Week By Week Breakdown

Below you will find all of our assignment and reading due dates, topics for each class session, and embedded hyperlinks that will grant you access to each reading.

Underneath each topic for the week, you’ll also find some handy dandy guiding questions you can use as you unpack the readings for the week. The guiding questions serve as conceptual anchors for you as you navigate the content within the readings.

Please note that we will be using Introduction to Sociology 3e as our textbook this semester. I don’t like to brag, but this book is open-access, free, and virtual. Furthermore, it will ground many of our topics throughout the semester. The link to the textbook can be found here. Readings that are behind paywalls (and don’t worry-there aren’t many) will be posted on Blackboard in the course materials section. You’ll find them in a folder called “readings.” Pretty basic.

1/27: Welcome to SOC 166! Introductions and Syllabus

2/3:  Introducing Sociology & the Sociological Imagination

Guiding Questions: What is sociology and how do we do it? Why study sociology? And why bother developing our sociological imagination? We will tackle what theory and research look like in the field of sociology and introduce ourselves to the most prominent theoretical movers & shakers–and challenge them. 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

2/5: The Social World: Social Interactions and Socialization

Guiding Questions:  How do you know when and how to cross the street? How do you know when to exchange pleasantries–and when not to? In this session, we’ll explore the topic of socialization and answer questions such as: How are we socialized? What is the role of social interactions in the process of socialization? 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

2/10 & 2/18: Culture

Guiding Questions: What is culture? What are the elements that make up culture? And how we learn it? 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

2/19: Culture

in-person film viewing

2/24: Digital Auto-Ethnography Project

During this class session, we will go over the guidelines for your digital auto-ethnographic assignment and begin to work on the project in class. Please bring a laptop if possible. Alternatively, Ipads will be provided in class.

2/26 & 3/3:  Media & Technology 

Guiding Questions: What is the relationship between media and technology? What is media? What is technology? What kind of power and potential do media and technology have? And how do they change over time?  
Readings:
Assignments Due:

3/5 & 3/6: Content Analysis Project 

During this class session, we will go over the guidelines for your content analysis project and begin to work on the project in class. Please bring a laptop if possible. Alternatively, ipads will be provided in class.

Please note that this project has multiple components and deadlines. This project has multiple components & deadlines. 

3/10 & 3/12: Deviance, Crime, & Social Control

Guiding questions: What is deviance? What does it mean to be “deviant”–and how does that change with time, perception, culture, and context? What is the relationship between deviance and crime–and what do they both have to do with social control? 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

3/17: Deviance, Crime, & Social Control

in-person film
  • film: Ava Duvernay’s 13th 

3/19 & 3/24: Power, Oppression, & Domination: Understanding Racism

Guiding questions: What is the relationship between power, oppression, and domination? And what do they have to do with racism? How is racism reflective and deeply tethered to notions of power and control? 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

3/26: Power, Oppression, & Domination: Understanding Racism

In-person film: Get Out 
Readings:

4/2 & 4/7: Social Stratification

Guiding Questions: Is our society an inherently inequitable one by design? What does it mean and look like to live in a socially stratified society? Do we all have “equal opportunity” or is the game rigged? What is the role of agency and what is the role of structure in determining social stratification? 
Readings:
Assignments Due:

4/9 & 4/21: Patriarchy & The Institution of Gender

Guiding Questions: What is gender? Where does it come from? What purpose does it serve? And how does it sustain patriarchy–a complex system of domination and subjugation? 
In-Class Project: Age of AI: Fact-Checking & Prompt Creation
Readings:
Assignments Due:

4/23 & 4/28: Let’s Talk About…Sex, Sexuality, and Sexual Orientation

Guiding Questions: What is sex? What is sexuality? What is sexual orientation? How are they distinct? How are they interconnected? Do we choose our sex/sexuality/sexual orientation, or are they the byproduct of complex social processes? 
Readings:
Heads up! In class we’ll watch this video together as we unpack everything we’ve been taught about gender.

Assignments Due:

4/30: Let’s Talk About…Sex, Sexuality, and Sexual Orientation

in-person film: Moonlight

5/5 & 5/7:  (Re)Defining Relationships, Marriage, & Family

Guiding Questions: How do you define family, and how have you come into that understanding? In other words, what does family mean to you–and why?  What makes for a family? What relationship, if any, is there between marriage and family today? 
Readings:

Assignments Due: 

5/12 & 5/14: Grade Conferences