Brown, James S. (James Stephen), 1916-

James (Jim) Stephen Brown was a Professor of Rural Sociology at the University of Kentucky. In his academic research, Brown was particularly interested in the social structure of eastern Kentucky and made intensive studies of community life in that region. His research emphasized kinship structure, but he was also interested in social change and the adjustment of migrants from rural Kentucky into their new urban settings. He published numerous academic articles relating to his research, as well as two books, Mountain Families in Transition and Beech Creek: A Study of a Kentucky Mountain Neighborhood. Brown's work also provided a background for the book, The Road to Poverty: The Making of Wealth and Hardship in Appalachia, by Dwight B. Billings and Kathleen M. Blee.

Brown earned his Harvard AM in 1941 and his PhD in 1950.