SOCY 360.002 POWER AND PRIVILEGE SPRING, 2005
Instructor: Dr. Chris Hope
Class Meeting Time and Place:
MWF 1:00-1:50 p.m., LIB 001
Office Address: 88 Wentworth St. (Office #105).
Office Phone: 953-8185
or 953-5738
E-mail Address: hopec@cofc.edu
Office Hours: Monday, 2-4 p.m.
Wednesday and Friday, 9:00-10:30
a.m.
Thursday, 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m.
Or by appointment
BOOKS FOR THE COURSE
You will need to purchase two books for use in Power and
Privilege. They are:
We will be
reading assignments from both of these books immediately so you should purchase
them soon if you haven’t already done so.
There may also be a few additional readings during the semester to be
handed out or read on-line.
You may also
wish to acquire or borrow a book on the basics of writing and/or on writing
social science papers for a reference to use in developing and writing your
paper. I will give some guidance on
this in class but it is good to have a backup source as well, especially if you
have never written a college level research paper and/or your knowledge of
grammar and punctuation rules has faded.
SOCY 360 AND THE COLLEGE OF CHARLESTON
SOCIOLOGY MAJOR
Social
Inequality is one of the major focuses of contemporary American sociology and
one of the major emphases of the
sociology program at the College of
Charleston. Thus, we require SOCY
360, Power and Privilege, for all of our majors. Because the material is advanced and because you are expected to
produce a major piece of written work for the course, prior coursework about
large scale social institutions (SOCY 202), the basic theories in sociology
(SOCY 260), and the basic methods of sociological research (SOCY 271) is
prerequisite to the course. You may
also have previously taken courses dealing with particular types of inequality
(e.g. SOCY 354 Gender and Society, SOCY 343, Race and Ethnic Relations) or
courses in which the consequences of inequality were dealt with (e.g. SOCY 351,
Urban Sociology, SOCY 347, Child Welfare) or with societal level attempts to
deal with inequality (e.g. SOCY 345, Social Policy).
COURSE OBJECTIVES
In SOCY 360, we will work together to:
·
come to an
understanding of how and why various groups in society have differential power,
prestige, and privilege by considering a number of sociological theories
·
become
aware of the multiple consequences of inequality
·
examine how
social class, gender, race and ethnicity, and other factors intersect to shape
individual experiences
·
evaluate
how various social policies affect inequality
·
identify
the trends and changes most likely to affect inequality in the future
·
produce polished, meaningful research papers
COURSE PROCEDURES
The basic
organization of the course is provided by the Sernau text, Worlds Apart. On most class days, you will have reading
from both the Sernau text and from Shapiro’s reader, Great|Divides. I expect you to have all the reading for
each day completed by class time on the day for which it is assigned. In class, I will elaborate on and update
some selected parts of the reading assigned, answer your questions, ask you to
respond to questions about the readings or to engage in group exercises related
to the day’s topic, and show occasional videos. If I find that students are not prepared to discuss the
readings, I reserve the right to require reading summaries/syntheses and/or
give daily quizzes on the readings. Some
class days, particularly during the first part of the course, will be partially
devoted to activities related to the paper you will be working on. In addition to keeping up with the assigned
reading, you will need to spend a considerable amount of time outside of class
reading, taking notes, and thinking about your paper topic and then writing
your paper. This is a labor-intensive course;
plan to spend 8-9 hours a week outside of class on it.
ATTENDANCE
Class attendance
is expected. 10% of your grade depends
on participation in class activities; if you’re not here (for whatever reason),
you’ll be forfeiting this part of your grade.
More importantly, people have very different experiences with social
inequality and if you are not here to contribute your views and listen to those
of others, you will be missing much of what the class has to offer.
EVALUATION
Your grade for
the course will be based on :
Midterm
exam 100
pts. 25% of your grade
Final exam 100
pts. 25% of your grade
Paper (to be
divided into several distinct
Assignments)
160 pts. 40% of your grade
Participation
and Attendance
40 pts. 10% of your grade
400 pts.
100%
The midterm
exam, covering the first five chapters of Sernau and associated readings from
Shapiro, will be given on Monday, February 28 and will consist of some
combination of multiple choice, short answer, and essay questions. The final exam will be given on Friday, May
6, 12 p.m.-3 p.m., the scheduled final exam time for this class. It will cover Chapters 6-10 of Sernau and
the associated readings from Shapiro.
As a major part
of the course, you will write a library research paper of 15-20 pp. on some
topic having to do with social stratification or inequality. You will work on the paper progressively
during the semester. Further details
about the paper and the due dates for its various parts will be covered on a
separate handout to be given out on the second day of class. As noted above, parts of some class periods
will be devoted to paper-related issues and I expect you to come see me in my
office at least twice during the semester to discuss your paper.
Final grades
will be assigned using the following scale:
400-360 pts.
(100-90%) = A
359-348 pts.
(89%-87%) = B+
347-320 pts.
(86%-80%) = B
319-308 pts.
(79%-77%) = C+
307-280 pts.
(76%-70%) = C
279-240 pts.
(69%-60%) = D
239-0 pts. (59% and lower) =F
SPECIAL NOTE
Every semester, there are a few students
who have personal, family, or health difficulties that interfere with their
schoolwork. If this should happen to you, please let me know so that together
we can work out what's best for you in terms of the course. The withdrawal date for spring semester is February 23.