11 - 20 of 264 results for: SOC

Each class will be focused on a different topic and have guest speakers. This class will be open to students, faculty and staff to attend and also be recorded. Deep disagreement pervades our democracy, from arguments over immigration, gun control, abortion, and the Middle East crisis, to the function of elite higher education and the value of free speech itself. Loud voices drown out discussion. Open-mindedness and humility seem in short supply among politicians and citizens alike. Yet constructive disagreement is an essential feature of a democratic society. This class explores and models respectful, civil disagreement. Each week features scholars who disagree - sometimes quite strongly - about major policy issues. Students will have the opportunity to probe those disagreements, understand why they persist, and to improve their own understanding of the facts and values that underlie them.

An overview of the major forms of inequality in American society, their causes and consequences. Special attention will devoted to to public policy associated with inequality.

Markets are inescapably entangled with questions of right and wrong. What counts as a fair price or a fair wage? Should people be able to sell their organs? Do companies have a responsibility to make sure algorithmic decisions don't perpetuate racism and misogyny? Even when market exchange seems coldly rational, it still embodies normative ideas about the right ways to value objects and people and to determine who gets what. In this seminar, we will study markets as social institutions permeated with moral meaning. We will explore how powerful actors work to institutionalize certain understandings of good and bad; unpack how particular moral visions materially benefit some groups of people more so than others; examine the ways people draw on notions of fairness to justify and contest the market's distribution of resources and opportunities; and consider who has agency to build markets according to different normative ideals. Most course readings are empirical research, so we will also critically discuss how social scientists use data and methods to build evidence about the way the world works.

The seminar introduces students to major themes connected to the immigrant experience, including identity, education, assimilation, transnationalism, political membership, and intergroup relations. There will also be some attention given to research methodology. The seminar addresses these themes through reading ethnographies that document the everyday experience of immigrants and immigrant communities, broadly defined, in the United States. The course readings primarily come from more contemporary ethnographic research, but it will also include a sampling of ethnographies that examine the experience of previous waves of immigrants. Student participation will include in-class discussions of readings, short written responses to readings, and a final paper in which students draw on original ethnographic research that they conduct during the quarter. By the end of the quarter, students will be able to identify the social, political, and economic forces that shape the immigrant experience. More importantly, students will understand HOW these forces enter the immigrant experience in everyday life.

Preference to freshmen. Seminar discussion of how various institutions in U.S. society employ racial categories, and how race is studied and conceptualized across disciplines. Course introduces perspectives from demography, history, law, genetics, sociology, psychology, and medicine. Students will read original social science research, learn to collect and analyze data from in-depth interviews, and use library resources to conduct legal/archival case studies.

Over the past few decades, social movements have increasingly relied on social movement participants leveraging internet technologies in mobilization, coordination, and public outreach to assist in their movement goals. How have new online tools such as social media and digital connectivity changed the processes of contemporary social movements? This course uses a sociological perspective to examine the ways social movements have adapted to online technologies to critically think about how the internet has altered traditional forms of social movement mobilization. The first half of the course is an introduction and review of traditional social movement literatures, while the second half is focused on different contemporary social movements where the internet played an important role, including the Arab Spring, Black Lives Matter, LGBTQ equality, feminism and the #MeToo movement, and most recently, the storming of the U.S. Capitol. Students will be encouraged to think about the ways in which social movement processes have been accelerated and/or changed due to the effects of online technologies.

This Introductory Seminar reviews the history of social network studies, investigates how networks have changed over the past hundred years and asks how new technologies will impact them. We will draw from scholarly publications, popular culture and personal experience as ways to approach this central aspect of the human experience.

Where does the food you eat come from? How does it get to your plate? Where does it go when you don't finish it? And why are those particular items on your plate in the first place? How and what we eat is a vastly overlooked part of everyday life, and yet comes with huge personal, societal, and environmental effects, both positive and (quite often) negative. But this isn't indicative of personal moral failings or ignorance - rather, the food system was designed this way. And it leaves many of us without choice or consent around what we put into our bodies and how our actions impact those around us, thereby exacerbating social and health inequities. This class will uncover the secret workings of the global food system and introduce students to movements and efforts towards creating a more just food future for all. We will center on the concept of 'food justice,' which includes all ideas and practices that strive to eliminate exploitation and oppression within and beyond the food system. This trajectory will take us through understandings of economic, political, cultural, social, and ecological life, both now and in the past, providing students with a unique opportunity to gain interdisciplinary knowledge of food systems. For instance, we will learn about how historical and modern-day activists and scholars draw on movements for economic, gender, racial, climate, and environmental justice, and explore the possibilities for both reformative and transformative food politics. Finally, because food production, consumption, and activism are all highly tangible practices, the class will engage in field trips to the Stanford O'Donohue Family Farm, Stanford Food Institute's Teaching Kitchen, and a local Bay Area farm to get hands-on experience with what it means to eat more ethically.

Preference to sophomores. Historical overview of race in America, race and violence, race and socioeconomic well-being, and the future of race relations in America. Enrollment limited to 16.