Faculty

Rebecca Jean Emigh

Professor

I study long-term processes of social change.

In particular, I am interested in how cultural, economic, and demographic factors intersect to create these processes of social change. This interest is reflected in two large research projects, one on transitions to capitalisms and one on forms of information gathering. In both projects, in different ways, I use historical perspectives and mixed methods to analyze the similarities and differences in these social phenomena in the past and present. I am especially interested in a "view from below," that is, how ordinary people affect social relations, and thus, the course of history.

Degrees

Ph.D. Sociology, University of Chicago, 1993.
M.A. Statistics, University of Chicago, 1990.
M.A. Sociology, Columbia University, 1985.
B.A. Sociology, Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa, Honors in Sociology, Barnard College, Columbia University, 1984.

Selected Publications

Antecedents of Censuses From Medieval to Nation States: How Societies and States Count (Volume 1) and Changes in Censuses from Imperialist to Welfare States: How Societies and States Count (Volume 2). (with Dylan Riley and Patricia Ahmed). Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. (Honorable Mention, Barrington Moore Prize for Best Book, Comparative and Historical Section of the American Sociological Association, 2017.)

Volume 1: Palgrave-Macmillan, Springer

Volume 2: Palgrave-Macmillan, Springer

Reviews of Antecedents of Censuses From Medieval to Nation States and Changes in Censuses from Imperialist to Welfare States:

Author-meets-critics Symposium. Trajectories 28(3):10-42, 2017.

"Transitions to Capitalisms: Past and Present." Pp. 577-596 in The Sociology of Development Handbook, edited by Gregory Hooks. Oakland: University of California Press, 2016.

“The Racialization of Legal Categories in the First US Census.” (Lead author; with Dylan Riley and Patricia Ahmed). Social Science History, 39 (4): 485‒519, 2015. (Winner of the SSHA 2015 Founders Prize.)

The Undevelopment of Capitalism: Sectors and Markets in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2009.

Reviews of The Undevelopment of Capitalism:

Epstein, Steven A. “Review of The Undevelopment of Capitalism: Sectors and Markets in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany.” The Journal of Economic History 71(2):529-530, 2011.

Lachmann, Richard. “Review of The Undevelopment of Capitalism: Sectors and Markets in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany.” International Journal of Comparative Sociology 51(3):236-238, 2010.

Mielants, Eric. “Review of The Undevelopment of Capitalism: Sectors and Markets in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany.” Contemporary Sociology 38(6):575-576, 2010.

Stern, Laura Ikins. “Review of The Undevelopment of Capitalism: Sectors and Markets in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany.” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 41(1):144-146, 2010.

"Author (Paul McLean) Meets Author (Rebecca Emigh) Meets Critics (Emily Erikson, Randall Collins, Rosemary Hopcroft)." Trajectories 21(1):13-29, 2009.

“What Influences Official Information? Exploring Aggregate Microhistories of the Catasto of 1427.” Pp. 199-223 in Small Worlds: Method, Meaning, and Narrative in Microhistory, edited by James F. Brooks, Christopher R. N. DeCorse, and John Walton. Santa Fe: School for Advanced Research Press, 2008.

“Internal and External Ethnic Assessments in Eastern Europe.” (with Patricia Ahmed and Cynthia Feliciano.) Social Forces 86(1):231-255, 2007.

“The Unmaking of Markets: A Composite Visual History.” Vectors: Journal of Culture and Technology in a Dynamic Vernacular 1, 2005. [Online]. Available: http://vectors.usc.edu/index.php?page=7&projectId=5 (click on “launch project”) (Opened at the MOCA, Los Angeles, March 3, 2005).

“Household Composition in Post-Socialist Eastern Europe.” (with first author, Patricia Ahmed). The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 25(3):9-41, 2005.

“The Great Debates: Transitions to Capitalisms.” Pp. 355-380 in Remaking Modernity: Politics, History, and Sociology, edited by Julia Adams, Elisabeth Clemens, and Ann Shola Orloff. Durham: Duke University Press, 2005.

“[The] Transition(s) to Capitalism(s)?: A Review Essay.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 46(1):188-198, 2004.

"Economic Interests and Sectoral Relations: The Undevelopment of Capitalism in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany." American Journal of Sociology 108(5):1075-1113, 2003.

"Property Devolution in Tuscany." The Journal of Interdisciplinary History XXXIII(3):385-420, 2003.

"Numeracy or Enumeration? The Uses of Numbers by States and Societies." Social Science History 26(4):653-698, 2002.

"Post-Colonial Journeys: Historical Roots of Immigration and Integration." (with first author, Dylan Riley) Comparative Sociology 1:169-191, 2002.

"Theorizing Strategies: Households and Markets in 15th-Century Tuscany." The History of the Family 6:495-571, 2001.

“Review of Regions, Institutions, and Agrarian Change in European History, by Rosemary L. Hopcroft.” Contemporary Sociology 30(6):601-603, 2001.

“The Racialization and Feminization of Poverty?” in Poverty, Ethnicity, and Gender in Eastern Europe During Market Transition. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001 (with second author Eva Fodór and third author Iván Szelényi).

“Review of Capitalists in Spite of Themselves: Elite Conflict and Economic Transitions in Early Modern Europe,”by Richard Lachmann. American Journal of Sociology 106(3):832-834, 2000.

"Divergent Paths of Agrarian Change: Eastern England and Tuscany Compared." The Journal of European Economic History 29(1):9-51, 2000 (with first author Rosemary L. Hopcroft).

"The Gender Division of Labor: The Case of Tuscan Smallholders." Continuity and Change 15(1):117-137, 2000.

"Forms of Property Rights or Class Capacities: The Example of Tuscan Sharecropping." Archives Europeennes de Sociologie (The European Journal of Sociology) 41(1):22-52, 2000.

"Means and Measures: Property Rights, Political Economy, and Productivity in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany." Social Forces 78(2): 461-490, 1999.

"The Length of Leases: Short-Term Contracts and Long-Term Relationships." Viator 30:345-382, 1999.

"Traces of Certainty: Recording Death and Taxes in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany." The Journal of Interdisciplinary History XXX(II, Autumn):181-198, 1999.

"The Mystery of the Missing Middle-Tenants: The 'Negative' Case of Fixed-Term Leasing and Agricultural Investment in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany," Theory and Society 27(3):351-375, 1998.

"Labor Use and Landlord Control: Sharecroppers' Household Structure in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany," The Journal of Historical Sociology 11(1):37-73, 1998.

"Land Tenure, Household Structure, and Fertility: Aggregate Analyses of Fifteenth-Century Rural Tuscan Communities," The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 17(7/8):220-254, 1997.

"Land Tenure, Household Structure, and Age of Marriage in Fifteenth-Century Tuscany," The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 27(4):613-635, 1997.

"The Spread of Sharecropping in Tuscany: The Political Economy of Transaction Costs," The American Sociological Review 62:423-442, 1997. (Honorable Mention, Barrington Moore Prize for Best Article, Comparative and Historical Section of the American Sociological Association, 1999.)

"The Power of Negative Thinking: The Use of Negative Case Methodology in the Development of Sociological Theory," Theory and Society 26:649-684, 1997.

"Loans and Livestock: Comparing Landlords' and Tenants' Declarations from the Catasto of 1427," The Journal of European Economic History 25(3):705-723, 1996.

“Review of Fifteen Generations of Bretons: Kinship and Society in Lower Brittany, 1720-1980, by Martine Segalen.” American Journal of Sociology 98(1):214-216, 1992.

"Poverty and Polygyny as Political Protest: The Waldensians and Mormons," Journal of Historical Sociology 5(4):462-484, 1992.

“Polygynous Fertility: Sexual Competition versus Progeny," American Journal of Sociology 94:832-855, 1989 (second author; with first author: Douglas L. Anderton).