, developing the methodology to study three generations of families simultaneously, initiating graduate traineeships in the family field, helping to develop the family development conceptual framework, developing methods to improve theory, dramatically improving theory, and helping to establish the Theory and Method workshops that are held in conjunction with the annual meetings of the National Council on Family Relations.

Olson and Boss mention that Hill's " ABC-X model describing family stress resented in 1958has had an immense impact on the field".

Awards

He received, among others, the first Ernest W. Burgess Award given by the

(NCFR).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hill, Reuben 1912 births 1985 deaths American sociologists University of Wisconsin–Madison alumni University of South Dakota faculty Iowa State University faculty University of North Carolina faculty University of Minnesota faculty Family sociologists Scientists from Utah Presidents of the International Sociological Association

Biography

Research and impact

Awards

See also

References