Detroit Area Studies Series

The Detroit Area Studies series was initiated in 1951 at the University of Michigan and was carried out nearly every year until 2004. The Department of Sociology and the Survey Research Center of the Institute for Social Research were associated with the development of the series. It was initially supported by funds from the Ford Foundation, but after 1988 the University of Michigan provided primary financial support for the series, with supplemental funding obtained frequently from outside sources. The purpose of these surveys was to provide practical social research training for graduate students and reliable data on the Greater Detroit community. Each survey probed a different aspect of personal and public life, economic and political behavior, political attitudes, professional and family life, and living experiences in the Detroit metropolitan area. The different specific problems investigated each year were selected by the executive committee of the project.