Howard S. Becker

Howard Saul Becker (April 18, 1928 – August 16, 2023) was an American sociologist who taught at Northwestern University.

Becker made contributions to the sociology of deviance, sociology of art, and sociology of music.

Becker also wrote extensively on sociological writing styles and methodologies.

Howard Saul Becker was born April 18, 1928, in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Allan Becker (April 2, 1902 – March 27, 1988) and Donna Becker (born Bertha Goldberg; December 31, 1904 – 1997).

His great-grandfather, Gershon Movsha Becker, immigrated to the United States from Lithuania.

Becker began playing piano at an early age and by age 15 worked as a pianist in bars and strip joints and, later, with a campus band at Northwestern University.

According to Becker, he was able to work semi-professionally because of World War II and the fact that most musicians over the age of 18 were drafted.

It was through his work as a musician Becker first became exposed to drug culture, which he would later study.

Becker received his undergraduate degree in sociology at the University of Chicago in 1946.

While in school, Becker continued to play piano semi-professionally.

According to Becker, he viewed music as his career and sociology as a hobby.

Even so, he went on to get both his MA and PhD in sociology from the University of Chicago where he wrote his doctoral dissertation on Chicago school teachers.

At the University of Chicago, Becker was taught in the tradition of the original Chicago School of Sociology.

Becker and his colleagues, including Erving Goffman and Anselm Strauss, would later be considered part of the "second Chicago School of Sociology".

The Chicago School of Sociology focused heavily on qualitative data analysis and worked with the city of Chicago as a laboratory.

Much of Becker's early work was guided in the Chicago School tradition, in particular by Everett C. Hughes who served as Becker's mentor and advisor.

Becker is also often labeled a symbolic interactionist, even though he doesn't accept the label.

According to Becker, his academic lineage is Georg Simmel, Robert E. Park, and Everett Hughes.

After receiving his PhD at the age of 23, Becker studied marijuana use at the Institute for Juvenile Research.

He was later awarded a Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at the University of Illinois from 1953 to 1955, and then spent three years as a research associate at Stanford University's Institute for the Study of Human Problems before beginning his teaching career.

After receiving his doctorate at the University of Chicago, Becker worked for three years as an instructor in sociology and social sciences at the University of Chicago.

Becker's 1963 book Outsiders provided the foundations for labeling theory.

Becker was often called a symbolic interactionist or social constructionist, although he did not align himself with either method.

A graduate of the University of Chicago, Becker was considered part of the second Chicago School of Sociology, which also includes Erving Goffman and Anselm Strauss.

Becker's 1963 book Outsiders is credited as one of the first books on labeling theory and its application to studies of deviance.

Becker explored the theory in which deviance is simply a social construction used to persuade the public to fear and criminalize certain groups.

A compilation of early essays on the subject, Outsiders outlines Becker's theories of deviance through two deviant groups; marijuana users and dance musicians.

In 1965, Becker became a professor of sociology at Northwestern University, where he taught until 1991.

During his career at Northwestern, Becker also taught as a visiting professor at the University of Manchester and as a visiting scholar at the Museu Nacional in Rio de Janeiro.

These include a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1978–1979, the Charles Horton Cooley Award, awarded by the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction, in 1980, the Common Wealth Award in 1981, the Cooley/Mead Award in the Section on Social Psychology, awarded by the American Sociological Association in 1985, the George Herbert Mead Award given by the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction in 1987, and the Award for a Career of Distinguished Scholarship, awarded by the American Sociological Association in 1998.

Becker also holds honorary degrees from Université de Paris VIII, Université Pierre Mendès-France in Grenoble, Erasmus University in Rotterdam, and École Normale Supérieure Lettres et Sciences Humaines in Lyon.

Becker later resided in San Francisco.

He also spent three to four months out of the year in Europe, mostly in Paris.

Although no longer teaching full-time, Becker continued to write and record music.

In 1991, Becker became a professor of sociology and, in 1996, an adjunct professor of music, at the University of Washington until he retired in 1999.

Becker was also the recipient of numerous awards and honors in his field.

In 2004, Un sociologue en liberté: Lecture d'Howard S. Becker by French sociologist Alain Pessin was released in France.

In the book, Pessin examines Becker's work and contributions to the field of sociology.

Howard S. Becker died in San Francisco on August 16, 2023, at the age of 95.

Although Becker did not claim to be a deviancy specialist, his work on the subject is often cited by sociologists and criminologists studying deviance.