CROSS LISTED: EALC-083 SOCI-230 URBS-506

Although the remarkable economic achievement of South Korea over the last few decades has received the serious attention of academic and policy communities, dramatic social changes Korea has experienced in such areas as occupation, education, family, gender, and population have not been widely discussed. Korea is one of the countries with the highest proportion of young people who have college degrees in the world. Korean women show the lowest level of fertility in the world. Korea surpasses Japan in the speed of population aging. Korea now shows a higher (crude) divorce rate than most North American and European countries except for the U.S. In this course, we will address various issues related to recent social changes in Korea such as: What are the implications of recent rapid population aging for labor supply and immigration policy in near future? What are the consequences of recent rapid increase in divorce rate for children’s well-being? How has women’s economic participation changed along with their increasing levels of educational attainment? How has the expansion of education among Korean women affected the traditional cultural norm surrounding marriage and family? Why are Korean mothers so actively involved in their children’s education?

REGISTRATION REQUIRED FOR LEC, REC
CROSS LISTED: DEMG-536

A course on statistical methods for social scientists, applying the general linear model (GLM).  Students learn the logic and assumptions underlying the GLM and complete exercises that apply linear modeling techniques using the Stata statistical package to “real-world” data.  Issues covered include the logic of statistical modeling, efficient estimation (i.e., statistical precision), specification errors (i.e., what happens when you make incorrect assumptions about how the world works), analyzing group differences with discrete (qualitative) variables (e.g., looking at differences in social processes by gender, or race), representing social processes with multiple equations (“path analysis”), and nonlinear relationships in linear models.

This course will study social stratification primarily in contemporary societies.  We will examine both the distribution of social rewards as well as process for the allocation of these rewards.  Stratification theory and research on social mobility will be considered.  Topics include the influence of education, race and gender, and structural and organizational factors on individual success.  Acquaintance with stratification theory and quantitative methods would be helpful but not required.

This is a two-semester class which is intended to train graduate students in the key aspects of carrying out a research project using in-depth interviews and participant observation. It will cover all phases of the research: filing an application with the Institutional Review Board (IRB), gaining entre’ to the field, writing field notes, managing one’s role in the field, carrying out in-depth interviews, transcribing interviews, writing analytic memos, carrying out a literature review, modifying and focusing the research question, analyzing the data using Atlas Ti, writing a conference paper, and preparing an article for submission to a journal. Each student is expected to carry out a research project of his or her interest. The project must include at least two months of participant observation in an on-going group; ideally the participant-observation will be for a longer period. The research site should be a group which the student may seek to be part of (e.g., a classroom, work setting, leisure group, or political group). The research cannot be secret; nor should the study take place in a location where the student is a member before the class begins. There will also be in-depth interviews with members of the site and collection of relevant documents. The class also includes selected readings of classic and contemporary ethnographic studies. The primary goal of the class, however, is to function as a workshop intended to help students develop their research skills. Course requirements in the fall semester include an IRB application, six sets of field notes, a critical review of the literature, five in-depth interviews, and assorted exercises. Course requirements in the spring semester are ten sets of field notes, five additional interviews, data analysis exercises, a conference presentation, and a 20 page paper. Students need only begin the class with an idea of what they would like to do. They do not need to have begun the research. The one-year time frame permits the time for students to gain access to the site and carry out the research during the class. Beginning graduate students and advanced graduate students are welcome. Students from education and other departments also may join the class.

Open to Sociology/Demography Graduate Students Only

This graduate seminar for first-year graduate students will be a two-semester course covering the major subfields of sociology – their classical and contemporary theories, current methods and substance.

This is a graduate-level seminar structured around the main theoretical debates of contemporary sociology, including the interplay of rationality and emotion, the relationship between structure and agency, the nature of power, and the role of chance and contingency.  In considering alternative positions on these debates, we will encounter the major theorists of the past fifty years, including Parson, Merton, Goffman, Homans, Schutz, Coleman, Bourdieu, Luhmann, Haberman, Collins, and Giddens.

Requirements include intensive primary source reading, writing, and participation.  The course assumes, and does not provide, prior familiarity with the main theoretical perspectives, and thus does not substitute for the undergraduate theory course (Soci 126).

This course is intended to develop the skills and judgment required to conduct independent research in sociology.  We will discuss the selection of intellectually strategic research questions and practical research designs.  Students will get experience with the process of editing successive drafts of manuscripts, the oral presentation of work in progress, and the preparation of finished research projects.  The course is designed to be the context in which master’s papers are written.

This course deals with techniques for analyzing multivariate data which the dependent variable is a set of categories (a dichotomy or polytomy).  Topics will include linear probability models, logit (logistic) regression models, probit models, logit analysis of contingency tables, cumulative logit and probit (for ordinal data), multinomial logit, conditional logit (discrete choice), unobserved heterogeneity, log-linear models, square tables, response-based sampling, and repeated measures.  Methods will be illustrated
using the Stata System.  There will be several assignments using Stata to analyze
data provided by the instructor.

This course is intended to aid in the selection, framing, writing and revising of sociological dissertation proposals.  It is also intended to provide a forum for the presentation of dissertation research in progress.  The goal is to provide a forum for the acquisition of professional socialization in sociology.  We will discuss the framing of research questions, the design of research strategies, and the writing of dissertation proposals.  We will discuss the process of submitting manuscripts for conferences and journals, preparing curriculum vitae, job search strategies, and preparing for effective colloquium presentations.  It is expected that third year graduate students in Sociology will enroll in this class.

CROSS LISTED: DEMG-634

Population Processes I and II make up a two-course sequence designed to introduce students to the core areas of demography (fertility, mortality, population aging, and/or migration) and recent developments in the field.  PP II focuses on biological, social and demographic factors explaining levels, trends, and differentials in human fertility transition with an emphasis on the historical and current course of fertility transition in developed and developing countries.  In addition the course covers topics in family demography.  The course format consists of lectures and class discussions.  The course format consists of lectures and class discussions.  The two course sequence is required of Ph.D. students in Demography.  Others interested in enrolling in only one of the courses may do so with the permission of the Chair of the Graduate Group in Demography.

CROSS LISTED: AFRC-420 AFRC-620 SOCI-460

Spatial concepts like neighborhood and region, distance and proximity, have always been critical factors for understanding social phenomena, particularly those tied to various aspects of urban poverty and inequality.  This course will help cultivate an integrated approach to social science research that recognizes the importance of location, space, and time to enhancing our understanding of social processes.  Students will be (1) exposed to examples of the integration of spatial thinking into social science research; (2) trained in the fundamentals of geographic information systems (GIS) mapping and a spatial analysis methods; (3) exposed to the vast array of spatial data that are available; (4) and encouraged to think critically about how a spatially integrated social science approach can enhance their own research.  Although students will be trained in the use of the basic tools of GIS, this course is not intended to serve as a GIS methods course.

The dynamics of interpersonal interaction, especially in face-to-face encounters over limited periods of time.  Topics include: theory of interaction ritual deriving from Durkheim, Mauss, Goffman and their contemporary followers, ethnomethodology and conversation analysis, including micro-ethnographic studies of non-verbal bases of conversational analysis, interaction; sociology of emotions, including theories of Scheff,  Katz, Kemper, Hochschild and Collins; symbolic interactionist theory and contemporary research on the social nature of mind, cognition, and the self; relationship between micro and macro levels of analysis.

CROSS LISTED: DEMG-708

A second semester of an intensive course in preparing a major independent research paper.  This is a required course for second year demography students.

Course Professor:
Staff

CROSS LISTED: DEMG-731

This course considers a variety of procedures for measuring and modeling demographic processes.  These include increment/decrement tables, generalizations of stable population relations, two-sex models, and indirect estimation procedures.

CROSS LISTED: DEMG-796

The course investigates economic and social determinants of fertility, mortality, and migration, and it discusses the effects of population variables on economic and social conditions, including economic and social development.  Topics discussed in the course include: How do economic changes affect marriage, divorce, and child bearing decisions?  How do households make decisions about transfers and requests?  How can economic and sociological approaches be combined in explanatory models of demography change?  How does immigration to the U. S. affect the ethnic composition of the population, the earnings of native workers, taxes on natives, and the macro-economy?  What causes the aging of populations, and how will population aging affect the economies of industrial nations, and in particular, pension programs like Social Security?  What accounts for the rise in women's participation in the wage labor force over the past century?  How are family composition and poverty interrelated?  Does rapid population growth slow economic development in Third World countries?  In addition to these topics, the course also covers selected methods not included in Dem/Soc 535/536 and 609.