Fall 2024 Advising Guide

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Academic Advisement Information & Tips to prepare for registration

Fall 2024 Course Descriptions

General Sociology Major Overview and Requirements

General Anthropology Major Overview and Requirements

SOC 301 is recommended for students considering careers in the social sciences and humanities, planning to pursue advanced degrees, or interested in social action training. It is also a great course for anyone interested in intellectual history.

This student and faculty mentor will specify the learning assistant’s duties in a contract to be completed before the start of the Fall semester. Must be taken as a full-unit and will count as a 300-level Sociology elective as SOC 397. SOC 301 is scheduled for Tuesday/Friday 2:00-3:20pm and 3:30-4:50pm.

For more information on Learning Assistant Responsibilities and to apply, please fill out the form at the link here.

Each semester the department offers at least one mentored research course with a faculty member. Working in small groups, students gain valuable research experience while assisting a faculty member with their ongoing research projects. For Fall 2024, Dr. Didi-Ogren is recruiting a student research team:

ANT 390 Research Course in Anthropology with Dr. Didi-Ogren – Language and Identity in a Weekend Language School

Instructor: Dr. Holly Didi-Ogren (holly.didi-ogren@tcnj.edu)

How are social identities indexed (referenced), expressed, and constructed? How does language work as a key medium through which these things happen? This research seminar will give students the tools to learn about how social identities and cultural practices are brought into being through linguistic interaction. We will do so by deeply engaging in the social life of a Japanese Weekend School operating every Sunday on the nearby Rider University Campus.

No knowledge of Japanese is required. Students who will get the most out of this research seminar will have background in *at least one* of the following areas: 1) Cultural Anthropology (such as ANT110); 2) Linguistics (such as WLC215 or ANT213); 3) Japanese language

Class meeting time: M/Th 12:30-1:50

[if you are interested in participating but can’t meet at the scheduled time, let Dr. Didi-Ogren know. There may be flexibility in scheduling.]

To apply for consideration for this research course, please email Dr. Didi-Ogren at holly.didi-ogren@tcnj.edu

Human culture can be observed, studied, recorded, and shared in many ways. From the earliest portable video recorders, anthropologists have attempted to capture human behavior through film. While film provides a valuable method of preserving cultural behavior, questions remain about filmmaker biases as well as the subjects’ portrayals of behavior. This course will focus on the use of film as a tool to document cultures, both modern and historic. It will include intensive viewing and analysis of many ethnographic films depicting behavior, ritual, and cultures from a wide range of filmmakers and global cultures. The class will critique and compare these various themes. It will include a component of producing a short film about an anthropological topic.

 Fall 2024 Course Descriptions

ANT 110 / Intro to Cultural Anthropology

A survey of the major concepts of social-cultural anthropology.  Cross-cultural comparison will be a central concern of the course, as will the process of cultural change.

ANT 111 / Intro to Biological Anthropology

What makes us human?  Is it the use of language, the ability to manipulate material culture or the fact that we are bipedal?  This course will focus on evolutionary theory and the theory of natural selection, the behavior and anatomy of non-human primates, and the evolution of modern humans.  Students will also learn how anthropology is directly related to other disciplines including sociology, biology, ecology and geology. (Note:  this course has no lab, and while it satisfies the liberal learning requirement for a natural science course, it does NOT satisfy the requirement for a natural science with lab).

ANT 305 / Human Evolution

The study of human evolutionary past, using various methods, including archaeology and the interpretation of skeletal morphology. Evolutionary principles and processes of change  are used as a theoretical background to examine our non-human primate relatives, the human fossil record, and biological variation in modern human populations. It is recommended, but not required, that students complete ANT111 prior to enrolling in this course.

ANT 340 / Social Change in Latin America (crosslisted with SOC 342)

Latin America has been the subject for much debate about development in social theory.  This course examines the theoretical debates about development and provides empirical case studies to highlight how social change occurs in Latin America.  These themes include:  economic globalization, gender, migration, resistance to social change, urbanization, environmental degradation, corruption, social movements, structural adjustment, and race relations.

ANT 370 / Topics in Anthropology: Ethnographic Film

Human culture can be observed, studied, recorded, and shared in many ways. From the earliest portable video recorders, anthropologists have attempted to capture human behavior through film. While film provides a valuable method of preserving cultural behavior, questions remain about filmmaker biases as well as the subjects’ portrayals of behavior. This course will focus on the use of film as a tool to document cultures, both modern and historic. It will include intensive viewing and analysis of many ethnographic films depicting behavior, ritual, and cultures from a wide range of filmmakers and global cultures. The class will critique and compare these various themes. It will include a component of producing a short film about an anthropological topic.

ANT 390 / Research Course in Anthropology

A small group of students work closely with a faculty member on his/her ongoing research.  Students will learn to use the data collection and analysis methods used for the project and be offered opportunities to present the findings on campus or at a regional professional meeting. See description above for Fall 2024 research course with Dr. Didi-Ogren.

ANT 398 / 499 Senior Capstone Experience in Anthropology (crosslisted with SOC 398/499) – see description below. Enrollment with department consent

SOC 101 / Intro to Sociology

Sociology explores the intersection of biography and history.  Students learn the basic foundations of sociology, including its development as a field of inquiry, early sociological theory, and methodology.  The course also analyzes social organization, addressing culture, structure, socialization, and social control. Students investigate how culture, class, race, sex, family, medicine, business, religion, education, and government affect our lives.  Special attention is paid to the impact of society on self.

SOC 301 / Development of Socio-Cultural Theory

SOC 101 or ANT 110 is a pre-requisite (with a B- or better required of Sociology majors/minor)

The response of social theorists to the consequences of the industrial revolution and the issues of capitalism, secularism, modern consciousness, and the socio-critical enterprise, as seen through the work of such theorists as Marx, Durkheim, and Weber.  Contemporary development of these theories will also be discussed.

SOC 302 / Quantitative Research Methods

SOC 101 (B- or better), & STA 115 (B- or better) or STA 215 (C+ or better) are prerequisites. SOC302 and a required 80-minute lab class are co-requisites.

The course is designed to familiarize students with quantitative research methodology, methods of quantitative data collection, and analysis of quantitative data used in sociology.  In addition, students will learn one of the most widely used statistical software packages in the social sciences (SPSS) and conduct independent research using one of the most widely used sources of quantitative social data, the General Social Survey (GSS).  One additional 80-minute lab session is required as a co-component to this course.

SOC 342 / Social Change in Latin America (crosslisted with ANT 340)

Latin America has been the subject for much debate about development in social theory.  This course examines the theoretical debates about development and provides empirical case studies to highlight how social change occurs in Latin America.  These themes include:  economic globalization, gender, migration, resistance to social change, urbanization, environmental degradation, corruption, social movements, structural adjustment, and race relations. Crosslists with ANT 340.

SOC 365 / Poverty and Welfare in the US

History, nature, extent, levels, causes of poverty. Effect of industrialization, urbanization, and technology. Impact upon major institutions. Ethnic and racial group problems and reactions. Governmental and private organizational programs.

SOC 370 / Topics in Sociology: Epidemics, Science & Societies

What can epidemics tell us about social systems under stress? How do social structures of a particular time and place shape people’s vulnerability to infectious diseases? In this class, we will examine epidemics from the 1800s to the present day to see how germs, societies, and the scientific tools to fight disease interact and what studying epidemics can tell us about risk, social connection, and science itself.

SOC 375 / Religion and American Culture

To correctly understand U.S. culture, one must understand the religions that influenced, and continue to influence, its citizens.  Religion oriented the entire lives of early colonists, impacting the institutions they created, the interactions they had, and the cultural norms they established.  Today, religion is no less influential in American culture.  It shapes the personal realms of its citizens, as well as every institution within it.  This course will be of value to any interested citizen, and especially to those who seek to better understand the dynamic interplay of religion and American culture in the making of American individuals.

SOC 380 / Education and American Culture

Schooling is a primary nexus of American cultural contestation – that is, it is a critical arena in which competing visions of who America is (or should be) clash.  Examining education and its related social processes, then, provides much insight into American culture, its cultural processes, and its complex institutional relationships.  Issues of opportunity, equality, and mobility must, in particular, receive careful attention.  Knowledge gained from this course will be of value to any U.S. resident, but particularly to those who wish to deepen their understanding of the cultural foundations and complexities of U.S. education.

SOC 397 / Learning Assistantship in Sociology

Learning Assistants learn about the teaching of Sociology.  Students gain a deeper understanding of the particular course content area, gain insight into curriculum goals and methods of achieving them, and develop instructional skills in the areas of: providing written feedback, creating and/or delivering learning activities, and constructing learning tools.  Specific duties for the Learning Assistant are detailed in a contract that is developed and signed by both the student and faculty sponsor. [See above for Fall 2024 opportunity with Dr. Elizabeth Borland]

SOC 398 / Sociology Capstone Internship

Capstone internship constituting a culminating experience for sociology majors. Course draws on skills and knowledge of sociology courses as well as knowledge gained from the liberal arts broadly construed to be applied to reflect deeply and examine experiences and the social world at the internship site. Must be taken as a bundle with SOC 499 Senior Seminar in Sociology (of the same section number) to fulfill the capstone requirements of the sociology major.  (0.5 course unit; Corequisite: SOC 499; Prerequisites: SOC 301 and 302)

SOC 499 / Senior Capstone Seminar

SOC 301 and SOC 302 are prerequisites with a grade of C or better.

Senior seminar constituting a culminating experience for sociology majors. Course draws on skills and knowledge of sociology courses as well as knowledge gained from the liberal arts broadly construed. Must be taken as a bundle with SOC 398 Sociology Capstone Internship (of the same section number) to fulfill the capstone requirements of the sociology major. (0.5 course unit; Prerequisites: SOC 301 and 302; Corequisite: SOC 398)