Herbert Gans is a German-born American sociologist who was educated at the University of Chicago and the University of Pennsylvania. Active in urban planning and housing at the beginning of his career, he taught planning and sociology at Columbia Teachers College and subsequently at Columbia University. He is best known for his work on American communities, including The Urban Villagers (1962), a study of Boston's West End and The Levittowners (1967). He has focused much of his research on the American middle class.