Required Resources: Chapters 6, 7, 9 & 18 & Media Links from this module. I provide the media links because I think they enhance the process of learning about sociology and make it easier to ground the theories in real life. To that end, in each module, students will write a 750-1000-word essay and two 300 word responses to other students’ essays. I’m looking for integration: That means every chapter in all substantive chapters, and spread the media links and your personal insights around too. Think TOPICAL. Write about something, then use your new sociological perspective to analyze and more deeply understand your taken for granted world. Module 01 is required, but the system will drop the TWO lowest grades out of the remaining FIVE (Modules 02-06) This is a multi-step process and should not be approached all at once one hour before a deadline! Step One: Complete Primary Post = 7 points – Due on last Thursday of each Module: Write a 500-750 word essay about your understanding of the concepts from the textbook, through the lens of the media links you watched and in context of your life (conventional wisdom/common sense). Tell the readers what you watched, listened to, and read and how these impacted your understanding of the “taken for granted world.” Write how these links helped you understand chapters concepts and in what ways. It is especially interesting if you can tell us about the preconceived notions you had about some topics and how the information in the media helped change, reinforce, and/or modify that conventional wisdom. This process may be challenging at first, but I promise, it will get easier with each board. These are not summaries of what you did. They are learning documents showing what you learned and how you are making connections (micro/macro) how you are developing your sociological imagination and/or your sociological perspective. There are integration requirements for each essay. Integration Requirement 1: 4 (FOUR) concepts from each chapter in the relative module. Integration means you needs to spread terms throughout the essay – do not bunched them all up in one paragraph. Highlight ONLY the first important time you reference a textbook word, concept, date, or person to help me assess your ability to integrate the new terminology. Do not highlight a whole sentence or paragraph, just the term. Use a different color for EACH CHAPTER and provide a KEY to help me grade. Integration Requirement 2: 3 (THREE) Media links from that module. Use a signal phrase to introduce the media links when you use them the first time. You will use the same color for all the media (as if they are their own chapter). Integration Requirement 3: 2 (TWO) Insights derived from your life. This is where and how you use your sociological imagination, showing the micro macro connections your coursework is revealing. Bold/Italics these tidbits. Consider your life thus far and how the textbook concepts and the media links can shed light on or lift the veil from aspects of your life. In other words, write about your developing sociological perspective and show us how you are developing your sociological imagination. Example: “As I learned about Marx’s concept of the false consciousness, I was struck by the way I’ve noticed this happening at work. For instance, my colleagues and I are the proletariat, and we are often in competition with each other and do not look at our bosses for an understanding of why we cannot get a raise. This especially occurred to me after watching the School of Life video because I thought about how if I studied my coworkers, immersing myself in that world by conducting an ethnography, I might notice how they……)” Yellow = Chapter 1, Pink = Chapter 2, Red = Media Link Media links & instructions It will take approximately 2 hours and 10 minutes to review this whole page. Leadership (This section will take approximately 30 minutes to complete) Think of any organization where you’ve worked. Who was the “boss?” what kind of leader was that person? Now think about how many of the leaders you’ve encountered were women. More than your parents would have reported at your age, but still not fifty fifty, even though women are almost half of the total workforce. https://www.dol.gov/wb/stats/stats_data.htm https://www.dol.gov/wb/stats/NEWSTATS/facts.htm Now watch this TED conference from Sheryl Sandberg and try to understand gender in the workplace. http://www.ted.com/talks/sheryl_sandberg_why_we_have_too_few_women_leaders?language=en Deviance (It will take about an hour to review the items under this section) Consider this image. crimerate19602010.png What parts of our society can we use to explain how and why crime rates have so greatly reduced since circa 1990? Does it feel like crime is “down” in your lived experience? How much news do you watch? Consider this webpage about a study from Gallup on perceptions of crime: http://www.gallup.com/poll/179546/americans-crime-last-year.aspx Basically, even though crime rates have been going DOWN, many people believe that crime has increased in their respective localities. Again, how can we account for crime going down? Brainstorm that for a just a minute – what do you come up with as explanations? Does your list look anything like this? Possible Reasons for crime rate drop.jpg When you watch “It’s NOT ALWAYS a wonderful life” (About 15 minutes): Look for the spurious correlations people were making to explain the decline in crime in the late 80s early 90s. The reasons shown here account for just 50% of the drop, what accounts for the other 50%? If you have Netflix, the whole movie of Freakonomics is free online (without any Spanish subtitles!) Otherwise, I have linked a free oline copy for you (with Spanish subtitles.) http://documentary-movie.com/freakonomics/ To watch the segment, “It’s not always a wonderful life,” pull the film to 49:45. (With the Vimeo copy, you’ll have to let movie load a for a little bit before you can drag the curser). I’m not going to give away the punch line here, BUt I look forward to the discussion board posts about this one! While crime has gone down, we can all agree that there are still crimes being committed. Once someone has been found guilty and needs to goto to prison, what should that prison look like? Who should manage it and how should it be managed? Brainstorm those questions for a minute. There are basically four philosophies behind prison and punishment: Retribution Deterrence Isolation Rehabilitation What is the use of each of these? What percentage should we focus on each of these? How much are YOU willing to pay for prisoners? What do we do with those folks? What is the best way to create and maintain a prison? How do we pay for all the people behind bars? Consider this graphic: incarceratedamericans19202006.jpg Notice anything? How did we get so many people behind bars? What are the manifest and latent functions of this many people being incarcerated? Can you connect up the rate of decline in criminal behavior and the increase in incarceration rates? Consider these two videos clips. First, watch NOW: Prisons for Profit (25 minutes). This is a conversation we will have again when we discuss Higher Education. Consider that our tax dollars are paying for all prisons, but SOME of those prisons are being run like a “business” in that there is profit to be handed out at the end of each quarter – profit that was generated from Tax dollars. So basically, you are paying for someone’s second home, or boat, or vacation with your tax revenue. http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/419/ Now, watch this short clip about Norway prisons (about 9 minutes). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01mTKDaKa6Q What do you think of their philosophy on incarceration? Any guess how the recidivism rates in the US compare to those in Norway? Here, let me show you: norway versus us.png Stratification It will take approximately 60 minutes to go through this section. Clips from the Documentary “People Like Us” http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=C6D871A2A8C3C8EF&feature=iv&annotation_id=annotation_429839&src_vid=nU5MtVM_zFs The full length documentary is available at your library; however, watching these clips online is fine. Description: “How do income, family background, education, attitudes, aspirations, and even appearance mark someone as a member of a particular social class? Discusses how social class plays a role in the lives of all Americans, whether they live in Park Avenue penthouses, Appalachian trailer parks, bayou houseboats or suburban gated communities. Travels across the U.S. to present stories of family traditions, class mobility, and different lifestyle choices.” Next, watch TWO clips from the Jon Stewart Show http://www.cc.com/video-clips/ro5l52/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-world-of-class-warfare—warren-buffett-vs–wealthy-conservatives http://www.cc.com/video-clips/jfmt11/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-world-of-class-warfare—the-poor-s-free-ride-is-over This is a segment from an episode of the Daily Show from 2011. As you watch, listen for the ways the rich and poor are described by the talking heads. Think about the simplistic dichotomy that they offer, rich versus poor. Now look at the data in the textbook about social class. Are we really divided like that? What do you know about regressive versus progressive taxes? If someone doe not pay Federal Income tax, what other kinds of taxes might he or she pay? Watch a TED https://www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson The “Real World” Find 4 friends and play Monopoly – my way! If you are all interested in gathering your friends and or family to play Monopoly, please let me know. I can set up a time to visit the Southshore campus and we can play! Or, you can read the instructions in this folder and see if you can figure it out. I’m happy to chat with you to help you get a game set up. When you play Monopoly my way, you will play a stratified game, whereby each player has a different amount of money, different (or no) property to start and gets different amounts of money when they pass GO. THE IRON = THE DOG = THE CAR = THE HAT = THE HORSE = Basically, that’s the main differences. If I’m in a classroom, I let students play for about 35 or 40 minutes and then talk about the experience. Here’s a break down of the start of the game: Basic Monopoly Explanation.docx CEO to Worker ratio How much is enough? http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/06/business/dealbook/sec-approves-rule-on-ceo-pay-ratio.html?_r=0 Economics & Politics The clips, articles, and images in this section will take approximately 90 minutes minutes to go through. NO matter which one of these you choose to watch, you should be able to see the intersection of the economy, our government and corporations. In what way does this intersection benefit the worker versus the shareholder? How should we measure Walmart’s impact on our society? Remember back to The Story of Stuff and the notion of Externalized Costs? Watch this Frontline about Walmart. 55:09 http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/walmart/ Or, you can watch this documentary about Walmart 1 hour, 37 minutes Walmart The High Cost Of Low Price Check out this article from The Nation: Walmart Wages Are the Main Reason People Depend on Food Stamps by Peter Van Buren And while we’re on the subject of SNAP: Snap facts from 2011 4 out of 5 are not expected to work.jpg Finally, a short article with lots of interesting reports and citations for your info. Politics: https://www.theadvocates.org/quiz/ I am not advocating for the folks that run this site, but this quiz is a great barometer of where your head is at today. Answers to questions like these can and will change as you live your life. Keep in mind we have a system of government (set forth in the Constitution) and we then approach that system with different philosophies – that’s politics!