JOHN JAY COLLEGE OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE
The City University of New York SYLLABUS
Introductory Sociology
Sociology 101 Section 301 Spring 2010
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Instructor: Dr. Peter Marina
Course Description: This course centers on the foundations of sociology designed to introduce and interest students to the discipline. Students will become acquainted with the basic concepts, methods, and findings of the field. This course hopes to offer more then a mere survey that sweeps a wide range of issues without much quality or depth. Instead, students will become more intimately exposed to selected subfields within the discipline in order to develop a sense of the sociological imagination. The purpose of this class is for students to think sociologically on a wide range of issues. Students with an intellectual curiosity will find sociology a complex and fascinating field of study that, though most sociologists claim the discipline an objective science, invigorates a certain passion for the quest of knowledge and understanding. Sociology involves dialectical thinking. For example, individuals produce society while, at the same time, a product of the same society they produce. This type of thinking will find its employment throughout the course. Related to dialectical thought, sociology also involves the study of the interaction between individuals and social institutions (political, economic, social, cultural, and religious) as well as the various complex interactions between institutions. This course examines the sociological meaning of these interactions as they relate to issues in culture, society, stratification, race/ethnic/class/gender inequality, deviance, social control, family, religion, and education. This course introduces the fathers of sociology including Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and others while also covering a wide range of sociological perspectives from structuralfunctionalism to Marxism. If nothing else, students will learn to apply sociological thought to everyday life.
Prerequisite: ENG 101 and SOC 101.
Course Requirements and Grading:
Midterm
Exam (25%)
Class Presentations (25%)
Final Exam (25%)
Final Paper (25%)Exams include multiple choice, fill in the blank, and short answer questions.
Students will conduct three group or individual presentation in class on various readings.
Students must present and turn in a final paper five to seven pages in length. Students are free to choose a paper with a topic of their choice. Papers must incorporate sociological
Excess lateness and absence may result in grade reduction.
Textbook:
Kornblum, William. Sociology in a Changing World (Eighth Edition, 2005). Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth/Thompson Learning
Outside Readings:
Various outside readings will be included each week to compliment and elaborate on critical concepts offered in the main textbook and discussed in class. These readings are taken from books and/or scholarly articles.
Classroom Procedures:
- Please arrive on time.
- Pay attention to lectures and discussions. All ideas are welcome in the classroom and are open to debate.
- Please keep cell phones on silence or vibrate to prevent interruption in the flow of ideas and topics discussed in class.
- The academic classroom functions as an arena of thought where ideas are created, debated, and challenged. Topics may become heated and controversial, that is part of the fun of academic life. Please remember to keep composure and express ideas respectfully to others.
Cheating and Plagiarism:
Cheating: The unauthorized use or attempted use of material, information, notes, study aids, devices or communication during an academic exercise. The following are some examples of cheating:
- Copying from another student during an examination or allowing another to copy your work.
- Unauthorized collaboration on a take home assignment or examination.
- Taking an examination for another student, or asking or allowing another student to take an examination for you.
- Allowing others to research and write assigned papers or do assigned projects including use of commercial term paper services.
- Submitting someone else’s work as your own
- Unauthorized us during an examination of any electronic devices such as cell phones, palm pilots, computers or other technologies to retrieve or send information.
Plagiarism: The act of presenting another person’s ideas, research or writings as your own. The following are some examples of plagiarism:- Copying another person’s actual words without the use of quotation marks and footnotes attributing the words to their source.
- Presenting another person’s ideas or theories in your own words without acknowledging the source.
- Using information that is not common knowledge without acknowledging the source.
Note: Internet plagiarism includes submitting downloaded term papers or parts of term papers, paraphrasing or copying information from the Internet without citing the source, and “cutting and pasting” from various sources without proper attribution. Cheating and Plagiarism will not be tolerated, and if it occurs you will not receive credit for the assignment.
Course Outline and Required Readings:
Week 1:
Chapter One: Sociology: An Introduction
The Sociological Imagination
Sociology as a Human Science
Social Thought
Major Sociological Perspectives
Outside Readings:
(1) Peter Berger: An Invitation to Sociology
(2) Anthony Giddens: The Consequences of Modernity
(3) George Ritzer: The McDonaldization of Society
Week 2:
Chapter Two: The Tools of Sociology:
Applying the Sociological Imagination
Methods of Investigation
Ethics
Theories
Outside Readings
(1) C. Wright Mills: The Sociological Imagination
(2) Peter Berger: The Social Construction of Reality
(3) Jack Katz: Analytic Induction
(4) Howard Becker: Tricks of the Trade
(5) Clifford Geertz: Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight
Week 3:
No Classes
Week 4:
Chapter Three: Sociology of Culture
The Meaning of Culture
Culture and Human Behavior
Language
Hegemony
Civilization and Change
Outside Readings
(1) Clarke et al: Resistance Through Rituals
(2) Horkheimer and Adorno: Enlightenment as Mass Deception
(3) Wendy Griswold's "Culture and Societies in a Changing World
(4) Clifford Geertz: Ideology as a Cultural System
Week 5:
Chapter Five: Socialization: Becoming a Social Being:
Social Construction of the Self
The Socialization Process
Outside Readings
(1) Erving Goffman: The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life
(2) Erving Goffman: Asylums
(3) Peter Berger: The Social Construction of Reality
(4) George Herbert Mead: Mind, Self, and Society
Week 6:
Chapter Six: Interaction in Groups:
Importance of Groups
Group Interaction
Formal Organizations and Bureaucracy
Groups in Complex Societies
Outside Readings
(1) Kontos, Brotherton, and Barrios: Gangs and Society
(2) Georg Simmel: Dyad and Triad
(3) Mitchell Duneier: Sidewalk
Week 7:
Chapter Seven: Deviance and Social Control:
Social Construction of Deviance
Dimensions of Deviance
Theoretical Perspectives on Deviance
Crime and Social Control
Outside Readings
(1) Howard Becker: Outsiders
(2) Donald Cressey: Criminal Violation of Financial Trust
(3) Erving Goffman: Stigma
(4) Cloward and Ohlin: Delinquency and Opportunity: A Theory of Delinquent Gangs
(5) Marina and Baxter: Cultural Meaning and Fashion in the Hip Hop Urban Black Youth Community of New Orleans
Week 8:
MidTerm Exam
Chapter Eleven: Inequalities of Social Class
Social Inequality in America
Social Class and Life Chances
The Concept of Equality
Outside Readings
(1) C. Wright Mills: The Power Elite
(2) Herbert Marcuse: One Dimensional Man
(3) Paul Willis: Learning to Labour
(4) Mike Davis: Planet of Slums
Week 9:
Chapter Twelve: Inequalities of Race and Ethnicity
The Meaning of Race and Ethnicity
Intergroup Relations
Culture and Intergroup Relations
Theories of Race and Inequality
Outside Readings
(1) Hayward Horton: Toward A Critical Demography of Race and Ethnicity: Introduction of the “R” Word
(2) Hayward Horton and Lori Sykes: Toward a Critical Demography of Neomulattos: Structural Change and Diversity within the Black Population
(3) Patricia Hill Collins: Critical Race Theory
(4) Tony N. Brown: Critical Race Theory Speaks to the Sociology of Mental Health: Mental Health Problems Produced by Racial Stratification
Week 10:
No Classes
Week 11:
Chapter Thirteen: Inequalities of Gender:
Gender and Inequality
Sex and Gender
Gender Stratification
Gender Inequality
The Women's Movement
Outside Readings
(1) Patricia Collins: Black Sexual Politics: African
Americans, Gender, and the New Racism
(2) Nancy Riley: Challenging Demography: Contributions from Feminist Theory
(3) Helen Reddington: 'Lady' Punks in Bands: A Subculturette?
(4) Sian Lincoln: Teenage
Week 12:
Chapter Fifteen: The Family:
The Nature of Families
Perspectives of the Family
Mate Selection and Marriage
Outside Readings
(1) Berger and Kellner: Marriage and the Construction of Reality
(2) Christopher Lasch: Haven in a Heartless World: The Family Besieged
(3) Don Edgar: Globalization and Western Bias in Family Sociology
(4) Walker and Collins: Families of the Poor
Week 13:
Chapter Sixteen: Sociology of Religion:
Religion in Society
Varieties of Religious Belief
Structure and Change in Modern Religions
Trends in United States Religion
Secularization Theory
Outside Readings
(1) Peter Berger: From Secularity to World Religions
(2) Jose Casanova: Public Religions in the Modern World
(3) Emile Durkheim: Elementary Forms of the Religious Life.
(4) John Lofland: Doomsday Cult: A Study of Conversion, Proselytization, and Maintenance of Faith.
(5) Peter Marina: Becoming Pentecostal: Conversion
Careers in a Holy Ghost Church
Week 14:
Chapter Seventeen: Sociology of Education
Role of Education
Attainment, Achievement, and Inequality
Structure of Educational Institutions
Outside Readings
(1) Pierre Bourdieu: Reproduction: In Education, Society and Culture
(2) Paulo Freire: Pedagogy of the Oppressed
(3) Richard
Week 15:
Open Topics/Final Class Paper Presentations
Outside Readings
(1) ___________________________
(2) ___________________________
Week 16:
Open Topics/Final Class Paper Presentations
Outside Readings
(1) ___________________________
(2) ___________________________
Final Papers Due