Sociological Theories of Gender — Sociologists who study gender have gone through an ongoing process of empirical research and theoretical discussions that explore the etiology of gender as a social phenomenon. These theories are important to learn because they inform not just sociological thinking but public discourse, public policy, and personal identity (and the…

Sociological meanderings towards collective well-being. — As I write this, it’s hot. My perennial flowers are blooming but thirsty; the grass of my lawn is dying. Watering them — especially the grass — feels short-sighted, as Mitt Romney recently argued. I read his article on American denial, and I’ve been thinking about it on the regular…

What we can learn about Democracy from the “Power and Control Wheel” — Stories like these are becoming much more common: Students sue Wentzville, Missouri, over school book bans targeting 'racial or sexual minorities' Two students are suing the Wentzville School District after it removed multiple books from school libraries. Last…www.kcur.org With Rising Book Bans, Librarians Have Come Under Attack Caustic fights over which books belong on the shelves have put librarians at the center of a bitter and widening…www.nytimes.com

Sociological Meanderings Towards Collective Well-Being — Lull’s opening statement — that “hegemony is the power or dominance that one social group holds over others” is clearly pertinent to the world as it is in the 21st Century, in the 2020s: the past few years as have been shaped by police brutality, protests, the covid pandemic, the…

For the Week of September 26th: A series of discussions about what it means to be assigned female at birth, to identify as female, as feminine, whether cisgender or transgender, and the threat of violence facing cisgender and transgender women; about feminist politics and motherhood and heteronormativity. It’s easy to…

Sociological Meanderings Towards Collective Well-Being — When the Industrial Revolution started and the Northern economy began to be a mass production economy, there was still “finishing” labor that was done in the home. This is economic labor, in that it contributes to the creation of a good, and yet it isn’t “counted” as productive labor since…

Sociological Meanderings Towards Collective Well-Being — As we’ve made our way through the Week Three material — Durkheim, Scott, and the ideas of solidarity and “toxic solidarity” and “dangerous dependencies” — I’ve been thinking about a song by one of my favorite musicians. The song is called “Revolutionary Love,” and it makes me think of Durkheim’s…

Thinking Gender, Thinking Intersectionality — Intersectionality frames our ability to understand the gender system. Really, this conversation is about centering the role that heteronormativity plays in constructing gender within a patriarchal system. This is the first intersection: gender and (hetero)sexuality. Of course, since intersectionality is about how we are positioned within a broad matrix of…