Social Problems (202-0-20)

Instructors

Austin Abernethy Stimpson Jenkins

Meeting Info

Online: Mon, Wed, Fri 9:00AM - 11:30AM

Overview of class

This course examines the relationship between social problems and social science. Students will learn how social scientists describe, diagnose, and solve social problems. We will also develop a critical understanding of how social-science approaches to social problems can be, and have been, misused.

In our first module, we will examine the development of social-scientific theories about social problems. In the second module, we will discuss how neighborhoods, social networks, and culture shape crime and racial inequality. Additionally, we will cover how our understanding of the relationship between crime and racial inequality has evolved since the mid-twentieth century. In our last planned module, we will explore how social policies originally intended to solve social problems—including the "carceral turn" in American criminal justice and the transformation of the American welfare state in 1996—have created problems of their own.

The topic of the final module is open. Students will collectively decide the subject of, and assigned materials for, the last section of the class.

Class Attributes

Social and Behavioral Science Foundational Discipl
Social & Behavioral Sciences Distro Area
Synchronous:Class meets remotely at scheduled time