Teaching Sociology最新文献

{"title":"Introduction to the Special Issue: Teaching Apocalypse, Now","authors":"Graham Cassano, Barbara Gurr, Melissa F. Lavin, Christine Zozula","doi":"10.1177/0092055x221120866","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055x221120866","url":null,"abstract":"The past few years have been particularly turbulent ones socially, economically, and politically in the United States and around the world. Helping our students critically analyze the causes and effects of racial injustice, misogyny (including transphobia, homophobia, and restrictions on reproductive health care), and wealth gaps has long been part of the purview of a sociological education, and recently our classrooms have increasingly become spaces in which to consider militarism and war, a global pandemic, the deepening integration of technology into our lives, and the steep rise of authoritarianism both in the United States and elsewhere. Of course, added to this are the profound urgency of climate change and its undeniable impacts on our world. We are, many might argue, living in a dystopia. Or a horror film. Certainly, an apocalypse. All these terms—“dystopia,” “horror,” and “apocalypse”—are relative to history, race, gender, sexuality, dis/ability, and income, among other social factors. Certainly, the middle passage of the trans-Atlantic slave trade was horror; certainly, the genocide of Native Americans was apocalyptic and their continued survival a lesson in the postapocalypse. Just as certainly, the rash of antitransgender laws and the steep rise in forced-birth laws in recent years can be understood as dystopic, as can the COVID-19 global pandemic, the unremitting presence of (and reliance on) technology in our world, and the January 6, 2021, uprising against the U.S. presidential election. All of these and more can also be understood as signs or warnings of the future, particularly for sociologists who also study history. However, history and sociology are not the only fields that can help us—and help our students—understand the world around us. The stories we tell about these phenomena, particularly in literature and televisually (through TV and film), whether fiction or nonfiction, also offer important insights for the sociological imagination, perhaps even a checklist of conditions or a training manual for the future. We noted in our initial call for papers published in volume 49, issue 1 of Teaching Sociology in 2021 that “the salience of such narratives is (domestically and globally) acute”; the months since have only increased this urgency. In this special issue of Teaching Sociology, we consider what is to be gained by the use of horror, dystopia, and postapocalyptic stories in the sociology classroom. We take a transdisciplinary approach to sociology in considering the use of genre-specific tools, including popular media with which many students already have a familiarity, to encourage critical analysis of the social conditions that lead to and derive from conditions of unrest, disparity, injustice, and social change. Contributors offer insights into how certain stories can be used sociologically and also how students might negotiate social meanings through familiar media. However, contributors to this issue go beyond a mere ","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"305 - 308"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47271937","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Sociological Role of Empathy in the Classroom","authors":"Colleen E. Wynn, Elizabeth Ziff, Allison H. Snyder, Kamryn T. Schmidt, Lauryn L. Hill","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221123338","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221123338","url":null,"abstract":"Teaching during a global pandemic has prompted many discussions about how faculty can best support students and create classrooms where deep learning and engagement occur. In this conversation, we argue there is a role for empathy in college classrooms. We present data from interviews with faculty at a small, Midwestern, teaching-focused university during the fall of 2020. We map these perspectives onto the empathy paths framework and suggest that the therapeutic and instrumental paths are most useful for understanding empathy in the classroom. We also discuss why it is important for faculty to think about empathy and the role sociology can play in these conversations. Finally, we present a series of empathetic practices individual faculty can incorporate into their pedagogy and structural supports that departments and universities can provide to help faculty engage in empathetic practices in the classroom.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"51 1","pages":"181 - 192"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45164968","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Monsters, Michael Myers, and the Macabre as Tools to Explain Ideological Framing","authors":"Justin Huft","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120860","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120860","url":null,"abstract":"Framing as a metacommunicative device establishes the narrative of a given story and mobilizes emotional support. Within the framework of monster theory, horror movies are seen as a way of framing common fears about moral decay, concerns about the future, anxiety about outgroup members, and spiritual unknowns. In the classroom, we explore the monstrous body as a stand-in for the demonized (often literally) outgroup. Through tracing some of the historic roots of monsters, students are better able to see monsters as a recurring framing device for social fears. Utilizing the concepts of frame alignment (aligning individuals’ frames with larger social movement frames) and frame analysis (investigating the processes and mechanisms people utilize to make sense of situations), exploration of various subgenres of horror (including psychological horror, body horror, killers, monsters, zombies, and the paranormal) flesh out how frames are amplified, bridged, transformed, and extended.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"372 - 383"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46482231","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Handmaid Still in the Classroom? Using The Handmaid’s Tale in Sociology of Gender","authors":"B. Prince","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120861","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120861","url":null,"abstract":"Sociologists are uniquely positioned to use science fiction literature in the classroom. Despite students reading less, the science fiction novel The Handmaid’s Tale is more popular than ever. I obtained the data for this study through content analysis of 108 student journal entries in a sociology of gender course at a small liberal arts college. Journal entries were analyzed for identification and application of class concepts in addition to an overall rating of The Handmaid’s Tale. Students successfully identified and connected 58 distinct class concepts to the novel. The most common concepts that students identified were gender stereotype, doing gender, and patriarchy. In addition, students enjoyed the novel and rated it highly. The average rating was 4.2 stars out of 5. Results from this study suggest that science fiction remains relevant and useful in the contemporary sociology classroom.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"340 - 348"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43222150","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"What’s Blood Got to Do with It? A Culture of Cinema Horrors at the Precipice of an Abyss","authors":"Erin Siodmak, R. Scannell","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120870","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120870","url":null,"abstract":"At a cultural moment in which the horrifying is central, what are the pedagogical options available by which to teach and think with our students? Horror movies, like all media, are mythmakers; media and culture reflect and reproduce but also create or consolidate. Teaching horror leads to new conversations, makes the familiar strange, and gives students new language and tools through which to assess and rewrite cultural and social narratives. This conversation bridges sociology, gender studies, and media studies to highlight the importance and usefulness of film analysis and theoretical texts that fall outside of sociology in developing robust sociological and interdisciplinary dialogue. We review the films, texts, themes, and approaches that we have used to get students to read difficult theory, think collaboratively and critically, and write in ways that push their voices and ideas beyond that with which they are accustomed and comfortable.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"399 - 408"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41671916","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Black Dreams, Electric Mirror: Cross-Cultural Teaching of State Terrorism and Legitimized Violence","authors":"S. M. Rodriguez","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120868","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120868","url":null,"abstract":"Sci-fi has the power to open dialogue because its alternate world-building enables students to feel far enough from reality to discuss social problems unreservedly. In this essay, I review an assignment I developed using Black Mirror and Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams that present episodes in which militarized policing, segregation, and genocide occur with the consent and complicity of populations convinced that these measures enable their safety. Paralleling U.S. carceralism, the fictional communities have been inundated with media and political advertising for greater segregation but have themselves never experienced the criminalized violence that justifies widespread state harms. Through a generative dialogue engaging the media, a discussion question, and the concept of state terrorism, students move to observe their positionality and critically assess state violence. Therefore, I recommend this teaching tool for any critical instructors—especially minoritized professors teaching primarily White classrooms—to inspire a stimulating dialogue in service of connection-making and peacemaking in the classroom.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"392 - 398"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49042111","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"New Resources in TRAILS: The Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology","authors":"","doi":"10.1177/0092055x221120864","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055x221120864","url":null,"abstract":"TRAILS, a peer-reviewed digital teaching resources library developed by the American Sociological Association (ASA), is an innovative educational tool that provides sociology teachers with access to thousands of teaching resources. Launched on May 25, 2010, the website offers many useful features, such as a searchable database of peer-reviewed teaching resources and the ability to customize presented content based on the interests of the subscriber. The types of resources that can be found on TRAILS include syllabi, assignments, class activities, lectures, PowerPoint slides, and assessments. Resources published in TRAILS have been through a strong, two-stage process of peer review based in empirically proven best practices in pedagogy. Access is free for ASA members and available at a discounted price for nonmembers in Department Affiliate departments. Submission instructions for TRAILS can be found at http://trails.asanet.org/ Pages/SubmissionDetails.aspx. Questions regarding TRAILS can be directed to the editor, Dr. Gregory Kordsmeier, at gkordsme@iu.edu.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"409 - 411"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48112396","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Sociological Theory through Dystopian and Fictional World-Building: Assigning a Short Story Parable Inspired by Derrick Bell’s “The Space Traders”","authors":"Juan L. Salinas","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120863","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120863","url":null,"abstract":"This article is a reflective analysis of an assignment in which undergraduate students developed dystopian, postapocalyptic, fantasy, and fictional short story parables to illustrate their understanding of sociological theory. In a social theory course, students were assigned a final paper in which they designed a short story that integrated sociological theory, including classical and contemporary concepts, which were applied to these fictional worlds. The assignment encouraged students to develop both macro- and micro-level creative social theory analysis using a fictional society that often touches on the themes of futurism, science fiction, or postapocalyptic settings. These scenarios allowed students to engage in world-building linked to systems of oppression that were analyzed through various perspectives, including Marxist theories, critical race theory, and feminist theories. The assignment is a creative way for students to apply their sociological imagination with the world-building process for an in-depth understanding of sociological theory.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"331 - 339"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44184246","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"“Everyone Is Supersmart Now”: Learning Higher-Level and Critical Sociological Thinking from the Dystopian Satire of M.T. Anderson’s Feed","authors":"Benjamin Gallati","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120859","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120859","url":null,"abstract":"Sociology instructors have long used nontraditional texts such as literary fiction to demonstrate core course concepts, increase student engagement, and develop students’ critical thinking in the classroom. In this article, I explore how written assignments structured around identifying core course concepts in a dystopian novel that connects to student interests can help develop higher-level and critical sociological thinking skills. Using data from an upper-level Sociology of Media course at a large, Midwestern university, I detail a final paper assignment centered around M. T. Anderson’s dystopian satire novel Feed. I present qualitative and quantitative findings that demonstrate students’ successful use of higher-level and critical sociological thinking to identify, analyze, and support original arguments regarding core course concepts within the dystopian world and our own.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"309 - 321"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47233796","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Immersion in Alien Worlds: Teaching Ethnographic Sensibilities through Dystopian and Science Fiction","authors":"Katherine E. Fox","doi":"10.1177/0092055X221120858","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0092055X221120858","url":null,"abstract":"The Alien Worlds project teaches ethnographic skills using the societies of dystopian, postapocalyptic, and science fiction texts as imagined field sites and targets for analysis. These exercises and assignments, which illustrate principles of qualitative fieldwork, were developed when COVID-19 precautions made it impossible to assign tasks that involved in-person social interaction. Preliminary findings from use in 2020–2021 Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (n = 140) and Science Fiction and Society (n = 10) classes suggest that science fiction may have an ongoing place in beginning and intermediate social science courses, as it provides an entertaining, low-stakes way for students to practice observation and analysis. The original project is designed to span at least six weeks or the course of a semester, but variations for shorter and stand-alone assignments are provided in addition to ways that it can be adapted to suit the needs of different audiences. Though it will not replace all in-person field experience for advanced sociology and anthropology students, it provides a bridge between classroom content and hands-on interaction that encourages a growth mindset in learning.","PeriodicalId":46942,"journal":{"name":"Teaching Sociology","volume":"50 1","pages":"384 - 391"},"PeriodicalIF":2.2,"publicationDate":"2022-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44940784","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"教育学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}