This course provides an introduction to the basic concepts, theories, and methods in sociology. It explores the interactions between self and society by examining social structure, social consciousness, and social change. It takes the perspective that individuals both affect and are affected by values, norms, groups, and institutions. Satisfies SEEDS Analyzing Cultures and Societies student learning outcome in alignment with Social Justice and Equity value.
This course uses social science frameworks to explore advocacy and civic engagement. Students will learn to evaluate information, understand sociopolitical structures, and enact social change through a collective social action project, applying theories and methods from social sciences to real-world community issues. Satisfies SEEDS Political and Civic Life student learning outcome in alignment with Engagement, Agency, and Leadership value. Mutually Exclusive with CSJ/PSY 208.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. This course examines the organization and function of social institutions in our society and how they relate to producing particular patterns of juvenile delinquency. Delinquency theories and analysis of the three primary components of the juvenile justice system; police, courts, and corrections, are included in the course.
Prerequisite(s): MTH 130 and SOC 100. This course provides an introduction to statistics for sociologists. It uses lectures and exercises to familiarize students with descriptive and inferential statistics. It explores the basic techniques used to describe social science data, examines probability theory and sampling theory, and introduces students to statistical inference techniques.
Prerequisite(s): PSY 100 or SOC 100. Human behavior as the interaction of individual and social processes. Recent research on topics such as interpersonal attraction, perception, and small group behavior; analysis of events and environments of current interest. (Also PSY/CSJ 230).
Prerequisite(s): PSY 100 or SOC 100. This course examines inequalities in power, privilege, and opportunities, which characterize the structure of most societies. It explores the role of ideology in legitimizing and sustaining unequal treatment due to differences in class, race, ethnicity, and gender. Topics include legal systems and the relation between educational attainment and social mobility. (Also WMS 234)
Prerequisite(s): PSY 100 or SOC 100. This course studies cities as physical settings which shape and are shaped by social life, and also the social experiences that such settings produce. The course focuses on cities in history, theories of urbanization, the impact of race, ethnicity, class, and gender on cities, and worldwide urbanization.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215; or PSY 100. This course emphasizes the social reactions perspective, analyzes how people are differentially labeled, the experience of stigma, attempts at neutralization, and explores different social control strategies across time and place.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215; or PSYC 100. This course concerns racial and ethnic inequalities from a sociological perspective. It focuses on the fundamental concepts of race, ethnicity, prejudice, and discrimination as they have played an important role in the maintenance of those inequalities. As such, the course examines how racial and ethnic inequalities have prevented social justice to be fully achieved, especially in the US. Satisfies SEEDS Political and Civil Life student learning outcome in alignment with Social Justice and Equity value. (Also AFS/CSJ/LAC/WMS 241A)
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. This course examines the classical and modern theories of crime, analysis of different crimes and criminals and the various responses to them by victims, their families, the media, and society as a whole. (Also CSJ 243)
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100. (Also WMS 249) From the perspective of the family as the most basic social institution in human society and as a focus of social change, this course discusses the major trends in the past forty years that have called attention to the diversity of American family life. Themes include the family life cycle, couple interaction, subcultural variations, and work-family interaction.
SOC 251 GENDER AND GLOBALIZATION, (Also WMS 251), Globalization may be conceptualized as the, constellation of transformations and crises, with local and global consequences. Global, crises are social, economic and political. Driven, by networks of power, capital and technology,, global processes are changing the structure, and meaning of the nation-state, institutions,, communities, family, culture and the self, worldwide. 1 c.u., , Prerequisites: SOC 100, SOC 215 with a grade of C, or better.
Restriction(s): Junior standing. (Also PSC/PSY 308) This course considers several different cross disciplinary theoretical frameworks that are relevant to understanding social problems (e.g., HIV/AIDS, poverty and homelessness, teenage motherhood, hunger, domestic violence, alcohol and drug abuse, aging, child welfare issues, etc.). The course investigates the ways in which these social problems and people's needs are addressed by our social welfare and human service institutions, both public and private. Ethical issues surrounding the provision of care and services in the human services are emphasized. Principles of group dynamics, needs assessment, participant observation and evaluative research methods are also studied.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. The course addresses issues relating to the death penalty including its history as well as, its level of effectiveness, costs, and discriminatory application. In addition, the course will analyze data on miscarriages of justice and public opinion and the effect of Supreme Court decisions.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 215 or PSY 245; and two 200-Level or higher Sociology courses. This course provides a basic survey of classical sociological theory. It explores the methodological and substantive concerns in the writings of classical theorists, including Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Max Weber. It examines those theorists' views on science, social structure and social change.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 215 or PSY 245 with a grade of C or better. This course provides an introduction to research methods used by sociologists. It reviews the guidelines, principles, and techniques for collecting social science data, including measurement, sampling, survey instrumentation, and field research.
Prerequisite(s): WRT 102 or WRT 105A or WRT 106A; and CSJ 101; and SOC 320B with a grade of C- or better; and any 200-level CSJ course. This course examines the realities of Law Enforcement from its inception as an organization to contemporary times. It describes the history of Law enforcement in the United States and the Social Justice matters connected to these Law Enforcement policies and practices. Mutually Exclusive with CSJ 330.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100 and SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. This course descriptions will be announced when the course is offered. As topics change, this course may be repeated for credit.
Prerequisite(s): WRT 102, WRT 105A, or WRT 106A; and CSJ 101 or SOC 320B; and two 200-level CSJ courses. Using historical documents, social statistics, works of literature, anthropology, and social and psychoanalytic theory, this course examines the process of marginalization, compares conceptions/social constructions of sanity and insanity among different cultures and subcultures, and analyzes the consequences of institutionalization, stigmatization, and marginalization. We will explore diverse populations and their access to and interaction with Social Justice, Healthcare entities as well as carceral responses to illness.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 100, SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. This course will analyze the social, cultural and political construction of sex, sexuality and gender by examining "western" and "nonwestern" conceptions of masculinity, femininity, male and female, heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality, transvestitism, transsexuality and transgenderism. Mutually Exclusive with WMS 336.
Prerequisite(s): PSY 245 or SOC 215. This is an interdisciplinary course that provides students with a social science framework relevant to the study of social problems, the programs designed to remedy them, and the actions of individuals and groups to address gaps between problems and policy.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 215 with a grade of C or better. Restriction(s): Junior standing or consent of Instructor. (Also CSJ 353) This course concerns statutory and case law pertaining to crime. Both substantive and procedural law will be considered.
Prerequisite(s): SOC 325A. Advanced selected topics in Sociology. Depending upon the instructor, course topics may be suited for either General Sociology or Criminal Justice Concentration students. As topics change, this course may be repeated for credit. (Also CSJ 433)
Writing Intensive. Advanced selected topics in Sociology. Depending upon the instructor, course topics may be suited for either General Sociology or Criminal Justice Concentration students. As topics change, this course may be repeated for credit.
This course provides a selective introduction to sociological perspectives and empirical research on punishment and incarceration. The first part of the course explores classical and contemporary approaches to the nature, causes, and consequences of punishment. We examine the Durkheimian, the Marxist, and the Weberian perspectives on punishment to gain an understanding of punishment as it relates to power and social control. We also examine the transformation of punishment from premodern to modern era, and the development of the prison, by exploring the work of Michel Foucault. The second part focuses on punishment in the United States. We explore the relationship between privilege and punishment by examining how race and class have been key factors in determining the nature and extent of punishment within the US criminal justice system. We look at how the apparatuses of punishment, the courts and the prisons, have reinforced and reproduced racial and class privilege. The third part focuses on alternatives to punishment and incarceration. We examine alternatives such as community corrections and treatment, and various proposals to end mass incarceration, including shortening prison sentences and decarceration, and their feasibility.
Prerequisite(s): Any 400-Level Sociology course. Restriction(s): Senior Sociology majors only. A graduation requirement (as an alternative to SOC 490/491), SOC 450 is an in-depth examination of a central issue in contemporary sociology. Examples of issues, which vary from semester to semester, are the media and social change; culture and identity; masculinities; social class and African-American status; Latino/Hispanic ethnicity; and sociology of information technologies. Students conduct their own research in consultation with the faculty. Cannot be substituted with portfolio assessment.