Sociology (SOCI)

Required course for Sociology majors and minors. Introduction to Sociology is the systematic study of human society, social life, and behavior. The purpose of this course is to offer an overview of the major concepts, theories, and methodologies of sociology that will enable you to think sociologically. We will examine important issues and institutions of contemporary society, including culture, socialization, stratification, social class, gender, race, ethnicity, education, religion, family, and social movements in order to develop an awareness of the connection between personal experiences and the larger society. Some seats are reserved.

This course is an interdisciplinary and comparative study of the experience of the various populations of Hispanic/Latin American descent in the United States, and their contributions through an exploration of their history, culture, institutions and social conditions. The course will focus on the experience of conquest, colonialism, immigration, racialization, and social inequality among Cubans, Dominicans, Mexicans, Puerto Ricans and other groups from Central and South America that make up the Latino/Latinx population in the United States. The course will examine the Latino/Latinx experience through the lens of various topics, including civil rights, identity construction, media representations, gender & sexuality, economics, education, civic & political participation and technology. We will also explore the timely subject of immigration and its social, economic and political implications, which is central to the lived experience a large segment of the Latino/Latinx population.

T 6:30 - 9:00 PM This course will examine the science of poverty and inequality. We'll cover the major empirical debates on the causes and consequences of poverty and inequality. We'll look at what the social scientific literature can tell us about how inequality shapes life chances, neighborhoods, political institutions, and health, among other outcomes.  We'll look at several dimensions of inequality, including race, class, income, education, and gender and we'll cover multiple methodological approaches to the study of inequality, including quantitative, experimental, and ethnographic methods.  Students will leave the course with a comprehensive survey of the literature in the field, and a better understanding, grounded in science, of why increasing income inequality is one of the most pressing social issues of our time.

Most of us are familiar with the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision. Some of us may have even celebrated or acknowledged the anniversary of the decision in our schools or communities in the past. But how much do you really know about this historic case? Have you ever had an opportunity to take a deep dive into this decision to fully understand its significance, the social conditions that precipitated the case, or what the plaintiffs and justices hoped to achieve? Have you ever wondered how much progress the country has made toward achieving those goals? Using a sociological lens that challenges us to consider the social forces that shape our institutions and everyday experiences, this course provides an opportunity for you to explore those questions through existing research, documentary films, guest lectures, local exhibits, and your own original research on the K-12 educational experiences of your peers. As we approach the 70th anniversary of Brown, this seminar will examine equality of educational opportunity then and now, addressing topics such as the changing definition of race, de jure and de facto segregation, busing, between-school segregation, and tracking and ability grouping.

MW 3:30 – 4:45pm WGR 211 This course applies sociological theory and research findings to the American interactional, structural, and cultural response to dying and death. The definition of death, medical technology-induced social issues; society's response to death; dying process and dying setting; social interaction patterns during the dying experience, and near-death experiences are examined by applying sociology principles and analytical evidence to these phenomena. The student should develop an understanding about how to apply sociological knowledge to current social situations, to develop a clearer understanding of the social situation, and to formulate policy as a result of evaluating the evidence. Some practical advice about the death and dying experience is also given.

Traditional and non-traditional religious values and beliefs are examined as sources of meanings and individual or social identities. The processes and consequences of internalizations of specific religious values are analyzed in a variety of historical and cultural settings, with attention to the influence of religious organizations as social structures. The range of belief systems focused on in this course includes cults, sects, and denominations, as well as personal spirituality. Data from major world religions, as well as individual life histories, are resources and research materials. There will be some class discussion on identity and secularization or identity and secular religions in modern industrial societies. Links will be made between religion and family, gender, social class, race, ethnicity, education, work, politics, health, and recreation. Students will design research about their own special interests in identity and religion. Projects may include field work in Washington D.C. Local religious communities are also possible sites for research on particular aspects of identity and religious practices. Some library research is required. Students will present historical and/or cross-cultural data on major world religions. These data may be used with lectures, in class discussions, in research projects, or in the midterm exam.

Sport is a matter of common concern in contemporary American culture. Its presence can be felt daily through its connection to the major spheres of social life, including the media, the family, the economy, politics, education, and religion. In other words, sport is an important part of our everyday lives. This course examines the role of sports in the United States, focusing on sports as social and cultural phenomena. We will use sociological concepts and critical thinking to examine a variety of issues and topics. The class is designed to mesh your personal experiences and current level of knowledge with empirical evidence and sociological theory related to competitive physical activity or sport. Typical and traditional sociological concepts such as race, class, gender, political economy, socialization, and culture will be applied to and illustrated by the various contexts that sports can take. Prerequisite: A course in sociology. Fall.

This course examines major principles of social organization in Japan and contrasts them with the United States. The course begins with an overview of social structure, norms and values then focuses more closely on family, gender, education, community, current social problems and social change. The purpose is to enable the student to better understand Japanese society through a process of comparative analysis. Course Requirements: Two exams and one 8-10 page research paper Participate in two discussion groups and lead one discussion group. Post to class blogs.

Alternative visions of cultural diversity and biodiversity now challenge global attempts to establish a uniform market culture. At the same time recovery and reform from the financial crisis of 1997 have forced radical change in the developing economies towards uniform IMF standards. This course tracks those changes in East Asia and Latin America to provide a window on contested visions of development. Problems of growth versus equity, democracy versus repression, tradition versus modernity takes us to the core experience of bridging the local with the global. A review of political economy, culture, and the lived experience of development alerts us to both the intellectual and human dimensions of this critical human project. Questions of modernity and postmodernity in society and culture, at home and abroad, in Latin America and Asia give direction to the study. Fall. SOCI-167. Globalization and Social Change in Developing Countries (3) Professor Mashayekhi The general purpose of this course is to provide students with a historical, theoretical, and empirical discussion of the globalization process in developing countries ("Third World"). In particular, there will be a focus on the political and cultural dimensions of globalism since World War II. By "globalization" we refer to a significant intensification of economic, political, and cultural linkages between nations and regions of the world, and a corresponding consciousness about this process. Globalization, during the last several decades, has had two contradictory effects on non-Western cultures: homogenization, leading to cultural integration and increased similarities; and differentiation, promoting cultural resistance and the formation of nationalistic/nativistic identities. If pro-democracy movements in many contemporary developing countries represent the former, the cases of national liberation movements, Islamic revivalism, and newer ethnic-nationalism represent the latter. In other words, how people in these societies have come to define their national identities in reference to the "other," i.e., the West, after World War II. While the general concept in this course will be globalization, a range of relevant concepts such as national identity, Third Worldism, dependency, modernization/modernism, democratization and civil society, human rights and feminism will also be discussed.

The main purpose of this course is to familiarize the students with historical, theoretical, and empirical discussion of the globalization process in the developing countries (“Third World”), particularly during the last few decades. The concept of “globalization” came into public attention in the 1990’s and was defined by one theorist as “a social process in which the constraints of geography on social and cultural arrangements recede and in which people become increasingly aware that they are receding.” Globalization process is typically traced through three arenas of social life, namely: the economy, the polity, and the culture. The focus of the course is on the latter two, specifically in countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Globalization has created a more unified and systematic place, however that does not imply a more harmonious world. Alongside other forces of “homogenization’, one also finds the forces of “differentiation” an resistance. This resistance to globalization, or at times to its western-orientation, has taken diverse forms: nationalism, environmentalism, religious revivalism/fundamentalism, movements against the World Bank and the I.M.F. and even radical democratic movements. The real goal of this course is, therefore, to critically examine various definitions, characterizations, and evaluations of the globalization process. The course is divided into three main sections: A) General theoretical framework for analyzing “Third World,” B) Conceptualizing globalization; and C) Middle Eastern Politics in the age of globalization.

This is a seminar course aiming to discuss issues around state, religion and nationalism using a big questions driven and comparative approach. Some of the big topics we will include are state-building and state power, emergence of the nation-state, prevalence and use of nationalism in politics, meaning and shortcomings of democracy, problems arising at the intersection of religion and politics, such as secularism, fundamentalism, and right-wing politics. The main goals of this course will be to provide students with an overview of the building theoretical blocks from sociology in general and political sociology in particular to discuss these issues; and familiarize them with some of the analytic frameworks and tools sociologists use to understand the complications that arise from the use and abuse of the power that come with the state(s) appropriation and/or relationship with nationalism and religion that surround our lives today. Throughout the course we will use a range of classical theory readings and more contemporary works, a close look at American politics as well as lots of comparative studies from the Middle East and other parts of the developing world.

MW 5:00 – 6:15pm WGR 211 This course focuses on terrorism from a sociology perspective. Sociology of Terrorism takes a deviance and social control approach to the concept, theories, structure, and control of terrorism. A concept of many meanings and applications, the first section of the course will examine the social construct of the concept, terrorism, from several social and cultural perspectives. The second component of the course will examine theories of terrorism from the traditional functional/structural, conflict, and interaction theories. The first is the theoretical approach normally applied by governments, the second is the classic argument used by terrorist groups, while the third theory focuses on the protagonists and the victims. Part three will focus on the current state of terrorism, and part four on the current debate about controlling terrorism. The method is lecture participation, and discussion. The last section will present expected future trends in terrorism. Prerequisites: SOCI-001

Sociology Elective Course: This course focuses on comparative law enforcement systems from a sociology and cultural perspective. Sociology is the study of human social interaction and structure in groups. Sociologists examine systematically the ways people behave and arrange themselves in groups. Why people behave and organize the ways they do. By systematically observing and analyzing the group interactions and the group structures, sociologists can describe, explain, and interpret the group behavior patterns, and explain the influences of the social structure on that behavior. Sociology's structure/functional, interaction, and critical theories have been very useful in understanding social issues, and have been very influential in deciding social policy issues: sometimes beneficially, sometimes not so well. Comparative Law enforcement Systems uses functional/structural, deviance and social control, and social interactionist theory to understand various national police, court, and correction systems.

This course focuses on transnational crime from a sociology and criminology perspective. Sociology is the study of human social interaction and structure in groups. Sociologists examine systematically the ways people behave and arrange themselves in groups. Why people behave and organize the ways they do. By systematically observing and analyzing the group interactions and the group structures, sociologists can describe, explain, and interpret the group behavior patterns, and explain the influences of the social structure on that behavior. Sociology’s structure/functional, interaction, and critical theories have been very useful in understanding social issues, and have been very influential in deciding social policy issues: sometimes beneficially, sometimes not so well. The purpose of this course is to present current transnational crime behavior and explain national law enforcement agencies and international police organizations response to control transnational crime. The course will discuss: human trafficking, money laundering, trafficking in illegal items (drugs, weapons, antiquities, flora and fauna, body parts), and other transnational crimes. All definitions of crimes are social constructs, and are severely influenced by cultural and social forces. Some countries have similar laws, but many do not. In one country a deviant behavior is labeled a crime, and in another country the behavior is legal. One country’s criminal may be another country’s law-abiding citizen. Different crimes and different priorities compound the responds to transnational crime control. Those differences cause problems in dealing with global crime issues. The course objectives are: • Present current transnational crime operations • Explain the role of international organizations and crime control • Analyze the issue in controlling transnational crime • Present the trends in transnational crime and control

Social problems are defined as social conditions or patterns of behaviour that result in negative consequences for individuals, our social world, or our physical world; they can be local, societal, or global. When they threaten the wellbeing of many members of society, they become defined as social problems and prompt intervention. Sociology offers an objective and systematic approach to understanding the causes of social problems. In this course, students will learn about social problems from a sociological perspective. The course explores questions such as what are social problems; who defines them; what are their causes and their consequences on society? We will examine contemporary social issues in global, regional and Qatar contexts. We will delve into topics that include: poverty and its offshoots, gender inequalities (covering domestic violence and forms of sexism), crime and delinquency, (cyber)bullying, digital addiction, and population aging. We will touch upon other issues that arise from discussions or students’ interests, and consider responses to each social problem at policy and community-based levels. Guest speakers will present real-life case studies of local or global initiative responses to social problems.

Special Topics: This course entails a sociological examination of intersectionality, which has been described as both a theory and a means for social change. Starting with the social categories race, social class, and gender, the course entails looking at topics (such as family, education, work, and health) that demonstrate these categories' simultaneous influences on individuals' identities, interactions with others, and experiences within institutions. Turning to sociological literature, research, and contemporary debates, we'll first ask, "What is intersectionality?" and "What are the best ways to understand intersectional systems of inequality for members of both marginalized and privileged groups?" We will also extend the intersectional approach to include ethnicity, sexuality, religion, and nation.

Sociology Core Topic. Grounded in sociological theory, empirical data, and praxis, this course offers an introduction to the classical and contemporary research on race and ethnicity. As a class, we will learn what it means to treat race as social construct and also a central organizing principle in shaping patterns of power and inequality. To “bring race into the conversation,” however, is not license to silence other aspects of identity including, indigeneity, gender, sexuality, class, ability, and citizenship. The simultaneity, multiplicity and interaction between social difference makes intersectionality central to this course.

This three-credit course is a studio-based course designed for students to collaboratively build projects that address issues of gentrification in Washington, DC

Sociology Core Topic: This course provides an interdisciplinary introduction to the study of cities and urban life. Cities are socially and politically contested spaces, and researchers have sought for more than a century to understand the process of urban development and the consequence of urban life. Some argue that cities represent the crowning achievement of modernity; others suggest that cities are isolating and alienating, fostering anomie, rather than social cohesion. The course integrates work by urban planners, architects, political scientists, geographers and sociologists to provide a comprehensive set of tools to understand and analyze modern urban life. It begins with an analysis of the dynamics of capitalist urbanization and examines socio-spatial changes in the urban landscape in the early twentieth century. The course investigates the rise of urban ghettos in the post-War city, the growth of suburbia, and utopian schemes to reimagine the American urban landscape. Although the course focuses primarily on the United States, we will also discuss the rise of global cities, mega-cities and slums in the Global South.

[Formerly SOCI 3150] This course offers an introduction to the main themes and concepts in economic sociology, a thriving field that seeks to understand and explain our diverse economic decisions, transactions, and processes. In the first half of the term, we will start with an overview of the field’s theoretical foundations and distinct analytical traditions, focusing particularly on the role of social ties and cultural meanings in economic exchange. We will then apply these concepts and perspectives to 1) the most fundamental institution of economic exchange, i.e. money, and 2) the most ubiquitous type of economic action, i.e. pricing. In the second half of the term, we will expand our exploration to cover some of the most exciting and recent scholarship in the field, with a particular attention to how our economic transactions are constantly marked and stratified by moral categories, technologies and algorithms, and social inequalities.

[Formerly SOCI 160/SOCI 3260] Sociology Core Topic: In this course, we will examine sexuality-defined as behavior + desire-using a sociological perspective. We will explore sexual attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors, and also consider how the biology of sex gets sociologically constructed, including the myriad ways sexual desire and sexual activity are structured by social relations. Cross-cultural and historical accounts of sexual practices and meanings will be considered, as well as the contemporary theories and research methods used in sexuality studies. The course also focuses on the ways in which sexuality in social institutions and identity intersects with other major hierarchies of privilege and inequality, specifically race, ethnicity, social class, and gender.

This foundational course entails a sociological examination of intersectionality, which has been described as both a theory and a means for social change. Starting with the social categories race, social class, and gender, the course entails looking at topics (such as family, education, work, and health) that demonstrate these categories' simultaneous influences on individuals' identities, interactions with others, and experiences within institutions. Turning to sociological literature, research, and contemporary debates, we'll first ask, "What is intersectionality?" and "What are the best ways to understand intersectional systems of inequality for members of both marginalized and privileged groups?" We will also extend the intersectional approach to include ethnicity, sexuality, religion, and nation.

Sociology Foundational Course: This course explores the current research in the sociology of religion, as well as the directions that future work is going in. We begin with classical sociological accounts of religion by Emile Durkheim, who saw religion as a socially transmitted system of knowledge, and Max Weber's argument about the psychological-religious motivations of the Protestant ethic. After that, we will be moving back and forth between studies about religion in America and in other parts of the world, including Egypt, South Africa, Kenya, China, and India. The course will include readings on practices of Catholic converts, an orthodox Jewish community, fasting, meditation, qigong, the connection between religion and gun ownership in America, Muslim youths, evangelical prayer, spirituality without religion, offerings to ancestors, Buddhist volunteers, and hospital chaplains. We will work through themes of emotion, institutions, ritual, personhood, power, politics, sociality, community, markets, and culture. The course will cover the growing body of research that questions some previously taken-for-granted categories in the sociology of religion.

Sociology Core Topics Course: This course uses sociological theories to explore the production and consumption of culture. It introduces how sociologists answer central questions about the relationships between culture and society with a focus on three issues: institutional fads, how we talk about love, and children’s consumption. We will explore questions such as; What is the relationship between social change (e.g., economic, technological, demographic, geographical...) and the kinds of culture people produce and consume? Is there something unique about the contemporary America that produces a particular set of cultural practices, and if so what do these practices tell us about the immediate and distant futures of this society? How do everyday actions we take and decisions we make reflect and also shape the culture in which we live in? How aware are we of the structural forces and the relational contexts that guide our decisions? The course will primarily focus on the contemporary American culture, but with a keen awareness of how it is situated within a global context. Course readings and writing assignments will encourage students to question what we so often take for granted, or not recognize as being a powerful force that shapes and situates our everyday actions. Finally, the course treats culture as a serious and a concrete topic of academic inquiry, not something that is solely for entertainment and leisure or an abstract concept that cannot be defined or studied scientifically.

Sociology Core Topics Course: This course is designed to provide students with an overview of the field of population studies, also known as demography. Broadly defined, demography seeks to describe and understand population change and composition. Population approaches have been used to describe and study a variety of social issues, including health and mortality, aging, family and households, fertility, racial-ethnic diversity and segregation, immigration, urbanization, and concerns about food, resources, and sustainability. Understanding these approaches is important as businesses, governments, and individuals deal with the demands of changing populations. This course pays particular attention to the causes and consequences of population change. Emphasis will be placed on relating demographic concepts and methods to current events and pressing social and political issues. Students will become familiar with some of the tools and basic methods that demographers use. For example, they will be able to look at a country's population pyramid and tell a story about the country's fertility history.

Sociology Core Lecture course. This course is an introduction to the sociological analysis of social movements. Social movements have long been an important force behind political, social, and cultural change. From French Revolution to Civil Rights movement of the 60s, or the recent Arab Uprisings, they play an extraordinary role in shaping and reshaping our social institutions and everyday life. In this course, we will aim to get a scholarly understanding of social movement theory, and learn how to apply this theoretical knowledge using a toolkit to both historical and contemporary social movements and revolutions. We will pay particular attention to Civil Rights Movement, The Pro-Choice and Pro-Life Movements, American Right-Wing Movements, The LGBT Movement, Radical Islamic Movements, and Arab Uprisings, though we will also talk about many other social movements around the world.

This course offers an introduction to the major themes, theories, and debates in political sociology, with a central emphasis on power and social order. Political sociologists study how power and authority are produced, legitimized, contested, and institutionalized, and how these processes shape the emergence, maintenance, and transformation of social order. A core concern of the course is understanding why societies require social order, how order is constructed and sustained, under what conditions it breaks down, and how it evolves over time—including moments of crisis, breakdown, and revolt.

Sociology Core Topics Course: Law & Society, focuses on detailed examination of some of contemporary society's most salient legal issues. Students learn legal history, socio-political influences, and Supreme Court decisions on issues including abortion, affirmative action, discrimination against same-sex couples, federal elections, gun rights/regulations, and voting rights, among others. Students read primary sources and journal articles, watch documentaries, do simulations, and keep up with current events. Of particular interest are cases before the Supreme Court currently whose decisions will be announced in the summer.

Sociology Core Topic: This course is designed to introduce students to the criminological approaches of understanding crime, criminal behavior and the criminal justice system. Students will develop skills that will help them familiarize themselves with criminological theories and the consequences of deviance on one's social life. Throughout the course we will discuss topics involving criminal theory, how deviance and nonconformity are punished, research methods, and types of crimes. Special issues within the field will be discussed such as healthcare within prisons and jails, immigration, and gender considerations within the criminal justice system. Knowledge gained in this course give students the ability to critically analyze the who, what, where, and why of crime and deviant behavior and the ways in which it is studied.

This course (SOCI 3650) explores the social and cultural construction of adolescence in contemporary American society. Although much of the work in this area has been dominated by psychology, the central focus of the sociological study of adolescence will be to explore the perceptions, behaviors, and experiences of youth within the larger social context in which this transition to adulthood takes place. Adolescence is a life-stage where a great deal of meaning making is occurring about internal and external forces that have both individual and group consequences. Major themes will include: cultural and legal socialization of youth, crime and deviance, health and sexuality, employment and educational outcomes, and political behavior/civic engagement.

This course will provide an introduction to central topics in the sociology of health and illness. While the social is often thought to be at odds with the biological, the sociology of health and illness inevitably has to grapple with the relationship between the two. As a subdiscipline it is a broad field, the boundaries of which have proven difficult to define, but that reaches across an expansive range of disciplines relating to medicine and health. In this course, we will aim to understand how sociologists approach research in the areas of health and illness, while also exploring how sociology interacts with the variety of disciplines that cover these same topics such as science and technology studies, social epidemiology, medicine, public health, demography, health psychology, medical anthropology, and bioethics, as well as sociology of the body/knowledge.

Sociology Core Topics Course: SOCI 3863 introduces students to the sociological study of education and schooling, focusing on the relationship between schools and society and the consequences for social inequality. Americans believe formal education is an avenue for social mobility and it is often touted as the "great equalizer." However, studies consistently document that schools also contribute to the reproduction of social inequality. In this course, we will review theories of how schools work and why as we explore questions of social reproduction in education. We will examine how privilege and disadvantage are transmitted across generations through schooling, why such transmission persists, and the consequences for youth and society. Our primary focus will be the U.S. case, but we will also consider education systems in other industrialized countries.

This course provides an interdisciplinary introduction to the study of cities and urban life. Cities are socially and politically contested spaces, and researchers have sought for more than a century to understand the process of urban development and the consequence of urban life. Some argue that cities represent the crowning achievement of modernity; others suggest that cities are isolating and alienating, fostering anomie, rather than social cohesion. The course integrates work by urban planners, architects, political scientists, geographers and sociologists to provide a comprehensive set of tools to understand and analyze modern urban life. It begins with an analysis of the dynamics of capitalist urbanization and examines socio-spatial changes in the urban landscape in the early twentieth century. The course investigates the rise of urban ghettos in the post-War city, the growth of suburbia, and utopian schemes to reimagine the American urban landscape. Although the course focuses primarily on the United States, we will also discuss the rise of global cities, mega-cities and slums in the Global South.

The goals of this course are to critically examine the answers given to the following questions: Why do some people have more of the good things in life than others? Why are the poor poor? How did inequality in society begin? What does inequality look like in America? Are we a classless society? How do you recognize social class? How differently do people of different social classes experience and react to the world? What are your chances of moving up or down in the class order? Is there a ruling class in America? Is there a new class war underway in America? Do the Soviets have more or less inequality than we have? How does the international economic order affect inequality in the third world?

This course offers an introduction to the main themes and concepts in economic sociology, a thriving field that seeks to understand and explain our diverse economic decisions, transactions, and processes. In the first half of the term, we will start with an overview of the field’s theoretical foundations and distinct analytical traditions, focusing particularly on the role of social ties and cultural meanings in economic exchange. We will then apply these concepts and perspectives to 1) the most fundamental institution of economic exchange, i.e. money, and 2) the most ubiquitous type of economic action, i.e. pricing. In the second half of the term, we will expand our exploration to cover some of the most exciting and recent scholarship in the field, with a particular attention to how our economic transactions are constantly marked and stratified by moral categories, technologies and algorithms, and social inequalities.

Sociology Core Lecture course (more TBA).

In this course, we will examine sexuality–defined as behavior + desire–using a sociological perspective. We will explore sexual attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors, and also consider how the biology of sex gets sociologically constructed, including the myriad ways sexual desire and sexual activity are structured by social relations. Cross-cultural and historical accounts of sexual practices and meanings will be considered, as well as the contemporary theories and research methods used in sexuality studies. The course also focuses on the ways in which sexuality in social institutions and identity intersects with other major hierarchies of privilege and inequality, specifically race, ethnicity, social class, and gender.

Gender Roles is an introduction to the sociological study of gender. Sociologists of Gender argue that gender is a major organizing principle of everyday life. We will be investigating the social construction and maintenance of gendered – and transgendered – identities in a gender-stratified society. The topics we will examine include: cultural definitions and expectations regarding gender identity and roles; childhood socialization; intimacies and sexualities; gender inequalities in relationships, including marriage and families of choice; inequities in work and the economy; religion; power and politics; and social reforms and possibilities for all individuals. Variations based on race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic class are considered throughout the course. The focus is primarily on contemporary American society, although global issues will also be explored.

"Sociology Foundational Course: This course explores the current research in the sociology of religion, as well as the directions that future work is going in. We begin with classical sociological accounts of religion by Emile Durkheim, who saw religion as a socially transmitted system of knowledge, and Max Weber's argument about the psychological-religious motivations of the Protestant ethic. After that, we will be moving back and forth between studies about religion in America and in other parts of the world, including Egypt, South Africa, Kenya, China, and India. The course will include readings on practices of Catholic converts, an orthodox Jewish community, fasting, meditation, qigong, the connection between religion and gun ownership in America, Muslim youths, evangelical prayer, spirituality without religion, offerings to ancestors, Buddhist volunteers, and hospital chaplains. We will work through themes of emotion, institutions, ritual, personhood, power, politics, sociality, community, markets, and culture. The course will cover the growing body of research that questions some previously taken-for-granted categories in the sociology of religion.

This course examines the phenomenon of culture from a sociological perspective, which sees culture (broadly defined as tastes, values, traditions, beliefs, habits, as well as forms of aesthetic expression) as a key factor in almost any social context. This course will place a special emphasis on a few topics in particular, such as popular culture, globalization, political culture, culture and cognition, and institutions of culture production. Each week there will be a lecture on a particular concept or approach in the sociology of culture, followed by a student-led discussion applying that approach to a variety of cases, from a (e.g. art worlds) to z (e.g. zombies). No background in sociology is required but students should be prepared to actively consume and analyze both theoretical readings and cultural data on a weekly basis.

TR 11:00AM-12:15PM This course uses sociological theories to explore the production and consumption of culture. It introduces how sociologists answer central questions about the relationships between culture and society with a focus on three issues: institutional fads, how we talk about love, and children’s consumption. We will explore questions such as; What is the relationship between social change (e.g., economic, technological, demographic, geographical…) and the kinds of culture people produce and consume? Is there something unique about the contemporary America that produces a particular set of cultural practices, and if so what do these practices tell us about the immediate and distant futures of this society? How do everyday actions we take and decisions we make reflect and also shape the culture in which we live in? How aware are we of the structural forces and the relational contexts that guide our decisions? The course will primarily focus on the contemporary American culture, but with a keen awareness of how it is situated within a global context. Course readings and writing assignments will encourage students to question what we so often take for granted, or not recognize as being a powerful force that shapes and situates our everyday actions. Finally, the course treats culture as a serious and a concrete topic of academic inquiry, not something that is solely for entertainment and leisure or an abstract concept that cannot be defined or studied scientifically.

This is a designated CAS CURE (Course-based Undergraduate Research Experience Class). In this course, students will assist in the data collection for Yuki Kato’s research on urban agriculture in DC with a particular focus on the termination of gardens and farms. The course will provide training for the students to conduct qualitative interviews and code qualitative data using an online software. Throughout the semester, we will read relevant academic research and current statistics to contextualize the data being collected. The findings from the project will be organized into a StoryMap to be shared with the public. The course will partner with an activist-scholar, Malka Roth, who has conducted a “sociological autopsy” of the ending a sustainable urban farm. Ms. Roth will provide on-the-ground training and supervision for conducting data collection and well as making the findings from the study publicly accessible. The course is appropriate for seniors, juniors, and sophomores, with case-by-case exception for first year students. Prior social science research experiences are preferred but not necessary. Because the interviews are expected to be conducted in person whenever possible, students should be prepared to make time outside of the weekly lecture time, and to travel outside of the campus for data collection.

Spring 2016 TR 11:00AM - 12:15PM WAL 391 Students enrolled in Population Dynamics will become familiar with prevailing levels of fertility, mortality, marriage, and migration in each of the world's major regions; they will also learn what processes of change resulted in current levels. In addition, the course introduces multiple issues in the complex relationship between population dynamics and economic development. Fall 2015 TR 11:00 - 12:15pm WAL 391 Students enrolled in Population Dynamics will become familiar with prevailing levels of fertility, mortality, marriage, and migration in each of the world's major regions; they will also learn what processes of change resulted in current levels. In addition, the course introduces multiple issues in the complex relationship between population dynamics and economic development.

R 6:30-9:00pm This course will provide a sociological understanding of the processes by which non-nationals move into and settle in a new country. In particular, we will examine some of the major questions that guide sociological analysis of migration. Some of the questions that this course will address are as follows: Why do people migrate? Are they allowed to migrate? How do immigration policies influence flows of migration? To what extent do newcomers become part of the mainstream? What kind of networks do they create? What impact do they have on the host country? How do they relate to the native population? Do they engage in the public sphere as political subjects? Immigration is a fascinating yet multi-faceted subject. Students will be introduced to various sociological approaches, as well as strategies for investigating questions around immigration. In addition, students will be exposed to contemporary issues of salient relevance from a public policy perspective. Some of the topics to be explored include social-cultural assimilation, political incorporation, and economic integration. The course will primarily focus on the U.S., although we will also examine examples from other countries. Credits: 3 Prerequisites: None

The issues of modernization and development are at the very core of the development of sociology itself. The great founders (by consensus) of sociology, Karl Marx, Émile Durkheim, and Max Weber, each intellectually wrestled with the enormous social changes seen in industrializing Europe--and elsewhere as well--and out of that quest emerged their characteristic but deeply different approaches to social thought itself. The materials we consider will range widely: from deep and intense comparisons of the historical developmental experiences of multiple nations and world regions; to conceptual and theoretical and methodological issues concerning how to think about, measure, and compare experiences of development; to reading and absorbing data on changes in birth rates, GNP/capita, mortality, etc.; to absorbing the gist of sophisticated, state-of-the-art statistical studies trying to account for differences in development using routine--but scary for undergraduates--economic and sociological modeling. The course will also include deep engagements with both classic and thoroughly current theoretical approaches to development, ranging from Weberian and modernization theory to dependency and world-system theories, as well as to critiques of all those schools and new pathways beyond them. Special but by no means exclusive attention will be paid to development in Latin America. The work for the course derives from two equally weighted exams--part in-class, part take-home--contributing 75% to your final grade. The remaining 25% will be based upon class attendance and participation including one or more classroom presentations. Since the participation requires attendance, noticeable absences will lead directly to lower participation grades. Some part of the class grade may depend on a brief writing assignment or two.

Most of our behavior takes place in the context of the ordinary and the day-to-day, the “institutional” in sociological terms. Some behavior, though, is distinctively “other,” comprising what sociologists have jointly termed the topic of collective behavior and social movements: crowd behavior, crazes (violent and otherwise), riots, social reform movements, religious revival and millenarian movements, popular uprisings and rebellions, and revolutionary movements. In this course we will deal with a broad sampling of these forms, even if our focus will mainly be on social resistance movements of a wide variety. Our main goal is to try to begin to make some theoretical sense of those unusual patterns of human behavior. We will try to see how such activities are far from being merely spontaneous or explosive expressions of humanity’s psychological foundations, seeing them rather in terms of the social structures in which we are imbedded, the cultural standards by which we judge behavior (our own and others’), and the processes by which both structures and cultures are transformed. Out of those more routine patterns of existence do the extraordinary patterns of “disorder” emerge. We are interested especially in the origins of such varied collective activities -- including who joins and what joiners believe in and under what conditions these movements spring up – yet we are also interested in the outcomes of such movements and collective actions, including responses from the state and any goals that are (or are not) achieved. Among the specific empirical topics we will study are violent crazes, including witch hunts and lynchings; the social bases and processes of riots, especially in the United States, but also in Europe and elsewhere; some religious(-based) movements; an even wider variety of social movements that usually target the state in seeking the extension of new -- or the protection of old -- political, economic, and social rights; a special subset of such movements, transnational in their structures and reactive to globalization in their central beliefs; and some rural social movements in the Third World, including revolutionary ones. Please note that, despite a great deal of reading about the United States, past and present, this course is not “about” the United States only, but it is featured because it is so well studied and has such a rich history of collective behavior and social movements that we can come to think about in a systematic way.

The purpose of this course is to familiarize students with a range of concepts, theories, and issues in the sociological area commonly referred to as “political sociology.” In fact, the questions, “Who has power?” and, “How is power exercised and/or maintained?” are the central points of this discipline. Further, political sociologists are interested in exploring in whose interests is power applied; is the power of the ruling groups a product of the popular will, or is it created/maintained by the powerful themselves through a combination of “force” and their manipulation of public opinion? All in all, political sociology explores the relationship between society and politics: the fundamental ways in which political structures, processes, and decisions are linked to the social structure.

Students should become more aware of the nature and consequences of politics and realize how politics is present in all aspects of social life. Our approach is historical, global, theoretical, critical, as well as comparative. In addition to the US, we wish to understand the nature of politics in less developed societies, particularly in the Middle East. Therefore, some of the readings will focus authoritarian political systems and what is known as “the dynamics of democratization.”

Finally, we will explore the impact of globalization on the world and, in particular, on the role of Islamic societies. The emergence of some democratic movements in the Islamic world will be highlighted.

Sociology Core Topics Course: Law & Society, focuses on detailed examination of some of contemporary society's most salient legal issues. Students learn legal history, socio-political influences, and Supreme Court decisions on issues including abortion, affirmative action, discrimination against same-sex couples, federal elections, gun rights/regulations, and voting rights, among others. Students read primary sources and journal articles, watch documentaries, do simulations, and keep up with current events. Of particular interest are cases before the Supreme Court currently whose decisions will be announced in the summer.

The course is a survey of the nature and extent of crime and delinquency. It covers biological, psychological and sociological theories of crime causation; criminal typologies; legal and social definitions of crime; insanity defenses. Exercises based upon quantitative analysis of crime data are included. (Police, courts, and corrections are dealt with in a separate course, see Sociology of Criminal Justice.) The course has a mid-term and final exam; short quantitative exercises; and a research paper in which a criminological theory is tested with data.

This course examines “the family” as complex sets of ideologies and social practices. We look at American families in historical perspectives, and explore cross-cultural differences in family forms. Particular attention is paid to issues such as diversity in mate selection, love, sexuality, singlehood, marriage, divorce, parenting, conflict resolution, and violence. Families are also considered as a basic social institution, and as a widely accepted means of regulating gender relations, sexual behavior, and child care responsibilities. Some cultural ideals and social realities of family relationships and marriages are studied, as well as social class and race/ethnic group variations in families and family life cycle changes. We will view families as critical aspects of broad social changes. What tensions exist between families and other social institutions: the economy, education, religion, and political system? Do families make way for innovations in society, or do they act largely as conservative forces? What new kinds of families have emerged? Do modern alternative families enable their members to survive, adapt, and thrive more successfully than traditional families? Small group projects (see detailed description below) may include fieldwork in Washington D.C. Local community organizations are possible sites for research on particular aspects of family and community relations, as well as library materials. Students are required to bring to class some historical and/or cross-cultural data on families and society. These data will be used with lectures and group projects.

This course (SOCI 3650) explores the social and cultural construction of adolescence in contemporary American society. Although much of the work in this area has been dominated by psychology, the central focus of the sociological study of adolescence will be to explore the perceptions, behaviors, and experiences of youth within the larger social context in which this transition to adulthood takes place. Adolescence is a life-stage where a great deal of meaning making is occurring about internal and external forces that have both individual and group consequences. Major themes will include: cultural and legal socialization of youth, crime and deviance, health and sexuality, employment and educational outcomes, and political behavior/civic engagement.

How are corporations, supply chains, and rapidly changing consumer markets affecting environments around the world? Why do societies so often continue to produce severe hazards, even when majorities of residents say they care about the environment? Why are environmental hazards unequally distributed (both within the U.S. and globally), and what have environmental justice movements sought to do about it? How is climate change reshaping societies, and what are the prospects for effective and equitable transitions? Can technological solutions save the day, or are they a distraction from other pathways to social change? What counts as “nature” and “the environment” anyhow? These are just a few of the questions that can be addressed by taking a sociological perspective on the environment. Often, the “natural” and “social” dimensions of human life are assumed to be polar opposites. In contrast, this course emphasizes the links between environmental conditions and the social structures and practices that underlay them. It will examine the organizational, political, and institutional conditions that produce severe environmental degradation and environmental injustice (that is, the unequal and often racialized distribution of environmental hazards). In addition, the course will examine the conditions that have supported environmental (and environmental justice) movements, reductions in environmental harms, and environmentally beneficial reorganizations of social life.

The course is intended to speak not only to students who are already passionate about environmental and/or environmental justice issues but also to students who are interested in the wide-ranging implications of social inequality, processes of social change, and sociological perspectives.

"Science" has been increasingly treated by sociologists as an institutional area of study, in that sense resembling other institutional realms such as the family, religion, and politics. Sociologists can and do study each of these areas as a relatively separate--yet still socially "imbedded"--domain of activity that can be understood both in terms of its own internal patterns and dynamics and in terms of its dynamic relationships with the broader society. Such is the intent of this course: to examine science and the behavior of scientists in those internal and external social contexts. The course therefore will be a survey of systematic attempts to describe and understand science as an institution. After a brief survey of the sociology of knowledge, we will critically consider the relation of scientific activities to the other social identities of scientists, such as age, ethnicity, class, and other identities. We will pay especially close attention to gender-issues in science. We will then study the social and cultural organization of the scientific community itself, including the laboratory setting where science is done; the social organization of scientists into departments and "invisible colleges;" the cultural standards, rewards, and ambivalences of scientists; and the manner in which "scientific revolutions" occur (or not) in various fields. Finally, we will examine how the relations between science and the rest of the social order can nurture or inhibit its institutional advances, such as the interdependences (or not) between that field and the economy, the state, religion, and so forth. Especially in this latter section of the course, but not only here, we will draw on comparative or historical materials, not just studies of American science. (Detailed topical concerns are outlined below, at the beginning of the subsections of the syllabus.) All of these might reasonably be described as “classic” themes in the traditional sociology of science. The field that we study in this course has changed. Throughout most of the history of the Sociology of Science (fairly said to have been founded by Robert K. Merton in the 1930s), sociologists have tended to “black-box” scientific findings: they treat them as givens, as sound knowledge secured by methods that sociologists and others need not inspect (too) closely. Since the 1970s, there has arisen a “deeper” view, alternately termed the “Strong Program(me)” in the Sociology of Science or SSK (The Sociology of Scientific Knowledge). This viewpoint has both feminist and postmodern components, the latter often done by persons working out of a “cultural studies” perspective. In some of their more assertive writings, scientific knowledge is treated quite skeptically, at times viewed as nothing more than an “agreement constructed in a laboratory.” We will read several contributions from this literature (to which there are also responses from the classic sociology of science). But I think it only fair to give working scientists themselves a chance to answer such fundamental assertions about their disciplinary expertise, and hence we will read selections from a key work such as Higher Superstition, or related writings, where the scientists themselves read and respond to that literature, in many of its variants.

Sociology Core Topic: Education is a complex social institution that is responsible for a wide-range of individual and societal outcomes. The study of education has deep roots among the founders of sociology, including Emile Durkheim, who considered education "the base of democratic morality." The study of education continues to be a major focus of sociological inquiry, with a frequently debated question of whether education is a tool for social mobility and the realization of one's full potential, or a tool of oppression that reinforces inequality. This course will examine the institution of education using both theoretical and empirical texts, as well as applied examples of current policy issues. This course will also take a deeper dive into two urgent issues that are at the top of the education policy agenda this spring: (1) the current and future impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, and (2) the improvement of civic education to preserve and advance our democracy and democratic institutions.

MF 11:00am-12:15pm Car Barn 201 Social network analysis is both an approach to understanding social structure and society and a method for the analysis. Students in this course will gain an understanding of social network theory as well as how to do network analysis. This course will review articles on a wide range of topics related to networks, to introduce students to 1) the evolution of social network theory and d methods as an approach to understanding and studying sociology, 2) the ways in which new technology is changing how we think about and study networks. No background in network methods is required to take this class; all mathematical concepts necessary to understand the models covered will be reviewed.

[Formerly SOCI 201] Sociology Required course. This course is designed to provide a sound introduction to the overall process of scientific research design and the specific research methods most frequently used by sociologists and other social scientists. The research reports we read in journals or hear about in the news reflect the outcomes of a research process, which involves a series of critical decisions. Researchers must limit their topics, pose relevant questions, define their concepts, formulate testable hypotheses, develop means of measuring variables, design samples, and decide how to collect information. The course begins with an overview of the nature of scientific research (including both product and process) and a discussion of the ethics in conducting human subject research, and the dilemmas inherent in efforts to describe social reality. We then review issues related to posing research questions and selecting methods of data collection, such as variables, units of analysis, hypotheses, and establishing causality. We examine measurement and sampling in depth as well. The remainder of the course focuses on some data collection and analysis methods that are most prominent in the field of sociology: surveys, interview, focus group, and ethnographic fieldwork.

[Formerly SOCI 202/SOCI 2902] Sociology Required course. Sociology majors and minors only, or by instructor approval. Also offered in the Spring Semester. This course examines major theories of society exemplified in the work of sociological theorists. We will give special emphasis and about half of the term to those classical theorists whose insights formed the foundation of contemporary sociology: Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Émile Durkheim. In the latter part of the course we will survey and "map out" a variety of contemporary perspectives on society--most are heavily indebted to those three classical roots--including symbolic interactionism and its variants, structural-functionalism, conflict and exchange theories, neo-Marxisms and critical theory, feminism, and varied approaches to culture. In addition, we will give some attention to the social and organizational contexts in which classical and contemporary theory have emerged. The writing for the course will consist of a series of short writing assignments, numbering eleven in all. You may skip three (3) of these; thus you will have to write eight (8) of these in all, together contributing 80% of your final grade. Each assignment will be either (1) a short essay (ca. 3 pages) or (2) a series of roughly paragraph-length answers to a series of questions I pose to you. Required Bookstore Texts: Robert C. Tucker, ed., The Marx-Engels Reader, 2d ed. only; From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, eds. Gerth & Mills. Émile Durkheim, Suicide: A Study in Sociology; Peter Kivisto, Social Theory: Roots and Branches Readings, 4th ed. only (2011). Plus many Canvas readings.

[Formerly SOCI 203/SOCI 2903] Sociology Required course (for majors). Prerequisite: One course in Sociology or permission of instructor. This course introduces quantitative analysis in social research, including principles of research design and the use of empirical evidence, particularly from social surveys. The course will cover collecting and describing data, creating visual displays of quantitative information, identifying relationships among variables, and testing research hypotheses. Students are expected to attend two lectures each week and a weekly lab section where they will learn to use the statistical software Stata. Students will be evaluated based on their performance on two midterm exams, one final exam, and several written assignments building toward a final research paper that uses multiple regression to test sociologically-grounded hypotheses on a topic of their choice.

This is an independent research tutorial. Student must obtain permission from the department before enrolling.

Independent Study This is an independent research tutorial. Student must obtain permission from the department before enrolling.

This course explores tattoos as a religious practice, from a sociological perspective. There are no previous requirements for this class; we will read some sociology classic authors during the course. We start analyzing the relevance of tattoos in today’s society and search how sociologists of religion have understood tattoos so far. Later, we study tattoos from a lived religious perspective. Students will explore the history of religious tattoos in the Western world and the influences of other spiritual traditions on Western tattoos. As with many human creations, tattoos have also a ‘dark side’. They have been used as a tool of punishment. In that context, we will critically study religious mandates about tattoos. We will investigate contemporary religious, and spiritual tattoos in the U.S., the Americas, and Europe. After paying attention to the role of tattooists, we will explore sociological theories to discuss who has the power to define what is religion and what is not.

This course will explore the evolution of perceptions of racial mixing in the United States. It will examine the scientific and popular understandings of race that contributed to two contradictory typologies of thinking about multiraciality: notions of hybrid degeneracy and notions of hybrid vigor. The desire to document, classify, and characterize different racial types was rooted in an evolutionary schema that was fundamentally undergirded by assumptions of monoracial boundaries and separations between groups. We will revisit scientific theories of human difference, including the polygenism versus monogenism debates of the nineteenth century; renderings in popular culture of the mixed race experience such as the tragic mulatta trope; collaborations between biologists, geneticists, and social scientists to clarify scientific knowledge on race such as the UNESCO statement; and more contemporary celebratory portrayals of multiraciality. Understanding these shifts and moments will help us trace the framework and context within which multiracial identities have come to be asserted and constructed in the United States.

This course takes a chronological look at the depiction of race and ethnicity in the U.S. film industry and its impact on society. The course focuses on 6 races/ethnicities, African American, Arab, Asian, Latino, Native American, and European American (white) and examines the power of storytelling to create a cultural identity. Beginning with the silent era and continuing to the modern day, students view classic as well as little known films and learn the context in which the films were produced, directed, and acted. Using a sociological lens, students will study and discuss the impact of stereotyping, stigma, politics, and market forces.

TR 12:30-1:45pm Car Barn 202 In the 1850s, New York establishments advertising for new employees often added the coda, “No Irish need apply,” reflecting Americans’ widespread fear of being swamped by low-class, Catholic immigrants from Éire. In 1857 in the Dred Scott decision, Chief Justice Roger B. Taney pronounced black Americans “so far inferior, that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect, and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his own benefit.” In the 1920s, the U.S. Congress passed deeply restrictive immigration laws for the first time since our independence, certainly targeting and limiting immigrants then arriving from East Asia, but more so the larger numbers from eastern and southern Europe, notably peasants from Italy and Jews from Russia and Poland. In 1939, the U.S. government refused to allow a ship loaded with German Jewish refugees to dock at our ports; the ship was forced to return to Germany, and its passengers to their fates. By the 2050s, some demographic prophets tell us, fully half of the U.S. population will (may?) be Latinos, due to current -- and for many native-born Americans, much feared -- waves of immigration from Latin America. Such political targetings of selected “suspect” groups are thus a near-constant in U.S. history: plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose (the more things change, the more they stay the same). Yet a closer historical look suggests that adage to be both deeply right and thoroughly wrong. By 1960, a wealthy Catholic of Irish descent, John F. Kennedy, won the presidency of the United States; less than a half-century later, a Harvard-educated African-American repeated the unlikely story, as Barack Obama rose to assume the title, Mr. President. We no longer wring our hands over the huge numbers of our fellow citizens who ethnically identify with the Irish, Italians, or Germans (the last being the most common national heritage that Americans claim). Instead, we live in world where a spate of books tells us how, over time, the Irish, the Italians, and the Jews each “became white,” and where a 1992 novel, perhaps also portending a thoroughly assimilated future for Latinas (and their brothers), describes How the García Girls Lost Their Accents. To better instruct ourselves about the hues of our humanity, we will also consider other societies where race, color, and culture intersect in intriguing ways. In Peru, an old racist adage declared that “[t]he indian is the animal that most resembles man,” yet Peruvians elected a full-blooded Inca-descendent to the presidency early in this century. Brazil has recently instituted quota-systems by (dark) skin-color for greater access to the public universities, a matter tricky to implement given the complex skin-tone spectrum that prevails there. (The policy is attacked by critics as injecting into Brazilian society’s vaunted “racial democracy” some previously unknown forms of tension, i.e., American-style race-mongering.) Brazil’s race-mixture has long included Japanese-descent Brazilians from early 20th-century immigrant waves. Now a recent wave of counter-migration, wherein hundreds of thousands of Japanese-descent Brazilians have gone back to their ancestral homeland, vividly shows the cultural differences between those of the Japanese “race” who stayed put, and the samba- and beach-loving returnees who are Brazilian born-and-bred. Throughout this term we will critically and deeply explore the three concepts that compose its title, and how they relate to one another in our minds, in our cultural attitudes (both today and in the past), and (by term’s end) in some better understood social reality. Research from the fields of sociology, anthropology, and history may be central to our venture, but we also will draw fruitfully on materials and studies ranging from population genetics all the way to visual and verbal symbolic representations, such as caricatures, comedy routines, posters, and ethnic jokes. Why is any of this important? Throughout the entire semester, we will be confronted with the “facts of life” for various races, skin-colorations, etc. in the U.S. and elsewhere. Precisely because different “types” of people often come into tension-filled contacts with one another, their life-courses are predictably apt to go down very different roads. Those differences, and our interactions with others of different races, colors, and cultures, are thus profoundly consequential for people’s life-styles and – far more importantly, in my view – for their life chances: their likelihoods of having good (or bad) jobs, high (or low) incomes, more (or fewer) years of education, better (or worse) health and life expectancy, and so forth.

Sociology Seminar Course. Some seats in this class are reserved. This course combines lectures with seminar-form discussion to explore the complex ways that race impacts political behavior and attitudes in (primarily) American politics. The course takes a sociological approach that stresses the constructed nature of both race and politics. As a group, we will explore the mechanisms through which race informs political behavior, while also paying close attention to the ways that politics also informs our understanding of race. The course treats "race" as multifaceted construct, with multiple (and often times conflicting) influences on political behavior. The course is split into 3 parts. In the first portion of the course, we will explore the relationship between racial identity and political behavior at the individual level. The second part of the course will examine how ideas about racial groups shape political attitudes and behaviors, as well as policy outcomes. The third part of the course will explore how race is used to mobilize political and economic actors. Throughout the course, we will engage the debate concerning the role of race and racism in the formation of contemporary party coalitions in US electoral politics.Additionally, we will examine the actual policy outputs of government, exploring the degree to which the presence or absence of racial and ethnic diversity shapes both the nature of policy-making institutions as well as the policies they generate.

Sociology Seminar course. This course uses ethnography to examine the African-American experience in both theory and practice in American history. The course provides a practical introduction to theoretical and methodological issues related to race and ethnography.

Sociology Advanced Seminar: Amidst increasing racial and ethnic diversity in the United States, there is growing concern that racial and ethnic minorities in American cities will face even greater inequalities with respect to access to housing, resources, educational/employment opportunities, etc. This seminar critically examines how racial/ethnic inequality is generated and maintained in contemporary American society. The readings will cover major theoretical approaches and (quantitative and qualitative) empirical investigations of racial and ethnic stratification in several urban cities, notably, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York City, and Washington, D.C. This course will also explore the merits and limitations of various paradigms that aim to explain racial inequalities and the concomitant social policies that have been implemented and/or proposed to address the same.

M 3:30 - 6:00pm In Rebel Cities, David Harvey poses the central question of twenty-first century cities as a question of the right to the city, echoing the influential theorist, Henri Lefebvre.  “The question of what kind of city we want cannot be divorced from the question of what kind of people we want to be, what kinds of social relations we seek, what relations to nature we cherish, what style of life we desire, what aesthetic values we hold,” Harvey writes. “The freedom to make and remake ourselves and our cities is one of the most precious yet most neglected of our human rights.  How best to exercise that right?”   Drawing on a range of theoretical perspectives, this seminar investigates the question at the heart of David Harvey’s Rebel Cities – namely, how best to understand, evaluate and exercise the right to the city.  The seminar engages debates over the right to the city through a critical analysis of the contested process of gentrification.  Over the last couple decades, the sweep of gentrification has remade many urban neighborhoods.  In doing so, it has raised new questions about the rights of long-term citizens to shape their own communities, and the unequal distribution of benefits from the process of gentrification.  Despite extensive neighborhood changes, the ghettoization of poverty and a legacy of racial segregation continue to pose unique challenges to the creation of more equitable, just cities. These challenges, many of which are heightened by the process of gentrification, push issues of social justice to the forefront of our conversations about contemporary cities.  They raise new questions about inequality, equity and the twenty-first century urban condition.   Through an exploration of the process of gentrification in American cities, this interdisciplinary seminar investigates the ways that we, as urban citizens, can contribute to the creation of more just cities.  As David Harvey suggests in Rebel Cities, the ways that cities are shaped, patterned and contested tells us something deeply meaningful about contemporary social relations, power dynamics and political rights.  By studying gentrification, this course engages arguments about the right to the city – who has the right to occupy and shape urban spaces, and how conflicts over those rights play out in American neighborhoods – in the quest for a more equitable, just city. 

Advanced seminar

Sociology Advanced Seminar: Conventional accounts tend to mobilize moral arguments to either justify or vilify markets. This course offers a different sociological lens to explore how money and morals constantly intermingle and sustain each other, with a focus on the cultural dimensions of economic activity. We will read some of the most exciting empirical studies on a broad range of economic actions, including pricing, lending, paying, and gifting, to study how questions of legitimacy, fairness, and dignity shape these diverse realms of economic exchange. In each case, we will examine how social inequalities mark both our exchanges and moral boundaries. Throughout the course, we will explore questions such as: How do economic and cultural values structure prices of goods and services? Do monetary transactions, in turn, re-organize the moral categories that guide our social lives and political actions? What happens when money mingles with what we consider priceless domains like life and nature? How do morally contested markets, like life insurance, human organs, and marijuana, emerge or fail to emerge? Why do we tend to justify inequality in some markets but deem it unfair in others? We will conclude by considering the moral implications of digital monies and algorithms, which increasingly structure contemporary economic exchange.

This advanced seminar will ​examine how gender as a social category both shapes and is shaped by power (and politics). In this course, we will address gendered politics and policy on the macro-level and micro-levels of society. Along with in-depth discussions and analyses of gendered power, other dimensions of power will be included, such as race, ​social class, sexuality, religion, ​citizenship statu​s.

W 11:00AM - 1:30PM TBA

W 5:00 - 7:30pm ICC 204B This interdisciplinary seminar in social science, history, and religious studies, will be dedicated to the critical investigation of three interrelated themes: (1) A critical discussion of the three available types of theories of globalization: (a) economic theories of the capitalist world system, (b) political theories of the global expansion of the Westphalian system of territorial nation-states and of a world polity of isomorphic institutions, and c) sociological theories of world society and global culture; (2) A historical sketch of the role of the Jesuits as pioneer globalizers in the early modern phase of globalization and the confluence of global forces which led to their suppression at the end of the 18th century. The Jesuits will be used as a critical prism through which to reconstruct some of the complex world-historical processes of globalization which have led to our global age in order to conceptualize the potential role(s) of religion(s) in such processes; and (3) a critical reconstruction of the modern emergence of a religious-secular global field and the critical discussion of contemporary global religious-secular dynamics.

T 6:30-9:00PM Food, its production and consumption, is at the very core of our existence and inherently cultural, political and social. It is among our biggest industries; our most frequently indulged pleasure; a central ingredient in the social construction of identity and community; and also the object of major concern for disease, the environment, and world hunger. This stimulating course will give you an intellectual overview of the main issues and topics relevant to studying the cultural, political, economic and social forces that shape our food system. Our scholarly journey through the food system will explore methodologies and theories applicable to the analysis of food as we critically examine the following questions: How do such factors as ethnicity, class, religious beliefs, place, the media, and corporate capitalism affect what – and whether – people eat? In what ways do the practices and patterns of food production, distribution, and trade affect global and local inequality? How can changes to the food system contribute to social and economic change? What are some of the prevailing sociological approaches that enrich our understanding of the global food system and our place within it?

This seminar draws on a range of interdisciplinary theoretical perspectives in examining the similarities and differences between the environmental justice movement (EJM) and the food justice movement (FJM). EJM has a slightly longer history in the United States than FJM, and the two movements share notable similarities but with some key differences in terms of how they define and aim to resolve the problems of environmental injustice or food injustice. We begin by situating the emergence of EJM and FJM in the context of broader environmental and alternative food movements, both domestically and globally, and explore how various theoretical frameworks of the movements analyze environmental and food issues through the lens of social justice and human inequality, specifically on categories of race, class, and more recently, gender. Over the course of the semester we will examine various real cases of environmental and food justice activism, including both successful and failed attempts, and discuss each case in relation to the theoretical frameworks introduced in the seminar through the assigned readings and the lecture.

What does the social context have to do with happiness? This course looks at the relationship between individual satisfaction and social justice, equality, and other aspects of the collective good. We will read thinkers and researchers who have interesting ideas on money and capitalism, culture and habits, technology, the social self, social situations, race and ethnicity, institutions, gender, age, and finally, meditation, spirituality, and religion. We will compare classic and current sociological approaches which focus mainly on social problems (Harriet Martineau, Karl Marx, W.E.B. Du Bois, Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, Arlie Hochschild) to current research in psychology that studies factors leading to individual happiness. We’ll then have a chance to put these ideas into practice by developing a project that considers social contexts that allow people to live happier and more fulfilling lives. The course ends with a final project of your choice (video, grant proposal, wellness seminar, or mini research project) to expand on your ideas. First years and all majors are welcome; this course is interactive and asks for student engagement but does not require any particular type of coursework.

Global development is a term that refers to efforts around the world to make societies better (by improving people’s lives), especially for people who have lower income and less access to important things such as education and health services. This course explores the efforts being made to alleviate the suffering of people around the globe. Some of the questions we will answer include: What are people doing to try to help people around the world? Are those efforts effective? Why or why not? What are some of the unintended consequences that occur as a result of these activities? Out of the uneasy mix of missionaries, conquistadors, colonists, and humanitarians who populate its prehistory, poverty alleviation (in conjunction with the exercise of power) has evolved in the past six decades to become the field of global development as we know it today. Its dominant institutions became nationally and formally organized after World War II awakened the American conscience in a new way to the suffering of people in far-flung parts of the world, while at the same time, powerful national interests shaped the development enterprise more broadly. The goals of poverty alleviation have been realized to some extent; standards of living have risen to unprecedented levels since the 1990s. However, there are also apprehensions that global development is failing in some important ways. Some critics within the industry wonder how much people are really benefiting. This course is organized in roughly three sections: First, we examine research on what development interventions look like on the ground. What do people do, and how do people respond? How effective are the programs and projects? What are the outcomes? In the second section, we examine various explanations for why we are seeing particular outcomes, including those that focus on development’s historical roots, global political and economic structures, and organizational logics. Finally, the last section will look at various answers to the question, “How, then, should we proceed with global development?” A core part of one’s answer to this question depends on the definition of well-being one assumes. We will examine what “development as freedom” implies, as well as other conceptions of the good life and the use of happiness indexes around the world. The learning objectives of this course are: · To understand global development from the perspective of the person the programs are intended to help; · To think critically about global development interventions; · To learn about the ways that people are trying to measure and improve human well-being around the world..

Sociology Advanced Seminar: How do you feel about consumption? Hate shopping, hate spending money, or jump at the chance to window-shop, imaging what you might buy, who you might be? Some lament that consumption forces conformity to trends, others rejoice in the freedom to choose. Economists contend that consumption spurs growth, employment, and material welfare. Others counter that it fosters selfishness, waste and environmental degradation. Seems ironic that we all agree work is good, but not so consumption or even worse, consumerism. We seem to tolerate “over-working,” but not “hyper-consumption.” Consumerism in this course is the study of a way of life. It takes us beyond consumption or questions of what we purchase or how much we spend, to more fundamental issues of how and why we consume. Beyond attitudes or values of the individual, the study raises questions of equality, distribution, and justice in society. Both Korea and China stand apart from the Western experience of consumption in the pace of change, tensions over consumer individualism in traditional, communitarian cultures, and the prominent role of the state. A broad survey of consumption and the internet in China’s rapidly developing economy, draws us to status, lifestyle and identities. With South Korea, we turn to one major stream in Korean consumption, K-Pop. Both engage major concepts providing an analytic map for the course: reflexivity (Giddens), the public space (Habermas), cultural capital (Bourdieu), commodification (Marx), and rationalization & enchantment (Weber). This conceptual compass then guides us on a journey across consumption of space, technology, and fashion.

MW 8:00 - 9:15 am Hard work has been the hallmark of remarkable economic growth in Korea, China and elsewhere in Asia. Churning out consumer products at home for customers abroad, these nations prided themselves on labor not leisure. But as foreign demand fades, Asia’s developing nations must ratchet up local consumer demand to sustain growth, jobs, and incomes. Striking a new balance between work and consumption, between labor and leisure poses new challenges for institutions such as families, schools, churches, and states. This course looks to the growth and significance of affluence, the changing meaning of work, and emerging consumer identities in East Asian capitalism. Theories of class and state, consumerism, modernity and post-modernity will provide direction for student papers and class discussions. For instance, we will distinguish between Marx’s notion of class and Weber’s concept of status, and then redefine for East Asia. Similarly, we will work with concepts of Pierre Bourdieu on cultural capital and taste. We also discuss George Ritzer’s insights on how reason and emotion are reshaping consumerism. We conclude with societal transitions, following the work of Anthony Giddens on the re-structuring of society as former borders or identities fade. The course offers an introduction to Economic Sociology, the study of how markets give meaning to our everyday lives. You will learn of the evolving interaction of production and consumption, of work and leisure. Thirdly, you will become acquainted with models and paths of development in China and South Korea. We explore how new patterns of production and consumption re-shape institutions like companies, family and schools, reconfigure identities both individual and social, whether of class, gender, or region. Course requirements include reading assignments, as well as class attendance and participation in discussions. Two examinations will insure a common ground of theory and case material across the members of the class. You will then be asked to develop an 8-10 page paper on an aspect of consumption and society in either South Korea or China. The paper should serve as a focus for integrating the theories and case study material.

Sociology Advanced Seminar Course. This course examines the causes and consequences of forced migration, focusing in particular on displacement from conflict and human rights violations. It begins with the history of the concept of 'refuge' and then traces the evolution of the international regime for protecting and assisting refugees and displaced persons. The course then focuses on current examples of displacement in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, Central and South Asia, and Europe.

Sociology Advanced Seminar: This course provides a sociological examination of not only interpersonal violence, but also how violence manifests on the institutional and structural levels. Violence, initially, can be defined as "any action or structural arrangement that results in physical or nonphysical harm to one or more persons" (Barak, 2003). Throughout the course we will be asking several questions, including: What are the (social) dynamics of violence? and Who is affected by violence and how are they affected? An important question will be: How do we respond to violence (and victimization) with empathy? The course also examines modes of research on violence, public policies for addressing violence in society, and efforts toward nonviolence.

Sociology Advanced Seminar: This course critically examines the interplay between race, crime, law, and the administration of justice in the United States. The purpose of this course is to provide students with a critical overview of the United States criminal justice system and its administration on various groups (e.g., by race, gender, class, location/region, etc.). Students will receive a theoretical and empirical overview of the American legal and criminal justice system, emphasizing such issues as: the functions and purposes of crime control; the roles of the actors/subjects of the criminal justice system; crime and violence as cultural and political issues in America; racial disparities in offending and criminal justice processing; and juvenile justice.

Sociology 4624 is an advanced seminar that engages topics central to family diversity and inequality in the United States. We will read and discuss a series of books that take a sociological or social scientific approach to examining partnering and dissolution, childbearing and childrearing, family structure, work-family balance, and other topics relevant to contemporary American families. Our seminar discussions will be structured around student responses to the assigned books, and in our conversations, we will consider both the substantive contributions of the books to our understanding of family diversity and the research methods the authors used to arrive at their conclusions.

Sociology Advanced Seminar: Advances in reproductive technologies are rapidly changing the ways we think about kinship and families, the reproductive process, and the limits of human reproduction. The global reach of the fertility industry has leveraged differences in the policies governing these technologies across the world to develop markets for gametes, surrogates, and experimental procedures. Although these technologies have made fertility and reproduction accessible to new populations, they also raise concerns about the potential consequences they will have on both present and future generations. In this course we will explore the social, cultural, and ethical implications of reproductive technologies, while analyzing these considerations using sociological, bioethical, legal, and reproductive justice frameworks.

This course examines the reciprocal relationship between climate and society. On one side, climate change and global heating are caused fundamentally by society—that is, by the social organization of economic and political activity over the past century. At the same time, climate change and global heating have profound implications for current and future societies around the world, as people move, adapt, innovate, and resist.

In this seminar, we will consider what scholars have already discovered about climate-society relationships and ask new questions about how societies are changing in the midst of the current climate crisis. Based on research in sociology and other social sciences, we will consider questions like the following:

How have societies in different places and times dealt with changes in their surrounding environments? How did so many modern societies become so dependent on fossil fuels, and why are some less dependent than others (even at similar levels of income)? What role have social movements, climate-forcing industries, political polarization, social marginalization (especially as related to race, ethnicity, class, and indigeneity), cultural understandings of the environment, emotions, and extreme weather events played in responses to—or denials of—climate change? How do communities respond to natural disasters? Under what conditions do they band together or fall apart? To what extent—and in what circumstances—has climate change contributed to civil conflict, mass displacement, and refugee crises? How is climate change shaping the future of work? How are bottom-up activism, monitoring, and “citizen science” being mobilized to address climate change, and how do they intertwine with experts and elites? What opportunities does the current climate crisis provide for rethinking relationships between economies, environments, polities, and societies? How have other kinds of environmental hazards been reduced, and what implications does this have for climate change?

In addition to readings, seminar discussions, and in-class writing prompts (or other ways of checking in on the readings), the class will culminate in a project in which students design ways to communicate (or dialogue about) insights from the class to a broader audience.

Dear Student, American education is in crisis. International education rankings demonstrate that the United States underperforms compared to other countries. But the challenge goes deeper; everyday millions of American students do not have the opportunity to develop their talents because of inadequate schooling. Education Policy is about what we can do as educators, policy analysts, and citizens to recapture the power of education to elevate and enlighten individuals’ lives and to ensure democracy thrives. In Education Policy you will develop new analytic skills, an in-depth understanding of the social forces shaping education policy, strategies for blending theory with practice, and struggle with the complex process of creating innovative solutions to enduring educational challenges. Education Policy is a seminar; each student will have a research project associated with an education think tank in Washington D.C. The books for Education Policy: Shaping Education Policy: Power and Process edited by Douglas E. Mitchell, Robert L. Crowson and Dorothy Shipps; Understanding Education Indicators: A Practical Primer for Research and Policy by Michael Planty and Deven Carlson; Radical Possibilities: Public Policy, Urban Education, and a New Social Movement by Jean Anyon; Class Rules: Exposing Inequality in American High Schools by Peter W. Cookson, Jr.

Sociology Advanced Seminar: This seminar draws on a range of interdisciplinary theoretical perspectives in examining the similarities and differences between the environmental justice movement (EJM) and the food justice movement (FJM). EJM has a slightly longer history in the United States than FJM, and the two movements share notable similarities but with some key differences in terms of how they define and aim to resolve the problems of environmental injustice or food injustice. We begin by situating the emergence of EJM and FJM in the context of broader environmental and alternative food movements, both domestically and globally, and explore how various theoretical frameworks of the movements analyze environmental and food issues through the lens of social justice and human inequality, specifically on categories of race, class, and more recently, gender. Over the course of the semester we will examine various real cases of environmental and food justice activism, including both successful and failed attempts, and discuss each case in relation to the theoretical frameworks introduced in the seminar through the assigned readings and the lecture.

TR 3:30 – 4:45PM Lab – W 2:00-4:45PM In this course we will examine the rise of social entrepreneurship and the social movement it has come to represent in contemporary society as people across the globe achieve new ways to effect positive social change. The course will cover examples of social entrepreneurship and the qualities of the social entrepreneur as well as what makes a successful organization. On Tuesdays we discuss the reading -- theory and case studies, on Thursdays students meet a social entrepreneur or other experts in the field and have the opportunity for in depth conversation. Most importantly, students form small groups and partner with an organization to work on a socially entrepreneurial project that will further the organization’s mission of social improvement.

NEW Sociology Required Course [Formerly SOCI 303 / 3 credit hours]: This is the first semester in a two-semester senior thesis course. The expectation for the thesis is an exploration of a topic with research utilizing real empirical data. The thesis must include a bit of original analysis, not only a summary of existing studies. The format of the thesis should follow a standard academic journal article with the following elements: abstract, introduction, theory, data and methods, findings, and discussion. A thesis can utilize qualitative or quantitative data. A proportion of the instruction is done one-on-one with the instructor to accommodate research questions and methods more closely. This allows the student to receive guidance that is specific to the project. The seminar also mirrors the world of academic research. The peer reviews are also similar to that in academic research, where we present papers-in-progress at conferences, receive feedback, and then revise or continue with our work. By sharing work and digging deeply into others’ work, students will get a sense of what is excellent and what to strive for; what the standards of the project are.

Sociology Required Course (for majors). The senior seminar offers a unique capstone experience for Sociology majors at Georgetown University. Rather than presenting new material, the course is an opportunity for students to synthesize their experience as Sociology majors to produce an original research paper - the senior thesis. The course will emphasize your skills as critical thinkers, thoughtful researchers and strong writers as you engage with a research topic of your choice. Writing assignments throughout the semester will culminate in a final paper of ~ 15,000 words. As the capstone experience in the Sociology department, your senior thesis is an opportunity to select an exciting research topic and draw on your sociological knowledge to produce an outstanding piece of scholarship. Some seats are reserved.