The years following Arthur Vidich's return from the island of Puerto Rico was one of his most productive literary periods. During the years 1957 to 1964 Art published Small Town in Mass Society with Joseph Bensman, Identity and Anxiety with Maurice Stein and David Manning White, Reflections on Community Studies, a collaborative work with Joseph Bensman and Maurice Stein as well as his classic essay titled Paul Radin and Contemporary Anthropology.
During these early years of his career, before accepting a positon at the New School, he worked on a major study of the social and psychological consequences of change in rural Puerto Rico sponsored by the Social Science Research Center at the University of Puerto Rico and funded in part by the National Institute of Health. The results of that study have never been published which is certainly a great loss for the field of sociology.
News of his prolific literary activities was big news at the University of Connecticut in the fall of 1959 - receiving front page coverage in the student paper, the Connecticut Daily Campus. While living near the rural University of Connecticut campus, Vidich was a big fish in a small pond and it was inevitable that he would soon look for teaching opportunities in a larger urban center. In 1962, Vidich was hired by the New School for Social Research in downtown New York City. It was his vision of a sociologist's Shangri-La. He remained at the New School until his retirement in 1991.
During these early years of his career, before accepting a positon at the New School, he worked on a major study of the social and psychological consequences of change in rural Puerto Rico sponsored by the Social Science Research Center at the University of Puerto Rico and funded in part by the National Institute of Health. The results of that study have never been published which is certainly a great loss for the field of sociology.
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