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In this article I examine how the sociology major is structured at institutions of higher education in the United States. I use content analysis of college catalogs from 100 institutions to examine the sociology major at top institutions among regional and national universities and liberal arts colleges. I first examine the basic structure of sociology programs and then evaluate implementation of the recommendations from Liberal Learning and the Sociology Major (Eberts et al. 1990). In 1990 the Council of the American Sociological Association voted to "encourage departments to consider and implement the recommendations" for the undergraduate curriculum found in Liberal Learning. These recommendations suggest a cumulative curriculum, including a four-level sequence and a capstone course. I assess the extent to which these recommendations had been adopted a decade after the report (by the year 2000), and conclude with suggestions for expanding the implementation of recommendations for study in depth in sociology.

The twentieth century saw a series of major changes in higher education that, among other things, led to an increasing tension between teaching and research within the academy. I argue that the contraposition of these two activities is counterproductive to sociology as well as other disciplines. Content analysis of job listings in the American Sociological Association (ASA) Employment Bulletin from three different decades suggests that although teaching and research increasingly blended near the end of the twentieth century, significant differences remain between type of institution and the relative emphasis upon teaching and research. I conclude with several suggestions for changes that are needed to help bridge the gap between teaching and research within the changing landscape of higher education.

The papers in this collection address a set of important issues facing our discipline. These issues cross national boundaries, and indeed are important far beyond the sociological sphere. My brief comments here will use these papers as a springboard for noting several important curricular challenges and trends for sociology, in particular, and academia, more generally, as we enter the next century.