Last class is on Friday, December 10, 1999. Course objectives . The course aims at enabling students to query, analyze and understand the dynamics of social life. Objectives include ability to raise questions about social life, formulate ideas about how social life is patterned, and how social life is shaped by social conditions and, in turn, shapes thought and action, and skills in analyzing problems. The course introduces concepts for understanding social life, and theories about how life is patterned, how life is shaped by social conditions, and how social life affects beliefs.
Topics are divorce, abortion, crime, inequality, prejudice, and television violence.
We will address questions such as the following. The course utilizes lectures by the professor, readings from textbook, quizzes, recitations, and homework assignments that employs user-friendly software, SPSS, for analyzing data on social life. The analyses provide experience in formulating questions, testing hypotheses and interpreting evidence about social life. Sociology is introduced by doing. Philosophy of teaching .