1. Life Course Analysis as a Research Program.
(Historical origins and alternative traditions of research, basic concepts and heuristic assumptions, the logics of macro-micro modelling)

Readings:

Elder, Glen H. Jr., Monica Kirkpatrick Johnson, and Robert Crosnoe (2003): "The Emergence and Development of Life Course Theory." In: Jeylan T. Mortimer and Michael J. Shanahan (eds.), Handbook of the Life Course. New York et al.: Kluwer Academic / Plenum Publishers, Pp. 3-22.

Mayer, Karl Ulrich (2004): "Whose Lives? How History, Societies and Institutions Define and Shape Life Courses." Research in Human Development 1 (3): 161-187.
URL:http://www.mpib-berlin.mpg.de/en/institut/dok/full/ Mayer/whoselif/s15427617rhd0103_3.pdf

Background Literature:

Mortimer, Jeylan T. and Michael J. Shanahan (eds.) (2003): Handbook of the Life Course (Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research). New York: Kluwer Academic, 734 pp.

Sorensen, Aage B., Franz E. Weinert, and Lonnie F. Sherrod (eds.) (1986): Development and the Life Course: Multidisciplinary Perspectives. Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum.

2. A Primer in Event History Analysis

Readings:

Blossfeld, Hans-Peter and Gotz Rohwer (2002): Techniques of Event History Analysis. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates (Chapters 1-3)

Wu, Lawrence L. (2003): "Eveny History Models for Life Course Analysis." In: Jeylan T. Mortimer and Michael J. Shanahan (eds.), Handbook of the Life Course. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers, Pp. 477-502.

Background Literature:

Allison, Paul D. (1984): Event History Analysis: Regression for Longitudinal Event Data. Beverley Hills: Sage Publications.

Blossfeld, Hans-Peter, Alfred Hamerle, and Karl Ulrich Mayer (1989): Event History Analysis. Statistical Theory and Application in the Social Sciences. Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers, 297 pp.