Program Description

Are you interested in people? Are you fascinated by such topics as race, social class, gender, globalization, the environment, or social change? These subjects and others that deal with social relationships, culture, and the nature of society comprise the discipline of sociology. As a broad and eclectic field of inquiry, sociology uses many different approaches, ranging from cultural and historical studies to survey research.

The sociology major at Purchase College is designed to give students maximum exposure to the breadth of the field. Optional concentrations — Everyday Cultures and Social Change, Globalization and Society, and Health and Social Advocacy — allow students to focus on a particular area of interest.

What can you do with a degree in sociology? Opportunities exist in both the private and public sectors in the fields of social advocacy, social work, human service, education, business, law, criminal justice, social science research, and community relations. (For more detailed information about career opportunities, visit the American Sociological Association.)

Program Faculty

Requirements for the Major

All students majoring in sociology take the following courses, plus an additional four to five courses in the student’s chosen concentration:

• Introduction to Sociology
• Research Methods
• Sociological Theory
• One internship, study-abroad opportunity, or community-action independent study, chosen in consultation with the faculty advisor
• Sociology Junior Seminar
• Sociology Senior Seminar I & II
• Senior Project in Sociology

Concentration 1: Sociology (general major)
At least four sociology electives, chosen from specified courses in the following three groups: Sociological Perspectives, Social Institutions, and Inequality and Change

Concentration 2: Everyday Cultures and Social Change

• Three of the following courses, including at least one upper-level course:
  Culture, Consumption, and the City
  Computers and Culture
  Environmental Sociology
  Social Movements
  Urban Sociology
  Social Entrepreneurship
  Conflict Management and Mediation
  Innovation, Change, and Society
  Globalization, Culture, Social Change
  Mass Media and Society
• One of the following courses:
  Race and Ethnicity
  Sociology of Gender
  Class, Power, Privilege

Concentration 3: Globalization and Society

• Three of the following courses:
  Environment and Society
  Social Entrepreneurship
  Innovation, Change, and Society
  Globalization, Culture, Social Change
  Any relevant anthropology course
  Any relevant environmental studies course
• One of the following courses:
  Race and Ethnicity
  Sociology of Gender
  Class, Power, Privilege

Concentration 4: Social and Health Advocacy

• Three of the following courses:
  Birth and Death
  Sex, Politics, and Health
  Science, Medicine, Culture
  Religion, Culture, and Society
  Public Sociology
  Sociology of the Family
  Any relevant policy-based political science course
• Two of the following courses:
  Human Sexuality
  Race and Ethnicity
  Sociology of Gender
  Aging, Culture, and Society
  Class, Power, Privilege
  Conflict Management and Mediation

Representative Alumni

• Stephen Duncombe ’88, Ph.D., City University of New York Graduate Center; associate professor, Gallatin School, New York University; his books include Dream: Re-Imagining Progressive Politics in an Age of Fantasy
• Amy Bromberg Funk ’77, J.D., Yale University; chief manager, Smart Information Flow Technologies (SIFT), Minneapolis
• Jessica Hentoff ’7, artistic and executive director of the Circus Day Foundation and its entertainment wing, Everydaycircus
• Audrey Hutchinson ’77, program director, Education and Afterschool Initiatives, National League of Cities, Washington, D.C.
• Mary E. Kane ’73, film producer; credits include King of New York, Bad Lieutenant, The Funeral, and If These Walls Could Talk 2
• Antonio Pagliarulo ’02, author, A Different Kind of Heat and The Celebutantes young adult fiction series (Random House, Inc.)
• Jeffrey K. Salkin ’76, D.Min., Princeton University; senior rabbi of The Temple in Atlanta; well-known activist in Reform Judaism and award-winning author

For more information, visit the Sociology site in Academic Programs.

Updated May 27, 2008