Courses

SOCL B102 Society, Culture, and the Individual

Fall 2025, Spring 2026

Sociology is the systematic study of society and social interaction. It involves what C. Wright Mills called the "sociological imagination," a way of seeing the relationship between individuals and the larger forces of society and history. In this course, we will practice using our sociological imaginations to think about the world around us. We will examine how social norms and structures are created and maintained, and we will analyze how these structures shape people's behavior and choices, often without their realizing it. After learning to think sociologically, we will examine the centrality of inequality in society, focusing specifically on the intersecting dimensions of race and ethnicity, gender, and class, and the role of social structures and institutions (such as the family and education) in society. Overall, this course draws our attention toward our own presuppositions-the things we take for granted in our everyday lives-and provides us with a systematic framework within which we can analyze those presuppositions and identify their effects..

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Power, Inequity, and Justice (PIJ)

Counts Toward: Gender Sexuality Studies.

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SOCL B200 Urban Sociology

Fall 2025

How do social forces shape the places we live? What makes a place urban? What is a suburb and why do we have them? What's environmental racism? Why are cities in the US still highly racially segregated? We will take on these questions and more in this introduction to urban sociology. Classic and contemporary urban social theories will inform our investigations of empirical research on pressing urban issues such as housing segregation, the environment, suburbanization, transportation and inequality. The course has a special focus on the social, economic and political forces that shape in urban space in ways that perpetuate inequality for African Americans.

Course does not meet an Approach

Counts Toward: Africana Studies; Growth and Structure of Cities.

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SOCL B201 The Study of Gender in Society

Fall 2025

The definition of male and female social roles and sociological approaches to the study of gender in the United States, with attention to gender in the economy and work place, the division of labor in families and households, and analysis of class and ethnic differences in gender roles. Of particular interest in this course is the comparative exploration of the experiences of women of color in the United States.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Counts Toward: Child and Family Studies; Gender Sexuality Studies.

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SOCL B216 Social Dynamics of Violence

Spring 2026

How do we make sense of violence in society? Why do people act to hurt, injure, or kill each other? How do we account for the diversity and similarity of violent acts and actors? How do we understand the role of violence in social change and social order? In this course, we will examine violence from a sociological perspective. We will consider a variety of different kinds of violence, from bullying and corporal punishment to riots and wartime massacres, using comparative analysis to probe the patterns and causes of violence, and its embeddedness in our social relationships.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Power, Inequity, and Justice (PIJ)

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SOCL B220 Social Perspectives on Health

Spring 2026

CDC data from 2023 shows that Black and Hispanic Americans were 1.6 and 1.7 times more likely to die from COVID-19 than White Americans. Why do we see these disparities, and what do they reveal about broader patterns of social inequality? What does it mean to be sick, healthy, or medicated? This course invites students to consider how society shapes our experiences of health, illness, and medicine. Together, we will explore concepts such as medicalization, the social construction of illnesses, health disparities, medical ethics, and the authority of physicians. We will also examine how the state, experts, markets, and social movements shape healthcare, as well as how inequalities based on race, class, gender, geography, sexuality, and age influence health outcomes. By the end of the course, students will be able to analyze how social structures affect health and develop ideas for addressing health inequities.

Counts Toward: Health Studies.

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SOCL B221 The Social Life of Emotions

Not offered 2025-26

How do our emotions reflect and affect our social relationships, roles, and structures? How do we feel, manage, express, and share our emotions with others? How do social factors like culture, power, status, and ritual shape our emotional lives? The sociology of emotions contends that emotions are not just personal and psychological experiences, but are at the heart of social life. In this course, we will explore emotions from a variety of sociological perspectives, and apply these perspectives to a variety of sociological phenomena including family formation, job interviews, religious experiences and political movements.

Power, Inequity, and Justice (PIJ)

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SOCL B225 Women in Society

Spring 2026

In 2015, the world's female population was 49.6 percent of the total global population of 7.3 billion. According to the United Nations, in absolute terms, there were 61,591,853 more men than women. Yet, at the global scale, 124 countries have more women than men. A great majority of these countries are located in what scholars have recently been referring to as the Global South - those countries known previously as developing countries. Although women outnumber their male counterparts in many Global South countries, however, these women endure difficulties that have worsened rather than improving. What social structures determine this gender inequality in general and that of women of color in particular? What are the main challenges women in the Global South face? How do these challenges differ based on nationality, class, ethnicity, skin color, gender identity, and other axes of oppression? What strategies have these women developed to cope with the wide variety of challenges they contend with on a daily basis? These are some of the major questions that we will explore together in this class. In this course, the Global South does not refer exclusively to a geographical location, but rather to a set of institutional structures that generate disadvantages for all individuals and particularly for women and other minorities, regardless their geographical location in the world. In other words, a significant segment of the Global North's population lives under the same precarious conditions that are commonly believed as exclusive to the Global South. Simultaneously, there is a Global North embedded in the Global South as well. In this context, we will see that the geographical division between the North and the South becomes futile when we seek to understand the dynamics of the "Western-centric/Christian-centric capitalist/patriarchal modern/colonial world-system" (Grosfoguel, 2012). In the first part of the course, we will establish the theoretical foundations that will guide us throughout the rest of the semester. We will then turn to a wide variety of case studies where we will examine, for instance, the contemporary global division of labor, gendered violence in the form of feminicides, international migration, and global tourism. The course's final thematic section will be devoted to learning from the different feminisms (e.g. community feminism) emerging out of the Global South as well as the research done in that region and its contribution to the development of a broader gender studies scholarship. In particular, we will pay close attention to resistance, solidarity, and social movements led by women. Examples will be drawn from Latin America, the Caribbean, the US, Asia, and Africa.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Counts Toward: Africana Studies; Child and Family Studies; Gender Sexuality Studies; Latin American Iberian Latinx.

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SOCL B231 Punishment and Social Order

Fall 2025

An examination of the American criminal justice system and punishment in its social context. The course addresses theoretical approaches to crime control and examines the current system of mass incarceration in cross cultural comparison and relative to alternative approaches including restorative and transformative justice.

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SOCL B232 A Sociological Journey to Immigrant Communities in Philly

Spring 2026

This course will use the lenses of sociology to critically and comparatively examine various immigrant communities living in greater Philadelphia. It will expose students to the complex historical, economic, political, and social factors influencing (im)migration, as well as how migrants and the children of immigrants develop their sense of belonging and their homemaking practices in the new host society. In this course, we will probe questions of belonging, identity, homemaking, citizenship, transnationalism, and ethnic entrepreneurship and how individuals, families, and communities are transformed locally and across borders through the process of migration. This course also seeks to interrogate how once in a new country, immigrant communities not only develop a sense of belonging but also how they reconfigure their own identities while they transform the social, physical, and cultural milieus of their new communities of arrival. To achieve these ends, this course will engage in a multidisciplinary approach consisting of materials drawn from such disciplines as cultural studies, anthropology, history, migration studies, and sociology to examine distinct immigrant communities that have arrived in Philadelphia over the past 100 years. Although this course will also cover the histories of migrant communities arriving in the area in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, a greater part of the course will focus on recent migrant communities, mainly from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean and arriving in the area of South Philadelphia. A special focus will be on the Mexican American migrant community that stands out among those newly arrived migrant communities.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Counts Toward: Child and Family Studies; Growth and Structure of Cities; Latin American Iberian Latinx.

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SOCL B235 Mexican-American Communities

Not offered 2025-26

For its unique history, the number of migrants, and the two countries' proximity, Mexican migration to the United States represents an exceptional case in world migration. There is no other example of migration with more than 100 years of history. The copious presence of migrants concentrated in a host country, such as we have in the case of the 11.7 million Mexican migrants residing in the United States, along with another 15 million Mexican descendants, is unparalleled. The 1,933-mile-long border shared by the two countries makes it one of the longest boundary lines in the world and, unfortunately, also one of the most dangerous frontiers in the world today. We will examine the different economic, political, social and cultural forces that have shaped this centenarian migration influx and undertake a macro-, meso-, and micro-levels of analysis. At the macro-level of political economy, we will investigate the economic interdependency that has developed between Mexico and the U.S. over different economic development periods of these countries, particularly, the role the Mexican labor force has played to boosting and sustaining both the Mexican and the American economies. At the meso-level, we will examine different institutions both in Mexico and the U.S. that have determined the ways in which millions of Mexican migrate to this country. Last, but certainly not least, we will explore the impacts that both the macro-and meso-processes have had on the micro-level by considering the imperatives, aspirations, and dreams that have prompted millions of people to leave their homes and communities behind in search of better opportunities. This major life decision of migration brings with it a series of social transformations in family and community networks, this will look into the cultural impacts in both the sending and receiving migrant communities. In sum, we will come to understand how these three levels of analysis work together.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Counts Toward: Gender Sexuality Studies; Growth and Structure of Cities; Latin American Iberian Latinx; Praxis Program.

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SOCL B262 Public Opinion

Spring 2026

This course will assess public opinion in American politics: what it is, how it is measured, how it is shaped, how it relates to public policy, and how it changes over time. It includes both questions central to political scientists (what is the public, how do they exercise their voice, does the government listen and how do they respond?) and to sociologists (where do ideas come from, how do they gain societal influence, and how do they change over time?). It will pay close attention to the role of electoral politics throughout, both historically and in the current election. It is focused primarily on the United States, but seeks to place the US in global context. If this course is taken to fulfill an elective in the Data Science minor, students will conduct hands-on analyses with real data as a key component to both their Midterm and Final Essays.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Inquiry into the Past (IP)

Counts Toward: Gender Sexuality Studies; Political Science.

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SOCL B265 Quantitative Methods

Fall 2025

An introduction to the conduct of empirical, especially quantitative, social science inquiry. In consultation with the instructor, students may select research problems to which they apply the research procedures and statistical techniques introduced during the course. Using SPSS, a statistical computer package, students learn techniques such as cross-tabular analysis, ANOVA, and multiple regression. Required of Bryn Mawr Sociology majors and minors. Non-sociology majors and minors with permission of instructor.

Quantitative Methods (QM)

Quantitative Readiness Required (QR)

Counts Toward: Data Science; Health Studies; Health Studies.

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SOCL B267 Space, Place, and Queer Geographies

Fall 2025

How do spaces and places shape who we are and how we relate to others? How do different groups create, contest, and transform the environments they inhabit? This course introduces students to the sociology of space and place, with a particular focus on queer geographies. We will begin with foundational theories of space and place, exploring how power, identity, and belonging are negotiated through spatial practices. Next, we will investigate how sexuality and gender identity intersect with spatial experiences-from intimate spaces to neighborhoods to cities to digital environments. We will analyze how race, class, gender, and sexuality intersect to create different experiences of spatial belonging, exclusion, and resistance. Throughout the course, we will consider both the constraints and possibilities that spaces offer for identity formation, community building, and social change.

Course does not meet an Approach

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SOCL B269 Sociology of Deviance

Spring 2026

Sex, drugs, and… corporate malfeasance? Why are some behaviors and identities considered more morally acceptable than others? Who or what decides? How are boundaries of difference enforced? How do these boundaries wax and wane over time? In this course, we will analyze the origins, development, and reactions surrounding deviance in society. We will examine how behaviors are constructed as "deviant" or "normal," and how people exhibiting these behaviors experience the world. We will examine core theories of deviance and social control and analyze deviant acts and identities through different theoretical lenses. We will consider why deviance is often associated with "low life" in both society and the sociological literature, and we will consider how deviant behaviors exhibited by the wealthy and powerful are treated in society. We will also examine how the social media age shapes deviance. Through this course, we will hone our sociological imagination through critical reading, writing, and speaking.

Critical Interpretation (CI)

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SOCL B275 Social Problems, Community Conversations

Spring 2026

This Praxis course will create space for students and community members to examine social problems in a co-created, diverse setting. We'll ask questions like: What social problems have shaped our lives? How do they connect to the social problems of other generations? Who defines social problems, and how? Who tries to solve social problems, and how? How might sociology help us shed light on these problems? How can we design and participate in productive dialogues across difference around these social problems? The course will examine a variety of social issues chosen by students and community members (e.g. crime, racial/ethnic inequality, gender inequality, educational, environmental, healthcare, and housing crises, AI, changing workplaces). The course emphasizes co-creation and modes of learning that bring together lived experience, library knowledge, and conversation across diverse communities.

Cross-Cultural Analysis (CC)

Power, Inequity, and Justice (PIJ)

Counts Toward: Education Studies; Praxis Program.

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SOCL B302 Social Theory

Fall 2025, Spring 2026

This course focuses primarily on the works of classical social theorists. The theorists include: George Herbert Meade, Emile Durkheim, Karl Marx, and Max Weber; and secondarily their influences on the works of more contemporary theorists: C. Wright Mills, Shulamith Firestone, Antonio Gramsci, Erving Goffman, Randall Collins, Robert Bellah, Howard Becker, and Pierre Bourdieu. Among the theoretical conceptions examined: culture, religion, the sacred, power, authority, modernization, deviance, bureaucracy, social stratification, social class, status groups, social conflict, and social conceptions of the self.

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SOCL B303 Junior Conference: Discipline-Based Intensive Writing

Fall 2025, Spring 2026

This course will introduce students to a range of qualitative methods in the discipline and will require students to engage, through reading and writing, a wide range of sociological issues. The emphasis of the course will be to develop a clear, concise writing style, while maintaining a sociological focus. Substantive areas of the course will vary depending on the instructor. Prerequisite: Required of and limited to Bryn Mawr Sociology Major, Junior Standing

Writing Intensive

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SOCL B307 Transnational Queer Politics

Fall 2025

As people and ideas traverse national, cultural, and social borders, how are gender and sexuality negotiated and redefined? This course uses queer politics and practices as an entry point to examine transnational processes such as global diffusion, international organizations, colonialism, global capitalism, and neoliberalism. Instead of taking gender and sexual categories like "gay," "lesbian," and "trans" for granted, we will use a feminist and queer sociological approach to interrogate how gender and sexual categories are produced, maintained, and reconfigured in non-western societies. Furthermore, we will consider how to address the limits of global LGBT rights discourse, social movements, and politics through postcolonial and intersectional lenses. Together, we will cultivate critical tools to assess the relationships between gender, sexuality, and globalization and how these processes influence the lived experiences of queer/trans individuals worldwide. Prerequisite: At lease one course in the social sciences.

Counts Toward: Gender & Sexuality Studies; Gender Sexuality Studies; Gender Sexuality Studies; International Studies.

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SOCL B332 Sociology of Popular Culture

Spring 2026

"Culture" is one of those words that is used constantly by nearly everyone, but rarely is it made clear what exactly is meant by the term or what precisely it is contributing as either cause or effect. This course seeks to provide clarity and precision in what is meant by the term "culture" and how it can be a useful analytical concept, focusing explicitly on those cultural objects deemed "popular." It will explore how popular culture is produced, reproduced, received, challenged, disseminated, resisted, and transformed. Special attention will be given to how popular culture interacts with other social institutions, social movements, power relationships, and intersectional identities.

Course does not meet an Approach

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SOCL B336 Modernizing China

Spring 2026

Today, China is the world's second-largest economy and a major contender for the global superpower status to the United States. Yet, China was once one of the world's poorest countries in the mid-twentieth century. How did China modernize itself from the "Sick Man of Asian" to an emergent global economic, cultural, and political superpower? How are these changes impacting Chinese society and the world? At what/whose cost? This course takes a sociology of development lens to understand contemporary China's modernization projects. We will critically examine various modernization projects, including the "Great Leap Forward," the post-socialist market reform, and "One Belt One Road." Together, we will also consider how these measures create sweeping social changes in every fabric of Chinese social life-from the shifting relationship between the state and society, the one-child policy, to profound changes in family, kinship structure, and the most intimate aspects of life. Through examining and reflecting on various modernization projects in China, students will be able to critically analyze how social policies generate both intended and unintended consequences to social life. Prerequisite: One course in the Social Sciences or permission of instructor.

Course does not meet an Approach

Counts Toward: East Asian Languages & Culture; International Studies.

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SOCL B350 Movements for Social Justice

Fall 2025

Throughout human history, powerless groups of people have organized social movements to improve their lives and their societies. Powerful groups and institutions have resisted these efforts in order to maintain their own privilege. Some periods of history have been more likely than others to spawn protest movements. What factors seem most likely to lead to social movements? What determines their success/failure? We will examine 20th and 21st-century social movements to answer these questions. Prerequisite: At least one prior social science course or permission of the instructor.

Power, Inequity, and Justice (PIJ)

Counts Toward: Gender Sexuality Studies; Peace Justice and Human Rights.

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SOCL B365 Digital Sociology: Technology, Culture, and Community

Spring 2026

How do digital technologies shape who we are and how we connect with others? This seminar examines the sociological dimensions of digital media, focusing on how new technologies influence identity formation, community, and social relationships. We will explore how different groups use digital platforms to create belonging, resist or reproduce inequality, and build alternative forms of social organization. Particular attention will be paid to how marginalized communities leverage digital technologies for survival, community care, and cultural production. Prerequisite: Once course in the Social Sciences or permission of instructor.

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SOCL B387 Nocturnal Spaces, Nocturnal Selves: Sociology of Nightlife

Fall 2025

This seminar examines nightlife as a critical site for understanding contemporary social life. Far from mere entertainment, nightlife spaces serve as laboratories for social experimentation, venues for identity work, and stages for the performance of power, status, and belonging. Drawing from classic and contemporary research in sociology, urban planning, and cultural studies, we will examine how diverse nightlife settings-from local underground scenes to global party destinations-are organized, regulated, and contested. Throughout the course, we will pay close attention to how these after-dark social worlds reflect, reproduce, and challenge broader societal inequalities.

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SOCL B398 Senior Conference

This capstone course for the sociology major focuses on major concepts or areas in sociology and requires students to develop their analytical and synthetic skills as they confront both theoretical and empirical materials. The Key emphasis in the course will be on students' writing. Through a variety of assignments (of different lengths and purposes), students will practice the process (drafts) and elements (clarity and concision) of good writing. Specific topical content will vary by semester according to the expertise of the instructor and the interests of students. Writing Attentive.

Writing Attentive

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SOCL B403 Supervised Work

Students have the opportunity to do individual research projects under the supervision of a faculty member.

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