Flesh and Stone
Sennett's scholarly writing centers on the development of cities, the nature of work in modern society, and the sociology of culture. "Families Against the City", his earliest book, examines the relationship between family and work in 19th-century Chicago. A subsequent quartet of books explores urban life more largely: "The Uses of Disorder", an essay on identity formation in cities; "The Fall of Public Man", a history of public culture and public space, particularly in London, Paris, and New York in the 18th and 19th Centuries; "The Conscience of the Eye", a study of how Renaissance urban design passed into modern city planning, and "Flesh and Stone", an overview of the design of cities from ancient to modern times.