All Results
SociologyCredits
Examination of ethnographic methodologies in sociology with emphasis on analytic, performance, and autoethnography. Exploration of ethics in ethnography, visual sociology, and first-hand experience in both crafting and presenting ethnographic works.
Seminar and workshop on the principles and techniques of qualitative research, including but not limited to interviews and participant observation; students design and conduct original qualitative research projects, write and present analyses. Prerequisite: SOC 301W or similar research methods course with instructor permission.
- Programs:
Analysis of social forces that impact social change in the United States and globally. Examines the interaction between structural and cultural forces in the understanding of societal changes. Explores the global economic impact and the implications for world-wide changes. Analysis of the process of development and globalization and impacts on nations and populations across the globe.
Upper-division seminar focused on major theories and findings in contemporary family sociology; emphasis on reading, interpreting, and critically engaging with scholarly research on families, including dating and cohabitation, marriage, divorce, and parenting.
- Programs:
Analysis of the structures, functions, and origins of religion, its relationship to other social institutions, and its role in modern secular society. Examines processes of individual religiosity and explores current religious movements and trends. Explores world religions to enhance greater cultural understanding.
- Programs:
Topics vary as announced in class schedule. May be retaken for credit if topic varies.
Workshop topics vary as announced in class schedule. These workshops will be based on skill-building and career connections for sociology majors. May be retaken for credit.
- Programs:
For Honors students only.
This course will focus on ways that sociological concepts and research skills can be applied in practice settings to address human concerns and promote social justice. Students learn how sociological skills can be used to identify, investigate, and implement solutions to problems of social organization, social process, and social change. Through the course of the semester students will engage in experiential and/or project based learning, and collaborate in identifying and executing research in service of addressing a community problem or supporting a community organization.
- Prerequisites:
- SOC 301W or equivalent; Senior Standing.
- Programs:
The internship in sociology is designed to provide opportunity to apply classroom learning, to practice and enhance skills, to experience professional socialization, and to explore a career. It also serves as a vehicle for the student to become more aware of personal strengths and identify areas in which further growth is needed.
- Prerequisites:
- Consent
- Programs:
A maximum of six credits is applicable toward a single major in the department; three credits toward a minor.
- Prerequisites:
- Consent
- Programs:
Introduces students to central topics in medical sociology including: social factors responsible for people's health outcomes; social construction of health illness; health inequalities; evolution of the social institution of medicine; and/or issues realted to race/ethnicity, social class and gender.
Social and social-psychological forces in later life. Problems and prospects of growing old in the United States.
Study of the structure of human response to death, dying, and bereavement in their socio-cultural, interpersonal, and personal context. Formation of children's perception of death, functions of the funeral, euthanasia, and suicide are among the topics to be discussed.
The course will acquaint students with dynamic forces operating in the field of population and development. Includes an introduction to basic theories and techniques of population analysis, with coverage of global economic forces: fertility, morality, and migration. The causes and consequences of overpopulation are discussed with special attention to resource depletion and food shortages.
Examines various forms of family violence, including dating violence, spouse abuse, and child abuse; reviews social theory and empirical research and explores social policy, appropriate responses, and possible solutions.
Implications of sociological knowledge for the administration of Human Services programs. Theoretical and practical aspects of administration with the social service systems.
Applies sociological theories of identity to the experiences of women being released from prison. Taught at the women's prison in Shakopee, Minnesota and integrates MSU students with students drawn from the educational program within the women's prison in Shakopee.
Analysis of the development, structure, and functioning of social processes in large-scale, formal organizations.
Survey of major sociological perspectives on social movements, including theoretical approaches and empirical research on the causes, processes, and outcomes of social movements.
Overview of the role of the United States in an increasingly globalized society with a focus on economic and political inequality, the class structure, the labor process, race and gender relations, the global dimensions of capitalism, and modern crisis tendencies.
A critical consideration of myths concerning crime, perspectives on crime and their assumptions, current criminology theory, and construction of alternative explanations related to crime.
Study of minority racial and cultural groups in US society. An examination of how the lives of the members of these groups are affected by racism, prejudice, and discrimination.
An overview of sociological theory that surveys the classical tradition and emphasizes contemporary theories including functionalism, conflict theory, rational choice theory, and symbolic interactionism, as well as recent trends in theoretical developments.
Examines the sociological relationship between people and the environment including: ways various societies view the environment, social changes from ecological degradation, and solutions to environmental problems. Topics may include a sociological analysis of climate change, agriculture, and resource extraction.