New Resources in TRAILS: The Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology

Assignments

“Classical Social Theory: Lifeboat Survivors.” Billy R. Brocato. AREA: Theory. As students learn about the different classical social theory perspectives that have guided the field of sociology, it is time to put their understanding to work. Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Max Weber provided frameworks that described and explained the social factors, interactions, and normative values used to stabilize or improve their societies. For example, Durkheim is a structural-functionalist, Weber values rationalization and the meaning behind social actions, and Marx focuses on the social conflicts linked to the unequal distribution of power among the proletariat and the bourgeoisie. This activity—a lifeboat scenario—provides students an opportunity to consider real-life social justice issues. The critical essay (or group presentation) also allows for concrete application of the key elements that make up a specific paradigm and foster considerations emerging from students’ biases, for example, race, gender, social class, occupational positions, culture.

“Defining Family: A Case Study Activity.” Emily Ruehs-Navarro. AREA: Family. One of the first tasks in a sociology class on family is to help students to define the concept of the family. Instructors often work to complicate the meaning of family, challenge normative definitions, and assist students in thinking through the importance of this definition. In this activity, students will use case studies to explore these issues.

“Gender Shark Tank.” Matt Reid. AREA: Sex and Gender. We all share a common context of understanding when it comes to consumer products, and in our capitalistic culture, corporations exploit gender as a means of profit. We see this in the ubiquity of gendered products and services, none of which have any real need to be masculinized or femininized. To reinforce the understanding of gender as a social construction, students will work individually or in groups to “gender” a product or service and then present their creation in the format of a Shark Tank pitch. Students will also apply and explain concepts from the class and readings in their pitch. This fun activity can serve as a standard grade item or a friendly competition for extra credit.

“Identifying Manifestations of Color-Blind Racism.” Laura M Krull. AREA: Race, Class, and Gender. This resource details an assignment that accompanies Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s Racism without Racists, a foundational text on race and racism used in many sociology classrooms today. This text can feel theoretical at times, so one way to further solidify students’ understanding is to challenge them to use Bonilla-Silva’s theoretical concepts to analyze real-world examples. For this assignment, students work in small groups to respond to instructor-provided examples of everyday color-blind racism. They explain what element(s) of color-blind racism are present and then provide a critique grounded in other materials and concepts from class.

“Introduction to Qualitative Analysis: A Coding Exercise Using the Material Culture of College Students.” Jeffrey S. Debies-Carl. AREA: Qualitative Methodology. This exercise gives students a very brief and simple but effective experience with qualitative analysis. Students will generate their own data, analyze it through a coding procedure, and draw some tentative conclusions that will provide them with an understanding of how patterns can be found in qualitative data. They will also have a chance to engage in some introspection grounded in the data. In groups, students produce a list of whatever personal objects they have with them in class. Applying principles of open coding, they next reduce this list into a small number of meaningful categories. Finally, they answer a series of questions—as an assignment or for class discussion—that prompt them to interpret these categories. What does this material culture say about the life of a modern college student, and how might this compare to students from other time periods? Designed to be completed in 20 to 30 minutes, this exercise does not require any special materials or preparation. It works well as a general introduction to the spirit of qualitative research for first-year students, but it can also serve as the first step in a program of more rigorous methodological instruction that builds on its fundamental lessons.

“Persuasive Blog Post Assignment.” Carol L. Glasser. AREA: Animals and Society. In this assignment, students develop and write a persuasive blog post over the course of six to seven weeks through a series of staged assignments. This assignment is ideal for smaller classes (less than 20) but has been successfully taught with class sizes between 25 and 30 students. The assignment is geared toward introductory students and can be easily edited for any Introduction to Sociology course or topical lower-division sociology course. In their blog post, they will make an evidence-based argument to support their own opinion about a sociological topic related to course content. Materials provided include a schedule of assignment due dates, assignment guidelines, an in-class exercise, and grading rubrics. Staged assignments allow for small weekly activities between assignment due dates to make the various steps of the writing clear. This is particularly important because these steps, such as brainstorming, writing drafts, and identifying counterarguments, are not always taught to students. Persuasive writing and writing for a general audience are particularly useful skills for sociology students, as they will often find themselves in conversations about topics that many people have differing opinions about (race, gender, education, etc.). These are topics about which they have studied and have evidence-based opinions, so this assignment will help them learn how to frame their opinions like experts.

“Teaching Social Mobility Using a Virtual Field Experience That Combines a Podcast with Google Maps.” Trenton G. Ellis. AREA: Stratification/Mobility. Combining a podcast episode with Google Maps, this assignment is a virtual field experience designed for learning about social mobility as it manifests in the lives of poor children in the United States. Specifically, the assignment encourages students to evaluate the meritocracy narrative of social class mobility in the United States. First, students view a short instructor-created YouTube video tutorial on using Google Maps. Second, students access Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History podcast episode “Carlos Doesn’t Remember” via streaming or download. Third, while listening to the podcast, students virtually “walk” (via Google Maps) around the neighborhoods surrounding three schools described by the podcast host. Fourth, students take “photos” (screen grabs) representing perceived inequities between these neighborhoods. Finally, students upload photos and answer a series of discussion questions about key concepts and themes—particularly those related to social mobility and inequality. Limited resources and other factors pose practical challenges to field experiences for sociology students. Fortunately, online tools help instructors facilitate virtual sociological field experiences across various course modalities (online, in-person, synchronous, asynchronous, hybrid, etc.). Podcasts and web mapping software, like Google Maps, are two such technologies.

“Using Sociological Images to Develop the Sociological Imagination.” Georgiana Bostean. AREA: Introduction to Sociology/Social Problems. This resource provides students with practice developing their sociological imaginations through a scaffolded two-assignment series. Instructors can choose to use one or both assignments, and the assignments are well suited for both face-to-face and online courses. The series is assigned after students read C. Wright Mills’s Sociological Imagination and after learning major sociological theories and concepts. The assignments use the Sociological Images blog and students’ own visual images (e.g., photographs) to meet course learning goals: (1) link sociological theories and concepts to social events/trends, (2) apply these ideas to real life by identifying sociologically relevant images in daily life, and (3) communicate sociological analysis in academic and popular written forms. Instructors can adapt the assignments to topical courses, such as Social Stratification or Gender and Family, by asking students to focus on images related to the course topics. The materials provided in this resource include assignment guidelines and rubric.

Class Activities

“Conferred Dominance in the Built Environment: A Campus Accessibility Activity.” Chelsea A. Platt. AREA: Introduction to Sociology/Social Problems. This activity builds on Peggy McIntosh’s discussion and reflection on privilege through interactive learning. The concept of “privilege” is a foundational term to understand power and the reproduction of social inequalities for introductory and lower-level sociology courses. Many activities have been developed to illustrate the effect of privilege to students, ranging from reviewing privilege lists to personal reflections on privileged and marginalized identity categories. While a focus on individual identity is an effective way to think about individual experiences of advantage and disadvantage, it is often challenging for students to understand how privilege is also structural and systemic, not just something they experience individually. In this activity, students examine various spaces on the university campus to illustrate how able-body privilege is reproduced through the design and function of various spaces. McIntosh describes conferred dominance as a form of privilege that gives power or control over a group. Conferred dominance helps explain why systems of privilege are persistent and reproduced through interaction. This activity illustrates the ways in which privilege is embedded in social structures and organizations and also confers dominance through the design of spaces. While the activity focuses on physical-ability privilege, instructors can apply the activity to illustrate how other forms of privilege are also reproduced through the organization and structure of society.

“Gender Socialization and Children’s Halloween Costumes.” Alexandra Hendley. AREA: Sex and Gender. This content analysis activity allows students to examine the role that mass media and consumer culture play in children’s gender socialization. More specifically, students analyze the gendered meanings within marketing materials for children’s Halloween costumes. In discussion and/or in response to a written assessment question, students can identify how costume names, descriptions, and/or images are often gendered in stereotypical ways. Students can also identify ways that those stereotypes are challenged.

“Marvel Comics Gender Socialization Activity.” Meagan Amanda Pittman. AREA: Deviant Behavior/Social Disorganization. In this activity, small groups of students will analyze photos of Marvel characters (both in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and in their comic book form) to consider what messages are to be gained from popular media about gender and socialization. Once they complete the character analysis portion, in their groups, they will characterize the characters’ appearances, masculinity, and femininity and how the character appearances relate to the cultural expectations of men and women. Finally, individually, students complete a reflection focused on the media they consumed when they were growing up and how the messages they received helped to socialize them. The activity ends with a debrief and a discussion of their characterizations as well as a discussion of the social construction of gender, norms, and deviance (particularly deviating from gender norms). This activity can be used when discussing gender, social construction of reality, or deviance. It can be adapted to other popular media examples (like the Star Wars franchise), and it can be adapted to be completed online if necessary.

“Teaching Symbolic Interactionist Theory Through Werewolf.” Nicholas Baxter. AREA: Theory. Engaging with symbolic interaction theory can be a powerful experience for students, due to its potential to challenge taken-for-granted assumptions and analyze students’ everyday life. However, some students may have difficulty grasping the significance of the underlying concepts contained within the perspective. This class activity uses the game Werewolf as a student-centered applied-learning activity to teach symbolic interactionist theory and concepts. Werewolf provides a simulation game where students can engage in social interaction that exemplifies symbolic interactionist and dramaturgical concepts, including the premises of symbolic interaction, impression management, front stage/backstage, stigma, labeling, and the social construction of reality. Furthermore, since students take part in the interpretive processes within the game, they are also better able to understand how symbolic interactionist concepts and meaning making are a continuous process being accomplished through social interaction. Students will gain an understanding of the process of meaning construction, its role in social interactions, and the way that social meanings can result in stigma and labeling.