Introductory Sociology
(Soc 001)

Chris Chase-Dunn
University Of California, Riverside
Fall 2002, Tu-Th 2:00- 3:30pm
University Lecture Hall 1000
TAs: Andrew Jorgenson
Stephen Krawczuk
Guoping Jiang
Erika Gutierrez

David McCanna

Hiroko Inoue

 Course Web Site is at: http://iLearn.ucr.edu/
A student's username is the same as the student's user account on the server student.ucr.edu. The student's password is his or her 9 digit social security number with no dashes or spaces.

v. 9-23-02

This course covers the basic concepts of sociology and applies these concepts to the analysis of human societies. The first segment of the course explains the sociological perspective on human behavior and social institutions utilizing key concepts such as socialization, stratification, forms of integration, and the social construction of reality. The second segment of the course presents an overview of human social evolution from foraging bands to the global political economy. The third segment focuses on contemporary social change.

This is primarily a reading and lecture course. Lectures will be on Tuesday and Thursday from 2:10 to 3:30pm. It is very important to attend all the lectures and to take careful notes. Students are also required to attend a weekly Discussion Section meeting to ask questions about the readings and the lectures. Attendance will be taken at the Discussion Section meetings. Students should read the assignments prior to their Discussion Section meeting. The midterm and final are in-class short-answer essay exams. Study questions will be handed out the week prior to the exams. The midterm will be on Tuesday, October 29. The Final exam is on Thursday, December 12 from 11:30-1:30.
A five page Exercise Report is 
due the week of November 4-8 in Section. Grading will be based as follows: Discussion Section Participation = 20% Exercise = 25%, Midterm = 25%, Final = 30%. The following books are required reading and are available in the University Book Store:
Charles Lemert, Social Things
Stephen K. Sanderson, Macrosociology: An Introduction to Human Societies (4th ed.)
Stephen J. Rose, Social Stratification in the United States
W. Warren Wagar, A Short History of the Future

Thompson and Tunstall (photocopy produced by the Printing and Reprographics Service) is also in the University Boo Store. Readings marked with an asterisk (*) are required and should be read by the indicated dates. Others are recommended. Readings followed by a number in parentheses are in Thompson and Tunstall.


September 26: Overview of the course.

October 1:  Explanations of human behavior and the study of societies.

* Gouldner (1)

* Lemert, Social Things (whole book, skim Chaps. 4-7)

* Sanderson, Macrosociology, Chapter 1

October 3 I. SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND INSTITUTIONALIZATION
A. Social creation of the self: certification and socialization

* Mead (10)

* Georg Simmel, Conflict and the Web of Group Affiliations, pp. 138-63 (on reserve)
Jonathan H. Turner, On the Origins of Human Emotions, Stanford University Press, 2000.

October 8

B. Social construction of reality: institutionalization

*Berger and Luckman (43)

*Karl Marx, Capital, Vol. 1, Part 1, Section 4, "The fetishism of commodities" (on reserve)

October 10
C. Statuses and roles

*Merton (14)

*Goffman (13)

October 15

D. Types of social regulation: sharing, reciprocity, coercion, market exchange

*Blau (15)

*Karl Polanyi, "Our obsolete market mentality" Pp. 59-77 in George Dalton (ed.) Primitive, Archaic and ModernEconomies: Essays of Karl Polanyi. Boston, Beacon Press, 1968 (on reserve).

October 17

E. The moral order: deviance and social control; norms and values

*Robert Merton, "Social structure and anomie" (on reserve)

*Durkheim (7b)

*Kingsley Davis, "Jealousy and sexual property" (on reserve)

Kai Erikson, The Wayward Puritans

October 22
F. Social stratification: inequalities in small groups and in societies

*William F. Whyte, Street Corner Society, pp. 14-25 (on reserve)

*Marx and Engels (16a); Marx (16b)

*Weber (17)

*Erik Wright “Class counts: comparative studies in class analysis” (on reserve)

October 24 G.  Modes of accumulation and world-systems

*Chase-Dunn and Lerro, Social Change Chapter 2 (on reserve)

MIDTERM October 29



October 31
II. SOCIAL EVOLUTION: FROM SIMPLE TO COMPLEX SOCIETIES

*Sanderson, Chapters 2 and 3

Michael Mann, The Sources of Social Power, Volume 1

Exercise Report Due the week of November 4-8 in Section

November 5
A. Precapitalist socio-economic systems

*Sanderson, Chapters 4,5,6,11 and 15

*David Wilkinson, "Central Civilization" (on reserve)

November 7

B. Origins of the capitalist world-economy

*Sanderson, Chapter 7

*Immanuel Wallerstein, "Three paths to national development in l6th century Europe" (on reserve)

* Start reading, Wagar, A Short History of the Future. Finish by June 6

Fernand Braudel, The Perspective of the World, Volume 3 of Civilizations and Capitalism

November 12
C. The core countries

*Sanderson, Chapters 8,10,12

C. Chase-Dunn, "The development of core capitalism in the ante-bellum United States: tariff politics and class struggle in an upwardly mobile semiperiphery," Pp. 189-230 in Albert Bergesen (ed.) Studies of the Modern World-System

Giovanni Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century (London: Verso, 1994)

November 14
D. The underdeveloped periphery

* Andre Gunder Frank "The development of underdevelopment" (on reserve)

*Sanderson, Chapters 9,13

Volker Bornschier and Christopher Chase-Dunn, Transnational Corporations and Underdevelopment


November 19
III. CONTEMPORARY SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS

A. Class structure in the USA

* Rose, Social Stratification in the United States
* Sanderson, Chapter 10 (again)

November 21

B. Globalization
* C. Chase-Dunn, "Globalization: A World-Systems Perspective" Journal of World-Systems Research, Vol V, 2, 1999, 165-185. http://csf.colorado.edu/jwsr/archive/vol5/vol5_number2/html/chase-dunn/index.shtml

Philip McMichael, Development and Social Change

November 26

C. Family and Gender Roles

*Sanderson, Chapters 14 

Scott Coltrane, Gender and Families (Pine Forge, 1998)

December 3, 5

IV. PROGRESS?

*Wagar, A Short History of the Future, Part 1

*Sanderson, Chapter 18

Christopher Chase-Dunn and Bruce Podobnik, "The next world war: world-system cycles and trends" in Volker Bornschier and Christopher Chase-Dunn, The Future of Global Conflict (Sage, 1999). http://csf.colorado.edu/jwsr/archive/vol1/v1_n6.htm

Final Exam Thursday December 12, 11:30- 1:30

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