As a member of the first not entirely autodidact generation of Hungarian sociologists I started my carrier in the field of sociology of education. This field was closely related to the study of social structure and mobility in the new born – or reborn – sociology in this country. In this lecture I give an overview of the development of this sub-discipline: changes in research interest, institutionalisation, methodology, relationship to politics, social embeddedness, and international relationships – from the sixties up to our days. Sometimes from inside and sometimes from the periphery of the field I collected my impressions and convictions I plan to share with the audience. Younger colleagues in sociology of education might find more difficult to build their way as researchers than my generation did I think.

Three social science disciplines in Central and Eastern Europe : handbook on economics, political science and sociology (1989 - 2001) / Social Science Information Centre (IZ) ; Collegium Budapest. Ed. by. Max Kaase and Vera Sparschuh Bajomi - Biró - Hrubos - Lukács: A magyar oktatáskutatás térképéhez (The mapping of Hungarian educational research), Oktatáskutató Intézet, Budapest, 2002. Mirjana Ule: The Reconstruction of Sociology in Eastern Europe—Expectations and Dilemmas, Sociology Mind, 2014, 4, 264-271 (Published Online October 2014 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/sm http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/sm.2014.44027)