Secular Morality, Education, and Society: Sociology of Education

This chapter presents an overview of Émile Durkheim’s sociology of education through a brief thematic analysis of his ideas in three books now available in English: Education and Sociology, Moral Education: A Study in the Theory and Application of the Sociology of Education, and The Evolution of Educational Thought: Lectures on the Formation and Development of Secondary Education in France. The relation between individual and society is revealed to be a major concern of Durkheim’s sociology of education.