Hello, dear friend, you can consult us at any time if you have any questions, add WeChat: daixieit

405453: Introductory Sociology

SOCIOL-XL 1

Fall 2025

Description

Survey of characteristics of social life, processes of social interaction and tools of sociological investigation. Transferable for UC credit.

Objectives

1. The student will demonstrate an understanding of the Sociological Imagination in the tradition of C. Wright Mills.

2. The student will demonstrate knowledge of cultural diversity.

3. The student will gain an awareness of the crucial importance of social locations and statuses in determining life chances.

4. The student will demonstrate knowledge of how behavior and self-image are shaped by the factors of nature and nurture.

5. The student will demonstrate knowledge of social science research methods, data interpretation, and the various ethical issues related to the research process.

6. The student will demonstrate knowledge of the major sociological perspectives: Structural Functionalism, Conflict Theory, and Symbolic Interactionism.

7. The student will gain an understanding of the social institutions created within society that meet the social needs of individual.

8. The student will learn how modern changes in technology and issues such as sex, gender, and race/ethnicity have the potential to impact the socialization process.

9. The student will gain an appreciation for the social processes that shape experience, definition, and enactment of the self and personal identity.

10. The student will understand how the social environment affects human behavior and how the individual affects the social environment.

Outcomes

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to:

1. Analyze social events using three major sociological theories: Symbolic Interactionism, Structural Functionalism, and Conflict Theory.

2. Demonstrate knowledge of the key concepts involved in the social sciences.

3. Show knowledge of and an appreciation and acceptance of cultural diversity.

4. Intelligently discuss the various academic theories of deviance and social control.

5. Identify the social problems affecting their community and propose solutions.

6. Employ social science research methods, data interpretation, and discuss the various ethical issues related to the research process.

7. Use critical thinking skills to identify, analyze, and discuss social phenomenon utilizing scientific research methods.

8. Explain the differences between sex and gender and how societal forces affect their social construction.

9. Discuss the social construction of race and ethnicity and how these key concepts have the potential to impact one’s life chances.

10. Demonstrate knowledge of the gender stratification and the societal impact of treating women as a minority group.

11. Demonstrate how meaning is a socially constructed phenomenon in the tradition of W. I. Thomas, George Herbert Mead, and Charles Horton Cooley among others.

12. Illustrate how language structures our perceptions of the world and affects how people think and act toward one another.