This book offers a trenchant analysis of the theoretical and empirical contributions made by Randall Collins to microsociology, a field in which scholars examine face-to-face interaction in concrete social situations. Following a lucid overview of the field of microsociology by Elliot B. Weininger and Omar Lizardo, the chapters provide a rigorous and engaging conversation with Collins' arguments. Ethnographic papers by Randol Contreras, using data from New York, and Philippe Bourgois and Laurie Kain Hart, using data from Philadelphia, examine the social logic of violence in street-level narcotics markets. Work by Paul DiMaggio, Clark Bernier, Charles Heckscher, and David Mimno tackles the question of whether electronically mediated interaction exhibits the ritualized character which, according to Collins, is a common feature of face-to-face encounters. Simone Polillo examines the network level factors that facilitate intellectual creativity in diverse research fields. Chapters by Jonathan Turner, David Gibson, and Erika Summer-Effers and Justin Van Ness interrogate-theoretically and empirically-the challenging question of whether and in what sense the face-to-face encounters that constitute the micro-level of social reality enjoy autonomy vis-à-vis the macro-level. The volume concludes with Randall Collins' reflection on the accomplishments of microsociology and the challenges it faces moving forward.

Elliot B. Weininger is Associate Professor of Sociology at SUNY College at Brockport. He has published on the theoretical foundations of the concept of social class, as well as cultural and social capital. More recent work has addressed the ways that parents select schools for their children in districts with school choice programs and the role of schooling considerations in families' residential mobility.

Annette Lareau is the Stanley Sheerr Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of Home Advantage and Unequal Childhoods. She is currently writing a book about ethnography.

Omar Lizardo is Professor of Sociology at the University of Notre Dame. His research deals with various topics at the intersection of the cognitive social sciences, culture and consumer studies, network science, and social theory.

Introduction. Part I: Forward Panics in the Underground Economy. Chapter 1. Que Duro! Street Violence in the South Bronx. Chapter 2. "I Wasn't Even Gonna Shoot Him": Deadly Violence and the Carceral State in the US Inner City Narcotics Markets. Part II: Entrainment and Creativity. Chapter 3. Interaction Ritual Threads: Does IRC Theory Apply Online? Chapter 4. Creative Networks and the Determinants of Intellectual Recognition: Structural Holes vs. Mutual Halos in Financial Economics and Learning, Speech, and Hearing Research. Part III: The Theoretical Context of Interaction Ritual Chains. Chapter 5. The Effects of Cultural, Structural, and Interpersonal Dynamics on Interaction Rituals. Chapter 6. The Micro-foundations of Macro-violence: Vocabularies of Motive in the Initiation of State Violence and Coercion. Chapter 7. The Cube of Involvement: Conceptualizing an Interaction Ritual Approach to Social Involvement. Part IV: The Micro-Sociological Program. Chapter 8: What has Micro-Sociology Accomplished?