René König (5 July 1906 – 21 March 1992) was a German sociologist. He was very influential on West German sociology after 1949. Born in

Magdeburg Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river. Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebu ...

, he 1925 took up Philosophy, Psychology, Ethnology, and Islamic Studies at the Universities of Vienna and Berlin. He gained his doctorate (''Dr. phil.'') 1930 at the

Berlin University Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative o ...

. As an enemy of the Nazis, he could not obtain his post-doctoral degree (''Habilitation'') in the Reich, so he emigrated to Switzerland in 1937 and passed the examination at the University of

Zürich , neighboring_municipalities = Adliswil, Dübendorf, Fällanden, Kilchberg, Maur, Oberengstringen, Opfikon, Regensdorf, Rümlang, Schlieren, Stallikon, Uitikon, Urdorf, Wallisellen, Zollikon , twintowns = Kunming, San Francisco Zürich ...

, 1938. By then, he was strongly influenced by

Émile Durkheim David Émile Durkheim ( or ; 15 April 1858 – 15 November 1917) was a French sociologist. Durkheim formally established the academic discipline of sociology and is commonly cited as one of the principal architects of modern social science, al ...

Maurice Halbwachs Maurice Halbwachs (; 11 March 1877 – 16 March 1945) was a French philosopher and sociologist known for developing the concept of collective memory. Halbwachs also contributed to the sociology of knowledge with his ''La Topographie Legendaire de ...

, and

Marcel Mauss Marcel Mauss (; 10 May 1872 – 10 February 1950) was a French sociologist and anthropologist known as the "father of French ethnology". The nephew of Émile Durkheim, Mauss, in his academic work, crossed the boundaries between sociology and ...

. 1949, he was called to the chair of

Sociology Sociology is a social science that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. It uses various methods of empirical investigation an ...

Cologne University The University of Cologne (german: Universität zu Köln) is a university in Cologne, Germany. It was established in the year 1388 and is one of the most prestigious and research intensive universities in Germany. It was the sixth university to ...

, where he built up what was to be known later as the "Cologne School" (''Kölner Schule'') and established the ''

Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie The ''Kölner Zeitschrift für Soziologie und Sozialpsychologie (Cologne Journal for Sociology and Social Psychology)'' is a German academic journal for sociology. It has an empirical focus on social research, both qualitatively and quantitativel ...

''. He never left this university, in spite of several calls, and became Professor Emeritus in 1974, dying at

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

1992. He never gave up cultural studies writing the first sociology of fashion, but at the same time he was a German pioneer of empirical methods, as against the ideological biases of many contemporal colleagues. He played as well an important role in 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 sociolo ...

. He was the fifth president of ISA (1962-1966). Besides, he was en engaged liberal writer and essayist, and translated the novelist

Giovanni Verga Giovanni Carmelo Verga di Fontanabianca (; 2 September 1840 – 27 January 1922) was an Italian realist ('' verista'') writer, best known for his depictions of life in his native Sicily, especially the short story and later play ''Cavalleria ...

from the Italian into German. The René König Society (''René-König-Gesellschaft'') is publishing a complete edition of his writings.

References

1906 births 1992 deaths German sociologists Commanders Crosses of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany German male writers Presidents of the International Sociological Association {{germany-academic-bio-stub