Honors 220: Social Science and Society

Class, Culture and Gender across the Life Span

Spring 2003

Understanding the great human variety, with the tremendous range of experiences and realities across time and place, remains beyond the grasp of even the most powerful imaginations.  Each of us is born into a particular world, we grow accustomed to its conditions and confines, and then perceive the world within the limits of those conditions. Other people are then often understood according to our rules and expectations rather than their own.  The social and behavioral sciences aim to provide explanations for the patterns, the commonalities, and the differences across the range of human experience.  In so doing, these sciences challenge us to listen to others, to consider alternative points of view, and to identify the forces that operate to make human worlds what they are.

We cannot, of course, cover the whole of the great human variety in this course, but we will consider and discuss a variety of perspectives, realities and human experiences.  The course is organized around the issues, problems, and concerns that change and develop over the life span in contemporary American society.   In addition, we will see how an individual’s life course is affected by differences in social class, gender and culture.

Our explorations of some of the age, class, gender, and cultural differences will be considered from both a psychological and a sociological perspective. Psychology attempts to identify, describe and explain how individuals adapt to their environments.  Sociology attempts to identify, describe and explain how societies and social arrangements operate and come to be.  Therefore, we will be considering both how social environments influence individuals and how social environments are created and perpetuated by the activities that make them up.  Students will conduct in-depth interviews as part of a group-based research project. 

At the completion of this course, we hope and intend that you will have:

·         Greater appreciation for the diversity in American society.

·         Greater awareness of the inequities in society and how differences in class, culture, and gender influence people’s perspectives, experiences, and life chances.

·         Deeper understanding of how social science is produced and how explanations in the social sciences are constructed.

·         A general understanding of the disciplines of sociology and psychology and the differences between them.   

·         Advanced your critical thinking, writings and verbal skills.

·         Gained insight into the course of human development and the physical, social, and intellectual factors that influence changes over the life span.

Reviving Ophelia: Saving the Selves of Adolescent Girls, Mary Pipher, Ballantine Books, 1995.

Freedom Summer, Doug McAdam, Oxford University Press, 1990.

Worlds Apart: Why Poverty Persists in Rural America, Cynthia Duncan, Yale University Press, 1999.

The Fountain of Age, Betty Friedan, Touchstone Books, 1994.

A packet of photocopied readings is also required.

All students are expected to attend class, participate in class discussions, read the assigned materials, and complete all assignments on time.

Your course grade will be based on the following:

1. Fourth hour assignments: 25%

2. Final paper: 25%

3. Panel presentation: 10%

4. Participation and attendance: 10%

5. Midterm: 15%

6. Final: 15%

1. Fourth hour assignments: Each student will take part in a group that will meet for the fourth hour of this class. Each group will pick a topic related to the class on which they will carry out library research and interviews. Group members will prepare a panel presentation and individual final papers from this activity.

Assignments will build on each other to prepare for these final products:

1.      Group develops a preliminary topic to investigate.

2.      Each individual reviews 2 relevant articles found in the library.

3.      Group develops an interview schedule, based on what they have learned from the articles they have reviewed. The interview should allow for exploration and clarification of the individual’s experiences.

4.      Each individual carries out and transcribes two interviews.

5.      Each student will write two reaction papers to other group members’ interviews, including reflection upon how the interview relates to the research.

6.      Each group will present a panel on their project.

7.      Each individual will complete a final paper.

Points will be assigned for the fourth-hour assignments as follows:

Topic:                           10 points

Review of articles:         20

Interview schedule        10

Interview                      20

Reaction paper #1        15

Reaction paper #2        15

Group participation       10

Total                            100 points

The final grade for this part of the course will then be calculated as usual: 90-100 A, 80-89 B, etc.

2. The Final Paper.  Details on the final paper will be provided.  The library research and the interviews carried out as part of the assignments described above will provide the groundwork for the research paper.  The final paper is due April 29^th.

3. Panel presentation.  A panel presentation based on the research papers will be scheduled for the last two weeks of the semester. Details will be provided in class.

4. Attendance and participation. This grade is based not only on your attendance and verbal participation in class, but also on completing your work on time, staying up to date with the readings, and our overall evaluation of your effort to create a learning context for yourself and others in the classroom.

5 and 6. Midterm and final exam.  The format of these exams will be discussed in class.

Students who need course adaptations or accommodations because of documented disability, or who have emergency medical needs, or who need special arrangements in case the building must be evacuated should see me as soon as possible.

(Note: some additional readings may be added to this schedule.)

January 21            Introduction to the class

January 23-30      Introduction of Psychology and Sociology as disciplines and their methodologies: the life-span approach, socialization and stratification

Readings: Rutter, M. & Rutter, M. (1993). Developing Minds. “Why are people so different from one another?” (pp. 12-37). N.Y.: Basic Books.

Charles Lemert, “Imagining Social Things, Competently,” and “Personal Courage and Practical Sociologies” Pp. 1-30 in Social Things: An Introduction to the Sociological Life

Coles, Robert (1993). “Method,” Pp. 1-30 in a Call to Service: A Witness to Idealism,

Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

February 4            Interviewing

Johnson, J. (2002). In-depth interviewing. In Gubrium, J.F., & Holstein, J.A. (2002). Handbook of interview research. (pp. 103-119) Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

February 6-13       Infancy: Issues of attachment – Dr. Levine

Readings:

2/6 Sroufe, L.A. (1997). Emotional Development. “Attachment: the dyadic regulation of emotion” (pp. 172-191). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

2/11 Sroufe, L.A., Carlson, E., & Shulman, S. Individuals in relationships: development from infancy through adolescence. In Funder, D.C., Parke, R.D., Tomlinson-Keasey, C., & Widaman, K. (1993). Studying Lives Through Time. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

2/13 Fraiberg, S. “The ghosts in the nursery.” In Clinical Studies in Infant Mental Health.

February 18-27     Childhood

Readings:

Eder, Donna, (1995) “Segregating the Unpopular from the Popular,” Pp. 31-59 in School Talk: Gender and Adolescent Culture. Rutgers University Press.

Adler, Patricia and Peter Adler (2002). “Peer Power: Clique Dynamics among School Children.” Pp. 165-180 in Mapping the Social Landscape, edited by Susan Ferguson, Boston: McGraw Hill.

March 4-13           Adolescence: Issues of gender – Dr. Levine

Readings: Mary Pipher, Reviving Ophelia and a chapter from Real Boys, to be distributed.

March 18              Midterm exam

March 20-April 3 Early Adulthood: Critical Incidents in the Life Span

Readings: McAdam, D. (1988) Freedom Summer. Oxford University Press.

March 25-27         Spring break

April 8-15              Middle Adulthood: Issues of class

Readings: Duncan, C.M. (1999) Worlds Apart. Yale University Press.

April 17-24            Late Adulthood: Issues of Age – Dr. Levine

Readings: Friedan, B. (1994). The Fountain of Age. Touchstone Books.

April 29-May 8     Class presentations

Final exam: Thursday, May 15, 11AM-1PM