Ralph Larkin

Ralph Larkin

Ralph Wild Larkin (born May 27, 1940) is an American sociologist and research consultant. He is the author of Suburban Youth in Cultural Crisis (1979), Beyond Revolution: A New Theory of Social Movements (1986), and Comprehending Columbine (2007). He obtained his bachelor's degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara and received a master's degree in education from California State University at Northridge.

In 1969 he received a Ph.D. in Sociology of Education from the University of California, Los Angeles, and he taught sociology at Rutgers University in 1973. He met fellow sociologist Daniel A. Foss while teaching at Rutgers, and they later partnered in researching social movements. They co-authored a book together on social movements, and have jointly published studies in academic journals including Theory and Society, Sociological Analysis, and Social Text. Larkin is a Senior Research Associate at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, and owns his own consulting firm called Academic Research Consulting Service.