Events
- Annual Convention
- Great Teaching Round-up
- Leading from the middle
- fall conference for faculty leaders
- The Texas Network
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Events: 2009 Sociology Schedule
Sociology Summary
Friday, 11:15 a.m. - 12:45 p.m.
"The Image and Sociology"
Speaker: John Macionis, Professor of Sociology at Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio
Saturday, 9:00-10:15 a.m.
"Using the Mass Media as a Framework for Teaching Controversial Issues in Marriage, Family and Intimacy Classes"
Speaker: BarBara M. Scott, Professor of Sociology, African and African American studies, and Women’s Studies, and coordinator of the African and African American Studies Program, Northeastern Illinois University
Friday, February 20th, 11:15 a.m. - 12:45 p.m.
"The Image and Sociology"
Speaker: John Macionis, Professor of Sociology at Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio
Thirty-year teaching veteran John Macionis, Kenyon College, will discuss the emerging role of visual images in sociology, especially in the teaching of sociology to undergraduates. Macionis will examine a series of assignments that help students develop analytical skills and sociological literacy as well as help students see the importance of sociology in their everyday lives. In addition, Macionis will explore the role that images can play in sociological research. He will discuss photograph and commercial advertising as a useful source of data for ethnographic as well as historical studies. In particular, he will review a recent study of undergraduate study behaviors conducted by Pearson Education in which students created photo logs of themselves while studying and commented on a variety of patterns, including where they study, with whom they study, with and how they study.
Biography:
John J. Macionis (pronounced “ma-SHOW-nis”) was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University and a doctorate in sociology from the University of Pennsylvania.
His publications are wide-ranging, focusing on community life in the United States, interpersonal intimacy in families, effective teaching, humor, new information technology, and the importance of global education. In addition to authoring this best-seller, Macionis has also written Sociology, the most popular hardback text in the field, now in its twelfth edition. He collaborates on international editions of the texts: Sociology: Canadian Edition; Society: The Basics, Canadian Edition; and Sociology: A Global Introduction. Sociology is also available for high school students and in various foreign-language editions.
John Macionis is Professor and Distinguished Scholar of Sociology at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, where he has taught for more than thirty years. During that time, he has chaired the Sociology Department, directed the college’s multidisciplinary program in humane studies, presided over the campus senate and the college’s faculty, and taught sociology to thousands of students.
In 2002, the American Sociological Association presented Macionis with the Award for Distinguished Contributions to Teaching, citing his innovative use of global material as well as the introduction of new teaching technology in his textbooks.
Professor Macionis has been active in academic programs in other countries, having traveled to some fifty nations. He writes, “I am an ambitious traveler, eager to learn and, through the texts, to share much of what I discover with students, many of whom know little about the rest of the world. For me, traveling and writing are all dimensions of teaching. First, and foremost, I am a teacher—a passion for teaching animates everything I do.
Saturday, February 21st, 9:00-10:15 a.m.
"Using the Mass Media as a Framework for Teaching Controversial Issues in Marriage, Family and Intimacy Classes"
Speaker: BarBara M. Scott, Professor of Sociology, African and African American studies, and Women’s Studies, and coordinator of the African and African American Studies Program, Northeastern Illinois University
Dr. Scott teaches undergraduate students about trends and critical issues related to marriages, families and intimacy. Many of these are very complex issues that are often shrouded in myth and misinformation and often cause very personal and emotional as well as knee-jerk reactions from students. Scott will discuss teaching strategies or ideas to engage students and help them develop critical thinking skills, analytical skills and historical sociological literacy about marriages, families and intimacy as well as the link between their own marriage, family and intimate lives and larger social structure. Scott will also explore incorporating popular media such as literature and film into the teaching of critical issues and concepts related to the topic. In this context, she will use four basic controversial marriage/family/intimacy issues to frame her discussion: (1) same-sex marriage, (2) interracial marriage, (3) abortion, and (4) domestic violence. Where appropriate, she will show how teachers can incorporate contemporary socio-political events into the teaching of marriages/families/intimacy by relating these issues to the 2008 national elections and how both, political candidates framed these issues and how the electorate responded to referenda around these issues.
Biography:
Dr. BarBara M. Scott has been married for over 41 years and is the proud mother of two sons and proud grandmother of three grandchildren: two granddaughters and one grandson. As a wife and mother of two small children, she returned to different master’s degrees: a master of arts degree in sociology and a master of philosophy from Roosevelt University in Chicago, and later a doctorate in sociology from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Dr. Scott is a professor of sociology, African and African American studies, and women’s studies, and coordinator of the African and African American Studies Program at Northeastern Illinois University. She has served as president of the Association of Black Sociologists, a national organization. Dr. Scott is also a former chair of the Sociology, Criminal Justice, Social Work, and Women’s Studies departments at Northeastern Illinois University. She is a strong advocate for curriculum transformation and the integration of race, class, gender, and sexual orientation into the college curriculum, as well as a social activist who has been in the forefront of organizing among national and international women of color, both within and outside academia.
Professor Scott has received meritorious recognition for her work and has served for over 30 years as an educational and human resource consultant. She has coordinated the Women’s Studies Program, is a founding member of the university’s Black Women’s Caucus, and is the faculty sponsor for the undergraduate chapter of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority on structured relationships of race, class, gender, and sexual orientation; institutionalized racism and inequality; cultural images and the social construction of knowledge in the mass media; and Africana (aka Black) women’s studies. She finds teaching challenging and invigorating; among her favorite courses are Marriages and Families, Sociology of Black Women, Sociology
of Racism, and Introductory Sociology. She is an enthusiastic advocate of applying sociology to the everyday worlds in which we live and routinely engages her students in field research in the communities in which they live and work. After years of teaching, she still gets excited about the varied insights that sociology offers into both the most simple and the most complex questions and issues of human social life.
Sociology Section Chair: Dina Neal, Vernon College