Sociology Fall 2021 Courses - Register Now!

Introduction to Sociology

Professor Terence McGinn

Description: Sociology may be defined simply as “the study of human groups” or the “study of human social arrangements,” but sociology is also a perspective, a set of methods, a canon of literature, and an ongoing conversation about the patterns, probabilities, principles, and processes that characterize a society.

This course will be divided into three sections: (1) an introduction to sociology as a discipline and mindset, using Allan Johnson’s book, The Forest and the Trees, 3e; (2) the history of sociology – its key figures and the major concepts that have occupied the field over the past century and a half, using Fred Pampel’s book, Sociological Lives, and Ideas; and (3) a sample of contemporary issues addressed by sociology, based on a series of articles available on the course website.

Health and Society: An Introduction to Sociology

Professor Sarah Burgard

Description: Sociology is both an academic discipline and a perspective that empowers us to be critical observers of everyday life and the world around us. We will explore how to think and reason sociologically, then examine various social institutions (education, family, religion, etc.) and social constructs (gender, race, class, etc.) which shape our lives and experiences. Throughout the course, we will use sociological understandings of health and medicine, including medical school, the profession of medicine, health and healthcare policy, and health disparities to illustrate core sociological theory and concepts. Listen to professor Burgard discuss more about this course.

Race and Ethnic Relations

Professor Karyn Lacy

Description: This course examines the central tensions underlying race and ethnic relations in the United States. For more than sixty years, sociologists have been preoccupied with the study of inter-group relations, assimilation, and racial and ethnic conflict. Indeed these issues have grown more complex and nuanced as the United States becomes more racially and ethnically diverse. Our goal is to examine the social processes that facilitate or impede inter-group relations.

Law and Society

Professor Sandra Levitsky

Description:  This course explores many of the major issues and debates in the sociology of law. Topics include theoretical perspectives on the connection between law and society; explanations for legal compliance, deviance, and resistance; the relationship between “law on the books” and “law in action”; the relationship between law and social change; and law’s ubiquitous role in popular culture. The class emphasizes a critical examination of the factors that influence who mobilizes the law (and who doesn’t), who benefits from the mobilization of law (and who doesn’t), and what it means to “use” law in contexts other than courtrooms, such as in families, neighborhoods, workplaces, social movements, and mass media. 

Sociology of Gender

Professor P J McGann

Description: For individuals, gender is often an essential aspect of personhood and personal experience. But gender is also a cultural and structural system that differentiates members of society. At both the individual and institutional levels, gender intersects with race, class, and sexuality to structure identities, rights, privileges, and opportunities. Organized around investigation of the socially produced North American binary gender order, this course is an introduction to the sociological study of gender that focuses on gender as embedded in social life. Specific topics of study include gender identity, how children and adults "become" gendered and "do" their gender(s), gender as a symbolic system, gender and sport, desire and gender, trans, and intersex.

Intro to Sociology: Crime and the Criminal Justice System 

Professor Jeffrey Morenoff

Description: This course reviews major issues and theoretical perspectives in the sociological study of crime and the criminal justice system. Criminal justice is a big topic that can be broadly conceptualized as society’s response to crime and the institutions through which this happens. It includes legislative bodies that create laws, law enforcement agencies, courts, corrections (jails, prison, probation, and parole), and some aspects of community services.

The goal of this course is to give students the foundation of theory, methods, and substantive knowledge necessary to develop informed perspectives on criminality, crime policy, and the social consequences of crime and punishment. A wide range of topics will be covered. You will learn about perspectives on law, deviance and crime, justice, penal social control, and the key criminal justice institutions. Emphasis will be placed on how the criminal justice system operates, the different challenges facing the criminal justice system, the ways in which these challenges may be addressed, and how justice and morality guide the criminal justice system.

By the end of this course you will be able to demonstrate a thorough understanding of the main issues that are directly relevant to criminal justice theory and research. You will also better understand the fact and fiction in media portrayals and public stereotypes of crime and criminals, the assumptions behind different forms of punishment and other public policies related to crime, and how politicians think about and react to crime.

Race & Sexuality

Professor Margo Mahan

Description: This seminar explores the intersections between race, sexuality, and violence in the making of Western modernity. Historical in scope, students will develop a broad theoretical understanding of how race, sexuality, and violence shape and construct one another and operate as systems of power. We will draw on other disciplines—from art history to literary analysis—in order to explore the ways in which race, sexuality, and violence have operated to create social hierarchies, construct normative categories, maintain relations of power, and shape individual identities at different historical moments. We will also consider the challenges of doing historical research on these topics, with particular attention to the silences that available sources do not address, and possibilities for overcoming them.

Drugs and Society

Professor Andrea Kelley

Description: The use of intoxicants is found in every known society and drug use is as old as it is widespread. Drugs serve medical, religious, recreational, and many other functions. This course will attempt to explain the fascination humans have with intoxication. To do so, we will focus on drug use from a cross-cultural and historical perspective and center our attention on drug use within the context of various social institutions. The course is both empirical and theoretical. We will concern ourselves with the facts of drug use and then attempt to order these facts with testable theories. Overriding course themes illustrate how drugs are a social and political phenomenon, as well as a chemical one.

Project Community:  Sociology in Action

Professor Rebecca Christensen

Description: SOC 225 is an experiential course that is designed to help students participate in and reflect on community-engaged learning experiences through a sociological lens. Students are able to gain new perspectives on social inequalities through their experiences at a variety of sites, including elementary schools, after-school programs, health clinics, correctional facilities, social services agencies, advocacy centers, and other community organizations in Southeast Michigan.