Bryan R. Wilson
| Bryan R. Wilson | |
|---|---|
| Born |
25 June 1926 Leeds, England |
| Died | 9 October 2004 (aged 78) Middleton Stoney, Oxfordshire |
| Education | BSc, economics, University of London, 1952 PhD, sociology, London School of Economics, 1955 |
| Occupation | Reader in sociology, University of Oxford Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford |
Bryan Ronald Wilson, (25 June 1926 – 9 October 2004), was Reader Emeritus in Sociology at the University of Oxford and President of the International Society for the Sociology of Religion (1971–75). He became a Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford in 1963.
Wilson was the author of several influential books on new religious movements, including Sects and Society: A Sociological Study of the Elim Tabernacle, Christian Science, and Christadelphians (1961), Magic and the Millennium (1973), and The Social Dimensions of Sectarianism (1990).
Wilson was born in Leeds. He spent his undergraduate years at University College, Leicester, obtaining an External BSc (Econ) with First Class Honours from the University of London in 1952. He continued his studies under the supervision of Donald MacRae at the London School of Economics, where he was awarded his PhD in 1955 for a thesis entitled Social aspects of religious sects: A study of some contemporary groups in Great Britain with special reference to a Midland city. His thesis formed the basis of his first book, Sects and Society (1961).
He took up a lecturing post at the University of Leeds, a position he held until 1962 when he became Reader in Sociology at Oxford. A year later he became a Fellow of All Souls, and returned there after each of his many sojourns in Europe, America, Africa, Asia, or Australia as a researcher or Visiting Professor. In 1984 the University of Oxford conferred upon him a DLitt. In 1992 the Catholic University of Leuven, Louvain, Belgium, conferred upon him the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa in recognition of his outstanding contribution to the sociology of religion.
Wilson was a founding member of the University Association for the Sociology of Religion. From 1971 to 1975, he was President of the CISR (now known as the International Society for the Sociology of Religion or SISR). At the 1991 conference he became the first scholar to receive an honorary presidency from the Society. He was European editor of the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, sitting on the editorial board of the Annual Review of the Social Science of Religion, and sharing responsibility for the English-language papers of SISR issues of Social Compass.
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