91779

SOC 101 Introduction to Sociology

Sarah Egan

M . W . .

11:50 – 1:30 pm

HEG 204

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed: American Studies, Environmental & Urban Studies Sociology is the systematic study of social life, social groups, and social relations. In this class we will use the sociological perspective to explore many different aspects of social life: work, family, inequality, media, crime, gender, race and class. We will see how sociologists view these issues from a variety of different angles and use different methods to try to answer important questions about the social world. Students will learn to see how aspects of life we may take for granted are socially constructed and how our individual choices and actions are constrained and enabled by social, economic, and cultural structures. They will be able to describe some of the questions raised by sociologists and critique and expand upon the answers provided. They will learn to think critically about social life and about sociological research.

Class size: 22

91779

SOC 120 Inequality in America

Yuval Elmelech

. T . Th .

1:30 -2:50 pm

OLIN 201

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed: American Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Human Rights Why do some people have more wealth, more power, and receive greater respect than others? What are the sources of this inequality? Is social inequality inevitable? Is it undesirable? Through lectures, documentary films and discussions, this course examines the ways by which socially-defined categories of persons (e.g., women and men, Blacks and Whites, rich and poor, native- and foreign-born) are unevenly rewarded for their social contributions. Sociological theories are used to explain how and why social inequality is produced and maintained, and how it affects the well being of individuals and social groups. The course will focus on two general themes. The first deals with the structure of inequality while studying the unequal distribution of material and social resources (e.g., prestige, income, occupation). The second examines the processes that determine the allocation of people to positions in the stratification system (e.g. education, intelligence, parental wealth, gender, race). Class size: 22

91844

SOC 138 Introduction to Urban Sociology

Clement Thery

M . W . .

8:30 -9:50 am

OLIN 201

SSCI

Cross-listed: American Studies, Environmental & Urban Studies Urban Sociology’s fundamental tenet is that social phenomena can be best understood when they are related to their socio-spatial context. Then, two issues have to be explored: how the socio-spatial context is produced (i.e. the determinants of the city’s form and organization), and how the socio-spatial context matters (i.e. socio-spatial configurations’ impacts on particular outcomes). On the first issue, the course will address: (1) The mechanisms of urban decay and gentrification that have transformed American cities in the past 40 year (2) The process through which American cities became racially segregated (3) The crisis of the Keynesian-Fordist model and the rise of globalization and their effects on American cities. On the second issue, the course will address: (4) The impact of the neighborhood on individuals’ life chances, with particular attention to the contested notion of “ghetto” (5) The effects of the built environment on the character of urban life, and especially the “modernist debate” between Le Corbusier and Jane Jacobs, and the debates about the “Broken Window Theory” (6) The various forms of urban politics and citizen’s participation, from the immigrants’ “political machine” to the modern “pro-growth” city governments, and from the grassroots urban movements to the interrelation between of public spaces and public sphere. Class size: 22

91780

SOC 205 Introduction to Research Methods

Yuval Elmelech

. T . Th .

10:10 - 11:30 am

HDRANX 106

MATC

Cross-listed: American Studies; Environmental & Urban Studies; Global & Int’l Studies; Human Rights The aim of this course is to enable students to understand and use the various research methods developed in the social sciences, with an emphasis on quantitative methods. The course will be concerned with the theory and rationale upon which social research is based, as well as the practical aspects of research and the problems the researcher is likely to encounter. The course is divided into two parts. In the first, we will learn how to formulate research questions and hypotheses, how to choose the appropriate research method for the problem, and how to maximize chances for valid and reliable findings. In the second part, we will learn how to perform simple data analysis and how to interpret and present findings in a written report. For a final paper, students use data from the U.S. General Social Survey (GSS) to study public attitudes toward issues such as abortion, immigration, inequality and welfare, affirmative action, gender roles, religion, the media, and gun laws. By the end of the semester, students will have the necessary skills for designing and conducting independent research for term papers and senior projects, as well as for non-academic enterprises. Admission by permission of the instructor. Class size: 19

91781

SOC 214 Contemporary Immigration

Joel Perlmann

. T . Th .

3:10 -4:30 pm

OLIN 305

SSCI/DIFF

Cross-listed: American Studies, Human Rights Why do immigrants come to the US? Where do the immigrants come from, geographically and socially? How do immigrants handle cultural differences? How do they affect class and racial relations and to what extent do immigrants and their children assimilate into mainstream society? This course examines the huge immigration to the United States during recent decades (since the 1960s) – and its effect on both the immigrants and the society they have entered.   Throughout, we will ask how the answers to such questions distinguish the present era from the American historical experience as "a country of immigrants."  Specific topics include 1) immigrant origins and the reasons they come, both the great numbers who enter the upper-middle class and the millions more who enter at the bottom of the economic ladder;  2) immigrants’ efforts to preserve or shed cultural distinctiveness and ethnic unity;  3) how the children of the immigrants – by now tens of millions in number -- are faring; 3) the economic and cultural impact of the immigrants on American society; 4) how the ‘Great Recession’ is affecting immigrants and their children; 5) how a largely-non-white immigrant population is influencing the political culture of American racial divisions and the economic position of the native-born poor; 6) the subject of immigration restriction in politics; 7) the issue of illegal immigrants, and in particular what it means for them and for the rest of us that well over ten million ‘illegals’ live in the U.S. but cannot appeal to the law for protection; and 8) the balance of civil liberties and national security as America accommodates Muslim immigrants while defining itself as at war with extreme Islamists around the world since 9/11. Class size: 18

91848

SOC 266 Sociology of Social Movements

Sarah Egan

. T . Th .

11:50 – 1:10 pm

HEG 106

SSCI

Cross-listed: Human Rights This course introduces students to the sociological study of social movements. Using historical and contemporary empirical cases from the US and abroad, we will ask and answer questions about the origins, activities, and consequences of movements organized to produce or promote social, political, and cultural change. The course will also consider the intellectual history of the study of social movements, and will include approaches to social movement research from micro level social-psychological accounts, through middle range organizational analyses, and macro-level political process theories. Class size: 22

91849

SOC 267 Media, Power & Social Change

Sarah Egan

M . W . .

3:10 – 4:30 pm

OLIN LC 210

SSCI

Cross-listed: Anthropology; Experimental Humanities; Human Rights; Science, Technology & Society Is Google making us smarter? Is Twitter enabling revolutions? What role does technology play in our lives? Technology changes what we do - does it change who we are? We are living at a time of rapid technological innovation and diffusion and the above questions indicate that these new technologies are the cause of both much excitement and much concern. In this class students will learn to understand a variety of media technologies in their historical context and they will explore the impact that these technologies have had on social and political life. To this end, we need to think about technologies in a couple of different ways: (1) What does technology (print, radio, Twitter…) enable us to do? (2) How does technology affect the way people think about themselves, their political situation and the social world? And what are the consequences of these changes? Students will become familiar with relevant concepts from political sociology including nationalism, the public sphere, social capital and social movements. We will also consider the downside of media technologies, and inequalities in terms of access and participation. Class size: 22

91845

SOC 357 Controversies and Innovations in Qualitative Sociology

Clement Thery

. T . . .

4:40 – 7:00 pm

OLIN 301

SSCI

This reading seminar is built up on the intuition that books that trigger acrimonious controversies and books that are widely praised as strikingly innovative have something in common: they all tackle fundamental and problematic issues for qualitative social scientists. A close reading of these works can be, therefore, deeply enriching. The class will focus on the following themes: (1) Memoir as a genre of scholarship: Reading Venkatesh’s Gang Leader for a Day and Kahn’s Privilege in relation to Rabinow’s Reflections of Fieldwork in Morocco (2) The problematic incorporation of quantitative methods in qualitative research: Biernacki’s recent criticism of Griswold, Bearman & Stovel, and Evans’ scholarships in Reinventing Evidence(3) The qualitative study of the larger forces that weight upon the individual and the controversy between Duneier’s Sidewalk and Wacquant’s review and book Body and Soul (4) The problematic study of large settings, such as whole neighborhoods, for qualitative sociologist: Klinenberg’s Heat Wave, the controversy with Duneier’s review, and Venkatesh’s Off the Books (5) The study of historical emergence with DiMaggio’s Cultural Entrepreneurship in 19^th Century Boston and Bourdieu’s The Rules of Art. Class size: 15