Theories of Social Change (SOCI 435)

SOCI 435 surveys several different theories, concepts, and categories used by sociologists to explain social change. Students will be asked to draw from these theories and concepts when examining some of the social, economic, and political transformations occurring at the end of the twentieth century.

Course evaluation, in the form of a final assignment, research proposal, and research paper, requires you to engage the contemporary social issues discussed in your local paper or presented on websites of various social groups and institutions.

These analytical tools will provide a foundation from which students can critically assess such current social transformations as the population question, the collapse of communism and the end of the cold war, the global AIDS issue, the increasing pollution of the planet, the domination of the nation state by transnational corporations and global trading blocks, new forms of North-South imperialism, the Americanization or homogenization of global culture, the power of the worldwide news media, and more.