Introductory Sociology SOC 151-1 RobRosenthal
Fall 2009 PAC 204
MWF 10:00-10:50 685-2943
PAC 422 Office Hours: Thursday 9:30-11:30 and by appointment
Readings
Macionis & Benokraitis, Seeing Ourselves, 7th edition (M&B)
Kurt Finsterbusch, Annual Editions: Sociology 09/10 (KF)
assorted articles on reserve
I. Introduction
1. Why Study Sociology?
9/11: M&B 1: Mills, "The sociological imagination"
M&B 2: Berger, "Invitation to sociology"
Lazersfeld, "What is obvious?"
9/14:Wrong, "The oversocialized concept of man in modern sociology"
Wright, "Double mystery"
Ridley, “What makes you who you are?”
Bazelon, “A question of resilience”
M&B 10: Merton, “Manifest and latent functions”
2. How Do We Know What's True?
9/16: Collins and Makowsky, "Society and illusion"
Charon, "Why do we believe what we do?"
9/18:Gould, "The finagle factor"
9/21:Wright, "Sociology's pomposity and utility”
Orenstein, "Sociology without theory is a house without a foundation"
Lemert, “Social theory: Its uses and pleasures”
M&B 7: Babbie, “The importance of social research”
9/23:Liazos, "Practicing sociology"
M&B 6: Weber, “The case for value-free sociology”
KF 6: Balch, “The dubious value of value-neutrality”
Rosenthal, "Researching homelessness"
II. The Small Picture: Microsociology
3. Tools We Use: Language, Concepts, and Socialization
9/25: Davis, "Final note on a case of extreme isolation”
M&B 17: Mead, “The self"
Charon, "Are human beings free?"
SOC 151-1, Fall 2009 Rob Rosenthal
Introductory Sociology page 2
9/28: Horror Movie
No reading
9/30:Kluckhohn, "The meaning of culture"
M&B 9: White, “Symbol: The basic element of culture”
M&B 20: Heath, “Parents’ socialization of children in global perspective”
Gladwell, “Annals of behavior: Do parents matter?”
Journal Packet 1 (entries 1-3) due
4. More Tools: Norms, Roles, and Institutions
10/2:M&B 5: Miner, "Body ritual among the Nacirema"
M&B 12: Harris, “India’s sacred cow”
Goffman, "Territories of the self"
M&B 22: Goffman, "The presentation of self"
Adler & Adler, “Role conflict and identity salience”
10/5:Milgram, "Some conditions of obedience and disobedience to authority"
Meyer, "If Hitler asked you..."
10/7: M&B 27: Weber, "The characteristics of bureaucracy"
Eitzen, "Bureaucracy as a rational tool; bureaucracy as an irrational tool"
5. Normative and Interpretive Paradigms
10/9:Caplow, "The American way of celebrating Christmas"
Bittner, "Police discretion in emergency apprehension of mentally ill persons"
Homans, "Social relations in a bureaucracy"
6. "Deviance" and "Deviants"
10/12:M&B 30: Durkheim, "The functions of crime"
M&B 32: Anderson, “The code of the streets”
Erickson, "Notes on the sociology of deviance"
10/14:Sutherland & Cressey, "Learning to be deviant"
M&B 31: Rosenhan, "On being sane in insane places"
Miller and Jacques, "Identifying madness"
Solomon, "Defiantly deaf"
KF 5: Etzioni et al, “Diversity within unity”
SOC 151-1, Fall 2009 Rob Rosenthal
Introductory Sociology page 3
III. The Big Picture: Macrosociology
7. Classical Theories of Power and the State
10/16:M&B 4: Lengermann & Niebrugge-Brantley, “Women and the birth of sociology”
M&B 13: Marx & Engels, "Manifesto of the Communist Party"
Midterm given out
10/19: M&B 51: Marx, “Alienated labor”
M&B 60: Weber, “The Protestant Ethic and the spirit of capitalism”
Weber, "Authority and legitimacy"
10/21: No reading
No journal due today
Midterm due in Sociology office by 4PM
10/23:M&B 79: Durkheim, “Anomy and modern life”
10/26: Fall Break
8. Modern Theories of Power and the State
10/28:Berry, “Citizen groups and the changing nature of interest group politics”
Friedman, "The role of government in a free society"
10/30:Clawson et al, "Money changes everything"
KF 30: Javers, “Inside the hidden world of earmarks”
Hamburg, “In the money”
11/2:M&B 54: Mills, "The power elite”
KF 29: Domhoff, “Who rules America?”
M&B 55: Dye, “Who’s running America?”
11/4:No reading. Midterms returned and discussed
Journal Packet 2 (entries 4-7) due
11/6:Magdoff and Sweezy, "What is Marxism?"
Sweezy, "Radical theory of the state"
11/9:Rosenthal, "Skidding/coping/escaping"
Collins & Makowsky, “Michel Foucault: History as discourse”
SOC 151-1, Fall 2009 Rob Rosenthal
Introductory Sociology page 4
9. Education
11/11:Gracey, "Learning the student role"
Henry, "Golden rule days"
Karp & Yoels, "Why don't college students participate?"
Hurn, "Theories of schooling and society"
Edmundson, “On the uses of a liberal education”
M&B 64: Kozol, “Savage inequalities”
11/13:M&B 63: Bowles and Gintis, “Education and inequality”
Rosenthal and Jacobson, "Pygmalion in the Classroom excerpt"
Schafer et al, "Programmed for social class"
Anderson, "Cognitive styles and multicultural populations"
KF 34: Finn, “Can the center find a solution that will hold?”
10. Economics, Stratification, and the Occupational Structure
11/16:Scott & Leonhardt, “Class in America”
M&B 37: Davis & Moore (response Tumin), "Some principles of stratification"
Herrnstein & Murray (response Fischer et al), “The Bell Curve thesis”
KF 20: Madrick, “Goodbye, Horatio Alger”
Krugman, “For richer”
11/18:Funiciello, "The poverty industry"
M&B 39: Eglitis, “The uses of global poverty”
KF 22: Pomeroy, “A work in progress”
Barlett & Steele, “Corporate welfare”
11. Problems and "Problem Populations"
A. Constructing Social Problems
11/20:Gusfield, “The construction of alcohol problems”
Gliedman, "The wheelchair rebellion"
Henry, "Pride and prejudice"
M&B 36: Carrier, “Homosexual behavior in cross-cultural perspective”
KF 12: Anderson, “The aggregate burden of crime”
B. Poverty
11/23:Tour of Poverty, at:
Eberstadt & Gordon, “Are the poor largely responsible for their poverty?”
Banfield, “Several kinds of poverty”
KF 4: Gorski, “The myth of the ‘Culture of Poverty’”
Nelson, “The high cost of being poor”
SOC 151-1, Fall 2009 Rob Rosenthal
Introductory Sociology page 5
11/30:Liebow, "Men and jobs on Tally's corner"
M&B 52: Wilson, “When work disappears”
KF 21: Shipler, “Connecting the dots”
Gans, "The uses of poverty"
C. Questions of Race
12/2:M&B 44: Du Bois, “The souls of Black folk”
Brandt, "Racism and research”
Moore & Pinderhughes, “The Latino population”
Woo, “The gap between striving and achieving"
M&B 46: Sacks, “How did Jews become white folks?”
KF 23: The Economist, “Nearer to overcoming”
12/4:Steele, "Thinking beyond race"
KF 24: Wise, “Whites swim in racial preference”
Wilson, “The black underclass”
Gladwell, "Black like them"
KF 25: Monteith & Winters, “Why we hate”
11/26-11/28: Thanksgiving Break
D. Questions of Gender
12/7: M&B 40: Mead, “Sex and temperament in three primitive societies”
Griffin, "Rape: The allAmerican crime”
Sánchez-Ayéndez, “Puerto Rican elderly women”
KF 27: Musil, “Scaling the ivory towers”
M&B 57: Bernard, “‘His’ and ‘her’ marriages”
M&B 45: Collins, “Controlling images and Black women’s oppression”
12/9:M&B 41: Lorber, “’Night to his day’: The social construction of gender”
KF 8: Marano, “The new sex scoreboard”
KF 26: Havemann, “Great expectations”
M&B 18: Messner, “Boyhood, organized sports, and the construction of masculinities”
M&B 42: Benokraitis, “How subtle sex discrimination works”
Faludi, "Blame it on feminism"
Journal Packet 3 (entries 8-11) due
SOC 151-1, Fall 2009 Rob Rosenthal
Introductory Sociology page 6
IV. Social Change
12. Social Movements
12/11: M&B 76: Freeman, "On the origins of social movements"
M&B 77: Jasper & Nelkin, “The animal rights movement as a moral crusade”
KF 19: Katz, “Why aren’t U.S. cities burning?
M&B 19: Kilbourne, “Socialization and the power of advertising”
Gans, "Values in the news"
Gitlin, “Television’s anti-politics”
13. The Media and the Future: Predictions and Actions
12/14:KF 40: Brown, “Plan B 3.0”
KF 48: Glenn & Gordon, “Update on the state of the future”
KF 49: Sachs, “A user’s guide to the century”
KF 50: Wishard, “Understanding our moment in history”
Appelbaum, "The future is made, not predicted"
Clarke, "Hazards of prophecy"
Olson, “The execution class”
Final given out
Friday, 12/18: FINAL DUE BEFORE 4:00 PM (SOCIOLOGY OFFICE)
Assignments
Journals
One entry per week, due every Wednesday (except 10/21 and 11/25). You may hand them in during class or in my mailbox inside the Sociology office before 4 PM. Please do not email them to me. Entries will be returned the following week; these must be handed back to me when the Journal as a whole is graded:
Journal 1 (entries 9/16, 9/23, 9/30) is worth 10% of your final grade;
Journal 2 (entries 10/7, 10/14, 10/28, 11/4) is worth 20%;
Journal 3 (entries 11/11, 11/18, 12/2, 12/9) is worth 20%.
Late entries are graded down; missing entries lower the journala full grade.
You may hand in a “Free Pass” once during the semester instead of an entry.
Exams
A takehome, openbook midterm (distributed 10/16, due 10/21) and a take-home, openbook final (distributed 12/14, due 12/18), each worth 25% of your final grade.