Thinking sociologically enables us to understand the intersection of our individual lives with larger social issues and to grasp how the social world works. Students in this course will become familiar with the background of sociology and the core analytical concepts employed by sociologists. Students will also gain familiarity with the major substantive topics explored by sociology, with focused attention given to the study of social structures, material, cultural, and institutional explanations of social action, and using concepts for real world problem solving.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
This course explores the ways in which the body, as a reflection and construction of the self, is tied to social, cultural and political relations. Through this examination of the role that our bodies play in daily life we will delve into the study of gender, race, sexuality and power. We focus on several major areas: (1) after Roe and the medicalization of bodies (contraception, abortion, new reproductive technologies), (2) sex education and the Internet as sites of bodily learning (3) body work (nail salons, surrogacy) (4) the use of the body as a vehicle for performance, self-expression and identity (tattoos, getting dressed). Throughout the course we will discuss how ideas about bodies are transported across national borders and social, sexual and class hierarchies.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 12
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 10 4Y
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Hertz
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
What do your friend's social media postings tell you about the way they want to be seen in the world? What can you learn about poverty in the United States by observing a city like Boston? What do TV shows tell you about our societal beliefs about the haves and the have-nots? This course introduces students to sociology by studying U.S. economic stratification through an intersectional lens. We will learn to uncover patterns of inclusion and exclusion and illuminate the invisible ways that power seems to operate. Additionally, we will explore the simultaneous impact of race, gender, sexuality (and other identities) on economic insecurity. Topics in this course include historical understandings of poverty; intergenerational class mobility; depictions of poverty in pop culture; and bringing attention to populations that often get left out of mainstream conversations about poverty.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites:
Instructor:
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
The word meritocracy was coined by the sociologist Michael Young in the 1950s. In the intervening years it has taken on a life of its own and has become an enduring part of social and cultural debates over such diverse issues as equality, privilege, luck, and achievement. What is the relationship between these issues and, for example, admission to college? We will read Michael Young’s The Rise of the Meritocracy along with both support for and criticism of the idea of merit. How is it measured? What is its relation to social status? Are there alternative systems to meritocracy?
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 10 6
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
How are your personal problems related to larger issues in society and the world? In what ways do global economic and political shifts affect your personal trajectory as a college student in the United States? In this course, you will come to understand sociology as a unique set of tools with which to interpret your relationship to a broader sociopolitical landscape. By integrating classic readings in the discipline of sociology with the principles of global political economy, we will analyze and contextualize a range of social, economic, and political phenomena at the scales of the global, the national, the local, and the individual.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: S. Radhakrishnan
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
This course provides a broad introduction to population studies, or social demography, which offers a framework and tools by which to understand how fundamental human processes of birth, death, and migration are inextricably linked to social change and inequality. Is racial inequality deadly? Is there such a thing as “too many people” on Earth? Over the course of the semester, we will develop a conceptual and analytic toolkit that allows us to consider these, among other big questions about societies, populations, and inequality and change therein. In addition to developing a demographic vocabulary, students will learn how to use interpret and calculate basic demographic measures and statistics, including population growth rates, life expectancies, and racial/ethnic population compositions.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Yi
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Degree Requirements: DL - Data Literacy (Formerly QRF)
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
What do we learn about class, race, and gender by reading novels? What difference does it make when we read about these ideas rather than watching programs about them on TV? This course treats novels, short stories, poems, films, and radio and television programs as sociological texts. We will read and analyze them together to learn new concepts, methods, and analytical approaches. Class projects include debates, "author" interviews, and a creative writing project.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites:
Instructor: Levitt
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course offers an examination of the relationship between the individual and society from a sociological and interdisciplinary perspective. The course begins with an exploration of different conceptions of the individual in Western and non-Western social thought and then explores sociological theories of the self and society to explore a central question: to what extent are we determined by external social forces and to what extent can we find individual autonomy, personhood, and dignity in relation to these forces? A central focus of sociology is the study of social inequality, and the course offers detailed sociological case studies on the stigmatization and marginalization of physically disabled and mentally ill individuals. Special attention is paid to how sociological understandings of exclusion of physically and mentally disabled individuals have led to social movements to protect their human rights and personhood.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 12
Prerequisites: Open to First-Years and Sophomores.
Instructor: Cushman
Distribution Requirements: EC - Epistemology and Cognition; SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
An introduction to the collection, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of quantitative data as used to understand problems in economics and sociology. Using examples drawn from these fields, this course focuses on basic concepts in probability and statistics, such as measures of central tendency and dispersion, hypothesis testing, and parameter estimation. Data analysis exercises are drawn from both academic and everyday applications.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 190
Prerequisites: ECON 101 or ECON 101P or one course in sociology. Fulfillment of the Quantitative Reasoning (QR) component of the Quantitative Reasoning & Data Literacy requirement. Not open to students who have taken or are taking STAT 160, STAT 218, PSYC 105 or PSYC 205.
Instructor: Giles, Levine, Swingle (Sociology)
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Degree Requirements: DL - Data Literacy (Formerly QRF); DL - Data Literacy (Formerly QRDL)
Typical Periods Offered: Summer; Spring; Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring; Fall
Notes:
What is sociological theory and what work does theory do in sociology? What makes a theory useful? Which theories shape research agendas and why? The modern discipline of sociology primarily traces its origins to the 19th and early 20th centuries, when social scientists were grappling with the social upheavals of colonialism, industrial capitalism, urbanization, changing forms of governance, and the scientization of society. Placing key authors from this era in their historical context, this course takes a critical perspective to examine the origins of some of the foundational concepts that have shaped the history of sociology as a discipline: solidarity, authority, domination, class, nationalism, exploitation, justice, revolution, and more. As we work to understand the ideas of early sociologists, we will consider how their institutional locations shaped their understandings of the role of sociology as a theoretical and/or applied science, with special attention given to the roles race and gender have played in shaping the history of sociological theory. This will lead us to engage in critical examination of later processes of canonization that designated some works as “classics” and shaped our definitions of sociology and sociological theory.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 20
Prerequisites: One 100- or 200-level unit in sociology.
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
Critical theories question power, domination, and the status quo. They aim to critique and change society by uncovering the assumptions that keep humans from a full and true understanding of how the world works. In this course, we will examine several different bodies of critical theories, evaluating how these theories explain and offer practical solutions to social problems. Beginning with Marx’s historical materialism and critique of capitalism, we will trace Marx’s influence through the Frankfurt School’s critique of culture and Bourdieu’s critiques of symbolic power. From there we will turn to the social critiques of feminist theory, Critical Race Theory, and post-colonial theory. Through all of these theories, we will seek to understand: What are the possibilities for true human freedom?
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 20
Prerequisites: At least one 100- or 200-level unit in sociology, with SOC 200 strongly recommended
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes: This course can fulfill the requirement of a second course in social theory for the sociology major but is open to all interested students.
Who is an outsider? Who is an insider? What role do systems and structures play in shaping exclusion and inclusion in social life and organization? In this course, we will examine forms, conditions, causes, experiences, and the very definitions of social exclusion and marginalization through a deep engagement with sociological scholarship. We will focus on key topical contexts of interest including immigration, family and kinship, and poverty, based on a shared foundation of core sociological theory and concepts. We will consider not only how social exclusion helps us analyze sociological phenomena in new (or expanded) ways, but also how social exclusion is enacted and/or recognized in the policy systems that structure our everyday lives. Notes: This course can fulfill the requirement of a second course in social theory for the sociology major but is open to all interested students.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: At least one 100- or 200-level unit in sociology, with SOC 200 strongly recommended.
Instructor: Yi
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
This course investigates why certain problems become matters of significant public and policymaking concern while others do not. We do not focus on a predefined list of social problems but rather on the process by which some issues capture more attention than others. Our discussions analyze the actions of those institutions involved either in calling public attention to or distracting public attention away from particular problems in our society. This focus enables students to acquire a perspective toward social problems that they are unlikely to gain from the many other forums where people discuss social problems, such as journalism or politics.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Silver
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Summer
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
Feminist scholarship demonstrates that American family life needs to be viewed through two lenses: one that highlights the embeddedness of family in class, race, heteronormativity, gender inequalities and another that draws our attention to historical developments – such as the aftermath of World War 2, technologies and government social policies. In 2015 same-sex marriage became U.S. federal law; but at the same time fewer people are marrying and parenthood is delayed. Moreover, new reproductive technologies coupled with the Internet and the wish for intimacy is creating unprecedented families. Topics covered vary yearly but include: inequalities around employment, the home front and childcare; intensive motherhood, social class and cultural capital; welfare to work programs; immigrant families and the American Dream. Finally, we will explore new developments from adoption to gamete donors by same-sex or single-parent families and how science and technologies are facilitating the creation of new kinds of kin. A special feature of this class is looking at the relationship of families and social policy.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 20 5
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Hertz
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
Does education in the United States encourage social mobility or help to reproduce the socioeconomic hierarchy? What is the hidden curriculum—the ideas, values, and skills that students learn at school that are not in the textbook? Who determines what gets taught in school? How do schools in the US compare to school systems in other countries? What makes school reform so hard to do?
Questions like these drive this course. It offers students an introduction to the sociology of education by broadly exploring the role of education in American society. The course covers key sociological perspectives on education, including conflict theory, functionalism, and human and cultural capital. Other topics include schools and communities; the role of teachers, students, parents, mentors, and peers in educational inequalities (including tracking and measures of achievement), school violence, school reform, and knowledge production. We also look comparatively at education systems across the world.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: PEAC 20 7,EDUC 20 7
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Levitt
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
This course examines the distribution of social resources to groups and individuals, as well as theoretical explanations of how unequal patterns of distribution are produced, maintained, and challenged. Special consideration will be given to how race, ethnicity, and gender intersect with social class to produce different life experiences for people in various groups in the United States, with particular emphasis on disparities in education, health care, and criminal justice. Consideration will also be given to policy initiatives designed to reduce social inequalities and alleviate poverty.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Crosslisted Courses: PEAC 219
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
Why do people protest and organize to change the world around them? How do social movements operate, and why do some succeed while others fail? How do the powerful respond to protest movements? This class examines the origins, dynamics, and consequences of social movements on three levels. First, the course is grounded in the sociological perspective, looking at movements’ emergence, recruitment mechanisms, leadership, interactions, tactical repertoires, and framing processes, and so on. Second, we see these concepts in action through a global tour of activist hotspots, from the Arab Spring to Central American revolutionaries to Black Lives Matters. Finally, students learn directly by conducting original research and writing their own case study on a social movement of their choosing.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Staff
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course explores how marriage and the family have evolved over the past century, the changes both are undergoing now, and what the future may have in store for these two social institutions. The course will focus on the U.S. but students will be encouraged to make international comparisons. Using a variety of both scholarly and popular sources, we will explore cultural understandings of marriage and family life and topics like romantic love, Cinderella weddings, the nuclear family ideal, the Supermom syndrome, and the legal fight for gay marriage. Family diversity and variation are recurring themes throughout the course and particular attention will be paid to social class differences in family life and marriage, alternatives to the nuclear family like cohabitation and non-marriage, and the consequences of different living arrangements to individuals as well as to society as a whole. A primary goal of the course is to distinguish between the facts and many fictions surrounding family and marriage in contemporary society. In the process, the course will introduce the richness of the sociological approach and its use of surveys, in-depth interviews, analyses of film and literature, and other methodologies for understanding the family. ?
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Swingle
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course surveys the development of the modern organization and organizational analysis, with a focus on corporate strategy and managing employees. We live in a world of organizations: organizations drive the economy, innovation, and our careers, but are also the arenas in which policy issues like discrimination, harassment, and equity are raised, fought over, and ultimately implemented. We will read business case studies, management theory, and social scientific analysis to chart how organizations respond to internal and external challenges, how they succeed and when they fail. The focus in on for-profit corporations, but we will explore other complex organizations, from churches to governments to NGOs, and study the transformation of firms from conglomerates to networks. Students will write a case study of their own based on original research.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Staff
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
Two abiding tensions exist in the making of a physician. The first is between the humanistic and scientific sides of medicine, and the second is between defining the sociological foundation of medical practice and understanding the promise and limits of that foundation. A basic introduction to the sociology of the medical profession (applicable to the MCAT) will be offered in conjunction with a focus on physicians' self-reporting on the nature of their vocation.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
Among the various challenges that face democratic societies committed to the ideal of pluralism and its representations in both individuals and institutions, is what is meant by the term "liberty". Among those who identify as conservative, the concept of liberty has over time been addressed in ways that seek to impose order on both individual and institutional behavior or what some conservatives refer to as "ordered liberty". Classical liberal views of liberty stress the removal of external constraints on human behavior as the key to maximizing individual agency, autonomy and selfhood. This course examines the historical and sociological debates and tensions surrounding different visions of liberty. Focus on case studies of contentious social issues that are at the center of public debates, including freedom of expression; race and ethnicity; criminality; sexuality; gender; social class, religion, and the war on drugs.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 220
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Cushman, Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
How do our bodies and everyday experiences reflect and (re)produce geopolitical relations? How do militarized discourse and technologies shape our sense of (in)security in the world and at home? How is war gendered and how does gender become militarized? This course considers how war and militarism are intimately intertwined with our everyday lives. Drawing on scholarship from political sociology and geography, with a particular focus on feminist geopolitics, we will examine how war and militarism inform contemporary political governance across a variety of sites and scales, including our state institutions, economies, bodies, homes, and emotions.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Staff
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course will introduce students to core readings in the field of urban studies. While the course will focus on cities in the United States, we will also look comparatively at the urban experience in Asia, Africa, and Latin America and cover debates on “global cities.” Topics will include the changing nature of community, social inequality, political power, socio-spatial change, technological change, and the relationship between the built environment and human behavior. We will examine the key theoretical paradigms driving this field since its inception, assess how and why they have changed over time, and discuss the implications of these shifts for urban scholarship and social policy. The course will include fieldwork in Boston and presentations by city government practitioners.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: PEAC 227,AMST 225
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Levitt
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
What makes community possible? Where does our sense of belonging come from? How do communities attract and change us? How do communities socialize us to be good members or shape our beliefs? Sociological theorists have wrestled with these questions of community from the beginnings of the discipline. This applied theory course examines group formation via theoretical frameworks and thematic case studies of several types of natural and intentional communities, starting with the most intimate and face-to-face communities, friendship and marriage, before exploring important larger communities, including new religious movements, communes, and social movements. We will use these cases to compare various perspectives on the promises and pitfalls of social life in community. Students will apply theoretical frameworks to analyze each group, and conclude by analyzing the potential for community in the post-pandemic world. Note: This course can fulfill the requirement of a second course in social theory for the sociology major but is open to all interested students.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Staff
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course considers how debt and indebtedness shape contemporary social life and governance. We will examine how scholars have understood debt as—in addition to a financial obligation—a historically situated relation of power that influences societies in myriad ways. We will consider the creation of debt and experiences of indebtedness across a range of interlinked scales, including those of the transnational, nation-state, family, and individual, and in respect to class, race, gender, and age. Case studies might include medical, educational, housing, and carceral debts in the US; sovereign debt, structural adjustment loans, and international financial institutions; legacies of colonial debts in the present; and practices of debt resistance. We will work to interlink and contextualize case studies within an understanding of both how states and transnational institutions mobilize debt to govern labor and how the experience of indebtedness is intimately embodied in our everyday lives.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Staff
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes: Ann E. Maurer '51 Speaking Intensive Course.
If any mention of South Asian culture conjures for you Bollywood films, Bharatanatyam dancers, and Google engineers, then this course will prompt you to reconsider. Adopting a sociological perspective that examines culture from the specific context of migration, we will study the histories of Punjabi-Mexican families in California, Gujarati motel owners across the United States, South African Indians at the end of apartheid, and Bangladeshi garment workers in London’s East End, among others. Through our study, we develop a nuanced understanding of race, culture, migration, and upward mobility in the United States and beyond, while also considering the power of mobile South Asian cultures, including movies, music, dance, and religion.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Crosslisted Courses: SAS 232
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: S. Radhakrishnan
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
What is a crime? Who or what is a criminal? How do individuals and societies respond to crime? These are the broad questions that will structure our work together in this sociological introduction to criminology and criminal justice. We will begin by developing a shared foundation of key terms, concepts, and theoretical perspectives that are used to help us describe and understand crime. Using this shared foundation, we will then turn our attention to a set of real-world historical and contemporary “moments” to help us understand key challenges and possible futures currently facing communities and the criminal justice system.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Yi
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
What is therapy? Although historically tied to the values and goals of medicine, the roles that therapy and therapeutic culture play in defining life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are now ubiquitous. The impact of therapeutic culture on every major social institution, including the family, education, and the law, has created a steady stream of controversy about the ways in which Americans in particular make judgements about right and wrong, about others, and about themselves. Are Americans obsessed with their well being? Is there a type of humor specific to therapeutic culture? This course provides a broad survey of the triumph of the therapeutic and the insights into the character and culture that triumph reveals.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 241
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
We live in a world on the move. Nearly one out of every seven people in the world today is an international or internal migrant who moves by force or by choice. In the United States, immigrants and their children make up nearly 25 percent of the population. This course looks at migration to the United States from a transnational perspective and then looks comparatively at other countries of settlement. We use Framingham as a lab for exploring race and ethnicity, immigration incorporation, and transnational practices. Fieldwork projects will examine how immigration affects the economy, politics, and religion and how the town is changing in response. We will also track contemporary debates around immigration policy.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 246
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Levitt
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring; Fall
How can we understand the mechanisms and effects of racial domination in our society? In this class, we develop a sociological understanding of race through historical study of four racial regimes in the United States: slavery, empire, segregation, and the carceral state. We relate the U.S. experience to racial regimes in other parts of the world, including British colonialism, the Jewish ghetto in Renaissance Venice, and apartheid and post-apartheid states in South Africa, among other contexts. Thus, we develop a comparative, global understanding of race and power. We conclude with a hands-on group media project engaging a relevant contemporary issue.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 251
Prerequisites: At least one social science course required.
Instructor: S. Radhakrishnan
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course explores the distinctive contributions of sociology to the study of emotions. We explore sociological concepts, theories, and case studies that consider emotions, which are perhaps the most deeply felt experiences in the consciousnesses of individuals, as fundamentally social phenomena. Topics include: the social construction of moral panics and “folk devils”’ in social movements; hedonic cruelty; emotional labor in work organizations; emotional socialization in high-risk professions; the social structure of empathy, sympathy and pity; racial, class, and status stratification and the invidious social emotions of resentment, envy and Schadenfreude. Emphasis on showing how sociological perspectives on emotions can enhance students’ abilities to navigate the “complexities of feeling” in order to foster individual and collective human flourishing.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 20
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Cushman
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
Freedom of expression is considered one of the most fundamental human rights. Why is this the case? Why are people willing to suffer, fight, and die and to protect the right of freedom of expression? Why is freedom of expression so dangerous to those with political and social power? How do powerful elites mobilize against dissent and dissidents? What is the role of charismatic individuals and freedom of expression in social change? This course examines sociological theories of communication and freedom of expression; the idea of “civil courage” and its relation to social change; the origins of dissent and dissidents in comparative-historical perspective. Emphasis is on case studies of dissent and dissidents in authoritarian societies of the 20th and early 21st centuries in order to understand, sociologically, the elementary forms of dissent and “the dissident life.” The course introduces students to the life-history method of social research in examining case studies of dissent.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: None.
Instructor: Cushman
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
This course introduces some of the more prominent qualitative and quantitative methods used by sociologists to study the social world. The course emphasizes hands-on experience with several small-scale research projects with the goal of teaching students how to 1) integrate social theory with research methods, 2) ask good research questions, 3) define key concepts, 4) choose appropriate samples, 5) collect high-quality data in an ethical manner, 6) analyze data, and 7) write formal research papers. A section of this course will build upon the statistics learned in SOC 190, but statistics will not be the main focus.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 25
Prerequisites: ECON 103/SOC 190 or permission of the instructor. Required of all sociology majors. Not open to students who have taken SOC 301.
Instructor: Swingle
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Spring
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
Sociology as a discipline emerged in 19 th and early 20 th century Europe as a response to rapid social changes that dramatically transformed traditional societies and ways of life. Classical sociological theorists such as Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, W.E.B. Dubois, and Georg Simmel sought to explain the nature of these changes, but also offered critiques of what has been called “modernity.” The seminar begins with an exploration of these classical theories of modernity and continues with an examination of contemporary works that seek to understand and critique the consequences of modernity in a variety of social and cultural spheres. The seminar focuses on theories relevant to a central sociological question: how do large scale, transformative social and cultural changes affect individual self-identity, self-consciousness, and ways of being in the world? Central topics include: the challenges to individuality posed by pressures for ideological and social conformity; the quest for authenticity of the self; capitalism and the commercialization of emotions; the uncontrollability of the social world and the difficulties of experiencing resonance and harmony in social life; empirically-based, non-Marxist critiques of the state and other bureaucratic processes that challenge the quest for the autonomy and dignity of the self; the relationship between modernity and anxiety and the rise of the neurobiological imaginary in the treatment of mental health disorders; and the transformation of love and intimate relationships in the modern world. Particular attention is paid to non-Western social thought that is relevant to understanding the nature of the self in the modern world. This course fulfills one of the theory requirements for the Sociology major but is open to all interested students.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: At least one of the following is recommended - SOC 150, SOC 200, SOC 201.
Instructor: Cushman
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
More women leaders are in work settings and public office than any prior point in history. However, the fraction of women who are CEOs, board members of major corporations, heads of state and elected representatives in global assemblies remains shockingly small by comparison to the sheer numbers of women workers, consumers, and family decision makers. This course will examine the way that gender, race, and class shape women's access to positions of leadership and power at work. Questions to be considered include: (1) Why are there so few women leaders in work settings? (2) What can we learn about leadership from women who have achieved it? Four modules for the course are (1) Strategies developed by women who lead; (2) Efforts to achieve parity through policies, e.g., glass ceilings, affirmative action; (3) Tensions between work, family and carework; and (4) Profiles of Productive Rule Breakers. Students will research women leaders in all sectors and countries.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 30 6
Prerequisites: Open to Sophomores, Juniors and Seniors. Priority will be given to SOC and WGST majors and minors.
Instructor: Hertz
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This seminar will focus upon children and youth as both objects and subjects within societies. Beginning with consideration of the social construction of childhood, the course will examine the images, ideas, and expectations that constitute childhoods in various historical and cultural contexts. We will also consider the roles of children as social actors who contribute to and construct social worlds of their own. Specific topics to be covered include the historical development of childhood as a distinct phase of life, children's peer cultures, children and work, children's use of public spaces, children's intersectional experiences of inequality, and the effects of consumer culture upon children. Considerable attention will be given to the dynamics of the social institutions most directly affecting childhood today: the family, education, and the state.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Crosslisted Courses: EDUC 30 8
Prerequisites: Open to Juniors and Seniors who have taken any 100- or 200-level sociology course, or one of the following - EDUC 214, EDUC 215, or EDUC 216.
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes: Ann E. Maurer '51 Speaking Intensive Course.
In a seemingly borderless world full of hyphenated identities, do nations still matter? How and why are nations built and sustained? This course examines these questions with attention to race, class, and gender as interlocking systems of power, and utilizes the theoretical toolkits of feminism, post-colonial theory, and global sociology. We examine Native American, immigrant, and Black forms of belonging in the United States in relation to indigenous and post-colonial movements in various countries of the world, including India and South Africa, among others.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 16
Prerequisites: At least one social science course, or permission of the instructor.
Instructor: S. Radhakrishnan
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes: Ann E. Maurer '51 Speaking Intensive Course.
This seminar examines various works of W.E.B. Du Bois within their historical, social, and cultural contexts. Although this course will pay special attention to Du Bois's literary endeavors, it will also examine his concept of race and color and his approaches to colonialism, civil rights, and politics. This seminar will examine The Souls of Black Folk, Darkwater, John Brown, The Autobiography of W.E.B. Du Bois, and The Suppression of the African Slave-Trade as well as some of his poems and other fiction.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 20
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 310
Prerequisites: One 200-level course of relevance to Africana Studies or permission of the instructor.
Instructor: Cudjoe
Distribution Requirements: LL - Language and Literature
Typical Periods Offered: Every other year
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course examines the politics facing contemporary U.S. families and potential policy directions at the State and Federal Levels. Discussion of the transformation of American families including changing economic and social expectations for parents, inequality between spouses, choices women make about children and employment, daycare and familial care giving, welfare and underemployment, and new American dreams will be explored. Changing policies regarding welfare and teen pregnancy will also be examined as part of government incentives to promote self-sufficient families. Expanding family (i.e. single mothers by choice, lesbian/gay/trans families) through the use of new reproductive technologies is emphasized as examples of legislative reform and the confusion surrounding genetic and social kinship is explored. Comparisons to other contemporary societies will serve as foils for particular analyses. Students will learn several types of research methodologies through course assignments. Student groups will also produce an original social policy case.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 311
Prerequisites: One 100 level and one 200 level course in either WGST or Sociology. Open to Juniors and Seniors; to Sophomores by permission of the instructor.
Instructor: Hertz
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
Cultural and intellectual life is still dominated by the West. Although we recognize the importance of globalizing scholarship, our research and teaching still prioritizes western canons and frameworks. Cultural and intellectual inequality are part and parcel of socioeconomic inequality. If we don’t do better at one, we will not do better at the other. We need to master a broader range of methods, tools, and ways of knowing. In this class, Wellesley College students work with students and faculty from Latin America, Asia, and Africa to explore what it means to produce, disseminate, teach about, and act upon knowledge more equitably in different parts of the world. Our goals are to (1) learn to read power in physical, intellectual, virtual, and cultural spaces by witnessing, evaluating, and then acting, (2) gain exposure to ways of asking and answering questions outside the West, (3) reread classical theories in context to explore how we can reinterpret their usefulness and meaning, (4) understand and develop new engaged and critical pedagogies and forms of education, and (5) promote a decentered attitude, that charts more equitable and inclusive forms of intellectual engagement and collaboration.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Crosslisted Courses: PEAC 312,EDUC 321
Prerequisites: At least two 200-level or above courses in the social sciences including Peace and Justice Studies.
Instructor: Levitt
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes:
Concerns about the health of communities date back to antiquity. Social epidemiology is the study of the incidence and distribution of disease among populations. This course offers historical, sociological, and ethical perspectives on the uses of epidemiology as it emerged from an age defined principally by infectious disease to one of chronic illness. What are the social and collective responses to pandemics, real and imagined? Case studies address in particular global public health issues, including smoking, nutrition, AIDS, mad cow disease, and influenza, among others. Both governmental and nongovernmental approaches to health, including the World Health Organization and Doctors Without Borders, are considered. Special attention is given to disparities in health care, a core sociological focus.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: One 200-level SOC course or permission of the instructor.
Instructor: Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
This course uses the feminist optic of intersectionality to delve into the sociology of work. As one of the most fundamental aspects of human society, work shapes and is shaped by forces as big as the global political economy and by circumstances as context-specific as our complex social identities. How do race, class, gender, ability, age, and nationality constitute what kinds of work are possible in a given context, and for whom? How does work both take advantage of social difference and inequality and transform it? We will examine diverse kinds of work, including domestic work, factory work, precarious day labor, surrogacy, IT, and finance in the U.S., India, and China, among other countries. As we study ethnographies of work, we will conduct original qualitative research and share our research with the class through a sophisticated oral presentation.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: Prior completion of any sociology course or permission of the instructor.
Instructor: S. Radhakrishnan
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Spring
Notes: Ann E. Maurer '51 Speaking Intensive Course.
This course explores the powerful roles that technology plays in contemporary social life and suggests that some of the impacts that our ever-greater reliance on, and faith in, technology might have upon our lives. The course begins with a critical overview of the heralded promises that technology often carries; here, we explore some of the undersides of so-called "technological progress." The remainder of the course examines a variety of salient contemporary issues concerning the social implications of technological change.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 20
Prerequisites: None
Instructor: Silver
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
This course focuses on the politics of human reproduction which is inextricably linked with nation states, as well as cultural norms and expectations. Reproductive issues and debates serve as proxies for more fundamental questions about the intersecting inequalities of citizenship, gender, race, class, disability and sexuality. What does reproductive justice look like? We will discuss how the marketplace, medical technologies and the law are critical to creating social hierarchies that are produced, resisted and transformed. We ask: Why is access critical to control for the use of fertility technologies (both pre-and during pregnancy), gamete purchase, egg freezing? How is each accomplished and by whom? How are new technologies in reproduction coupled with the global marketplace creating a social hierarchy between people (e.g. gamete donors, gestational carriers). Finally, what is the relationship between the commercialization of reproduction and the creation of new intimacies and forms of kinship? The course emphasizes both empirical research situated in the U.S. and research involving transnational flows.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Crosslisted Courses: SOC 322
Prerequisites: Open to juniors and seniors only; must be a WGST or SOC major or minor or a junior or senior who has taken WGST 211/SOC 205.
Instructor: Hertz
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Typical Periods Offered: Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
How and why does consumerism exercise so great an influence on global culture today? How are our institutions and relationships shaped and transformed by the forces of commodification and consumerism? Are there any realms of life that ought to be free from the market-driven forces of commodification? Can consumerism offer a positive means of cultural critique to processes we wish to resist? In this seminar, we explore the history of consumer culture in the United States and globally, with special attention to understanding the effects of commodification upon the self, human relationships, and social institutions. We will consider both classical and contemporary critiques of commodification and consumerism, as well as arguments for the liberatory dimensions of consumer society. Course projects will give students opportunities to connect theory with questions of practical interest and to develop skills for communicating ideas in a variety of creative formats.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: One 100- or 200-level SOC course, or permission of the instructor.
Instructor: Rutherford
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Not Offered
Notes:
An examination of conservative movements and ideas in terms of class, gender, and race. Historical survey and social analysis of such major conservative movements and ideas as paleoconservatism, neoconservatism, and compassionate conservatism. The emergence of conservative stances among women, minorities, and media figures. The conservative critique of American life and its shaping of contemporary national discourse on morality, politics, and culture.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 30
Crosslisted Courses: AMST 348
Prerequisites: A 100-level sociology course or permission of the instructor. Open to juniors and seniors only.
Instructor: Imber
Distribution Requirements: SBA - Social and Behavioral Analysis
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall
Notes:
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor. Open to juniors and seniors.
Typical Periods Offered: Spring; Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall; Spring
Units: 0.5
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor.
Typical Periods Offered: Spring; Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall; Spring
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: Permission of the department.
Instructor:
Typical Periods Offered: Spring; Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall; Spring
Notes: Students enroll in Senior Thesis Research (360) in the first semester and carry out independent work under the supervision of a faculty member. If sufficient progress is made, students may continue with Senior Thesis (370) in the second semester.
Units: 1
Max Enrollment: 15
Prerequisites: SOC 360 and permission of the department.
Typical Periods Offered: Spring; Fall
Semesters Offered this Academic Year: Fall; Spring
Notes: Students enroll in Senior Thesis Research (360) in the first semester and carry out independent work under the supervision of a faculty member. If sufficient progress is made, students may continue with Senior Thesis (370) in the second semester.