Introduction to Sociology – SO 101 Kimberly Hennessee
The primary goal of both a Liberal Arts curriculum and the discipline of Sociology is to encourage students to question taken-for-granted assumptions that limit understanding of human experience. Using the Liberal Arts tradition of critical thinking and scientific examination, students gain a more informed grasp of a variety of social issues. Introduction to Sociology presents basic concepts used in sociological analysis. Additionally, this course introduces social science research methods. Attention is given to the world as a single society, interpersonal and intergroup relations, social institutions, and worldwide economic and political arrangements. Through the text, readings, lectures, and video, students will be exposed to a variety of classic as well as current sociological issues.
Introductory Sociology – SO 101 Marvin B. Scott
A Liberal Arts education encompasses transmitting to the student a general knowledge and appreciation of arts, sciences and humanities. Sociology courses transmit knowledge and understanding of societal structures. The following are liberal arts objectives met by this course.
explain the nature and role of broad social structures from a sociological perspective
identify fundamental assumptions of sociology and how these relate to theories of social behavior
identify forces supporting societal order and those leading to societal problems and disorder
describe the means for approaching and resolving societal problems
identify the major theories, scholarly works and methods for the study of societal issues and problems
Class, Status and Power – SO 325 Marvin B. Scott
A Liberal Arts education encompasses transmitting to the student a general knowledge and appreciation of arts, sciences and humanities. Sociology courses transmit knowledge and understanding of societal structures. The following are liberal arts objectives met by this course.
explain the nature and role of broad social structures relevant to class status and power from a sociological perspective
identify fundamental assumptions in the study of class, status and power and how these relate to theories of social behavior
identify forces related to class status and power that support societal order and those leading to societal problems and disorder
describe the means for approaching and resolving societal problems caused by system of class, status and power
identify the major theories, scholarly works and methods for the study of societal issues and problems related to class, status and power systems
International Crime: A Sociological Perspective – SO 355 Tamara G.J. Leech
Our study of international crime will be placed squarely within a liberal arts tradition that strives to foster social awareness and a global perspective. By semester’s end, you should (1) have a better understanding of modern international crimes and (2) be able to articulate and support your own views on current events. The hope is that you will apply the knowledge gained from this course to devise informed positions on future international crimes. To this end, the course will require you to:
Apply critical and abstract reasoning,
Scrutinize theory and research, and
Communicate clearly both orally and in writing.
Senior Seminar/Honors Thesis– SO 486/SO 499 Ken Colburn
This course is designed as a capstone experience for Sociology/ Social Work Specialization and Criminology majors in their senior year at Butler. It is also an opportunity for students to apply the critical thinking, writing and communication skills they have acquired as students in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. Unlike other courses in the major, which attempt to introduce students to a specific topic, subject or skill (e.g., Social Deviance, Urban Society, Social Theory, or Research Methods), the Senior Seminar is organized around students making use of the knowledge, skills, sociological imagination, and liberal education they have acquired in their sociology and liberal arts undergraduate career through the completion of an Independent Research Project. The focus of this course is on each senior student demonstrating authorship, that is, a display of a mastery of the sociological perspective in the articulation and working out of a project the student has formulated. This course spans the entire the senior year although it meets formally only during the fall semester, as explained below.
This course is also at the same time a course in liberal education. Sociology is one of about a dozen disciplines known collectively as the liberal arts and sciences. The use of the term ‘liberal’ in this context has nothing to do with current political usage (e.g., “liberal vs. conservative”). Liberal education has long been a cornerstone of higher education in the United States. It promotes not only intellectual excellence and the love of learning over one’s lifetime but it also cultivates personal virtues and democratic values such as integrity, tolerance, leadership and the public good. In the context of the ancient Greek polis—exemplified by such thinkers and artists as Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Aeschylus, and Euripides—a liberal education was the education a person received who was free from the immediate constraints and burden of making a living as well as liberated from the bonds of ignorance, prejudice and conventional opinion. Liberal education then, as now, presupposed leisure and demanded from the individual an excellence of vision and a bold imagination rooted in a deep regard for the common good and the value of community and the individual.
Sociology is deeply rooted in the liberal arts tradition of critical, holistic inquiry and a concern with the linkage between individual well-being and the collective good. Karl Marx’s classic formulation of alienated labor, for example, points to the fundamental problem with a society organized around a conception of workers as dispensable commodities and the concept of work as an external compulsion devoid of personal meaning and relevance for the worker. Work and workers become a means to an end in such a world rather than ends in and for themselves. Obviously such a view of work is harmful and detrimental to the individual worker. But Marx further questions whether a society organized around such a dehumanizing conception of work and the worker is conducive to the common good. One consequence of such a society, Marx observed, is the creation of a large class of persons who prefer to distance and dissociate themselves from the public realm. As a result, the proletariat (the class of workers) are not only economically deprived but also socially, morally and intellectually deprived, and estranged further from community and themselves.
Writing nearly a century later in the mid-twentieth century, another sociologist, C. Wright Mills, argued that a new state of mind was needed to understand the causes and consequences of sweeping social and technological change on individuals and society in the contemporary world. Referring to this new quality of understanding as ‘the sociological imagination,’ Mills suggested that its domain was the intersection between private troubles and public issues: it may be a personal tragedy when a few persons lose their jobs, but it becomes a public issue when a large number of workers become unemployed. For example, manufacturing in the United States has become decreasing part of the economic landscape and, as a result, more factories are closing and more workers are losing jobs, obviously not due to their own fault. Such plant closings also impact communities that must deal with loss of revenue and more demand for more social services, even loss of population.
Marx challenges us to consider how a good society can exist when a significant number of the population are excluded from full participation in the good life enjoyed by a privileged few. Should we not judge a society by how well it is able to make available to all members of the community equal opportunities for happiness, self-fulfillment and the good life? Likewise Mills invites us to consider the connection between the individual’s biography and the larger social and economic structure as a public, and not merely an individual, matter. Marx and Mills in their own distinctive ways exemplify the sociological and liberal education commitments to ask the big, bold questions even if the answers are uncertain and the potential solutions difficult to imagine.
Goals
¨ To demonstrate mastery of the sociological perspective—theories, issues, concepts, and research methods—through the formulation and completion of an original research project.
¨ To demonstrate the sociological imagination—a reflective, critical standpoint on contemporary society which recognizes the intersection of private troubles and public issues—through conducting independent sociological research and analysis on a significant social issue or concern.
¨ To develop and to demonstrate the necessary analytical, professional and research skills for success in advanced graduate study and to meet career demands after graduation.
¨ To demonstrate an understanding of the holistic perspective and critical reasoning and communication skills of a liberal arts education.
Urban Studies: The American City – SO 487/GE 313/AN 354 Bruce Bigelow & Ken Colburn
This is a course in the liberal arts. Liberal education, rooted in a vision of the common good and the inherent value of community and the individual, has long been a cornerstone of higher education in the United States. As such the skills of oral and written communication, analysis of data, and critical thinking are nurtured. In addition, values which support democratic citizenship including knowledge of social problems, tolerance and understanding of ethnic and cultural diversity, and lifelong learning are encouraged.
A liberal arts perspective focuses on such critical questions as: What is the good life and how can individuals attain it? What is a good society, that is, what are the requirements for a just and vibrant collective life? And how are these two matters connected--does the possibility of attaining a good life for the individual necessarily require the existence of a good society?