Social theory and analysis

Lectures: 1 session / week, 3 hours / session

This course is designed around three interlocking traditions of social inquiry:

The readings are set up in an alternating rhythm of theory and ethnography. We should try to read each week against the previous ones, building up a common framework and set of questions. You will get better grades (and learn more) if you weave the weeks together.

We want to ask:

Some of you are coming to this course with past experiences that will be useful to incorporate, and perhaps even some ideas about ongoing or future research. It will make the class more interesting and more motivated if you allow us to share those interests and read the texts in this class with an eye to how they might inform or be informed by those interests.

This is a reading and discussion seminar. Two students are assigned each week to help lead the discussion. Everyone else must (and the discussion leaders may, but are not required to) write a response paper on the readings. The response papers must be circulated to the entire class at least three hours before the class meets (i.e. the night before or early in the morning of class) by email.

There is no final exam for this course. Students are asked to take a "pre-test" to get a sense of what names and texts they recognize and can identify by argument, and to give them a sense of what they don't yet know that will come up in the class. There are two parts: a multiple choice identification part on the direct course subject matter; and a check list of novels, plays, and films on science, technology and society that they have read or seen, with a short answer space for adding names of other items and why they like them.

Don't show me this again

This is one of over 2,200 courses on OCW. Find materials for this course in the pages linked along the left.

MIT OpenCourseWare is a free & open publication of material from thousands of MIT courses, covering the entire MIT curriculum.

No enrollment or registration. Freely browse and use OCW materials at your own pace. There's no signup, and no start or end dates.

Knowledge is your reward. Use OCW to guide your own life-long learning, or to teach others. We don't offer credit or certification for using OCW.

Made for sharing. Download files for later. Send to friends and colleagues. Modify, remix, and reuse (just remember to cite OCW as the source.)

Learn more at Get Started with MIT OpenCourseWare