Introduction to Sociology
Overview
- Introduction: The Foundations of Sociology
- The historical development of sociology
- Sociology as a science
- Developing a sociological imagination
- Theoretical Perspectives
- Sociological research methods
- Developing sociological questions
- Understanding the theory-data relationship
- Quantitative and qualitative research methods
- Interpreting sociological data
- Culture and social interaction
- Socialization
- Stages and Processes of Socialization
- Agents of socialization: family, peers, school, media
- Elements of social structure
- Social Stratification and Inequality
- Class and caste
- Social mobility
- Classes in Canada
- Poverty in Canada
- Global poverty
- Sex, gender, and sexualities
- Race and ethnicity
- Social Institutions (select one or more from the following)
- Families; education; politics; religion; health and medicine; environment and sustainability; crime and criminal justice
- Theoretical perspectives on institutions
- Social organization of institutions
- Modernization and Global Social Change
- Sociological approaches to modernization
- Collective behaviour and social movements
- Global social change
- Global inequality
The course will employ a variety of instructional methods to accomplish its objectives, including some of the following: lectures, seminar presentations, audio-visual materials, small group discussions and workshops, research projects and term papers.
Evaluation will be based on course objectives and will be carried out in accordance with the Douglas College Evaluation Policy. The instructor will provide a written course outline with specific criteria during the first week of classes.
Instructors may use a student’s record of attendance and/or level of active participation in the course as part of the student’s graded performance. Where this occurs, expectations and grade calculations regarding class attendance and participation will be clearly defined in the Instructor Course Outline.
An example of a possible evaluation scheme would be:
|
Midterm |
30% |
|
Essay/Written Assignment |
25% |
|
Essay/Outline |
5% |
|
Final Exam |
30% |
|
Participation |
10% |
|
Total |
100% |
Students may conduct research with human participants as part of their coursework in this class. Instructors for the course are responsible for ensuring that student research projects comply with College policies on ethical conduct for research involving humans.
At the conclusion of the course, the successful student will be able to:
- Define the basic concepts of sociology and communicate these effectively.
- Identify several key historical processes and figures in the development of the discipline and discuss their contributions to the field.
- Demonstrate the ability to apply a sociological imagination to the analysis of features of everyday life.
- Be able to identify characteristics of the sociological perspective and to distinguish this from that of other scientific perspectives.
- Identify and compare the dominant sociological theoretical perspectives.
- Demonstrate a clear understanding of the relationship between theory and research in sociology.
- Demonstrate the ability to interpret sociological data presented in the form of simple tables and graphs.
- Identify the primary stages and agents of socialization.
- Describe the characteristics of stratification systems, with particular emphasis on social class.
- Discuss the ways in which social inequality is produced through social factors, especially class, age, gender, sexuality, race and ethnicity.
- Identify some of the primary changes in social and economic organization which have taken place historically, with specific emphasis as well on recent years.
- Describe the development of social institutions in Canadian society, with particular emphasis on at least one of the following: the family, education, crime and criminal justice, religion, politics, environment and sustainability, and/or health and medicine.
- Identify some of the key features of contemporary demographic change, and describe how they differ from traditional demographic characteristics.
- Discuss the characteristics of the processes of social change and modernization in Canada and on a global basis.
Textbooks will be updated periodically. An example of a typcial textbook that may be used for this course is:
- Schaefer, R. and J. Grekul (most recent edition). Sociology: A Brief Introduction. Toronto: McGraw-Hill.
Requisites
Prerequisites
No prerequisite courses.
Corequisites
No corequisite courses.
Equivalencies
No equivalent courses.
Course Guidelines
Course Guidelines for previous years are viewable by selecting the version desired. If you took this course and do not see a listing for the starting semester / year of the course, consider the previous version as the applicable version.
Course Transfers
These are for current course guidelines only. For a full list of archived courses please see https://www.bctransferguide.ca
| Institution | Transfer details for SOCI 1125 |
|---|---|
| Alexander College (ALEX) | ALEX SOCI 100 (3) |
| Athabasca University (AU) | AU SOCI 287 (3) |
| Camosun College (CAMO) | CAMO SOC 100 (3) |
| Capilano University (CAPU) | CAPU SOC 100 (3) |
| Coast Mountain College (CMTN) | CMTN SOCI 101 (3) |
| College of the Rockies (COTR) | COTR SOCI 101 (3) |
| Coquitlam College (COQU) | COQU SOCI 101 (3) |
| Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) | KPU SOCI 1125 (3) |
| Langara College (LANG) | LANG SOCI 1120 (3) |
| North Island College (NIC) | NIC SOC 110 (3) |
| Okanagan College (OC) | OC SOCI 111 (3) |
| Simon Fraser University (SFU) | DOUG SOCI 1125 (3) & DOUG SOCI 1155 (3) = SFU SA 150 (4) & SFU SA 1XX (2) |
| Simon Fraser University (SFU) | SFU SA 150 (3) |
| Thompson Rivers University (TRU) | TRU SOCI 1110 (3) |
| Trinity Western University (TWU) | TWU SOCI 101 (3) |
| University of British Columbia - Okanagan (UBCO) | UBCO SOCI_O 111 (3) |
| University of British Columbia - Okanagan (UBCO) | DOUG SOCI 1125 (3) & DOUG SOCI 2235 (3) = UBCO SOCI_O 111 (3) & UBCO SOCI_O 121 (3) |
| University of British Columbia - Vancouver (UBCV) | DOUG SOCI 1125 (3) & DOUG SOCI 2235 (3) = UBCV SOCI_V 100 (6) |
| University of British Columbia - Vancouver (UBCV) | UBCV SOCI_V 1st (3) |
| University of British Columbia - Vancouver (UBCV) | DOUG SOCI 1125 (3) & DOUG SOCI 2235 (3) = UBCV SOCI 100 (6) |
| University of Northern BC (UNBC) | UNBC SOSC 1XX (3) |
| University of the Fraser Valley (UFV) | UFV SOC 101 (3) |
| University of Victoria (UVIC) | UVIC SOCI 100A (1.5) |
| Vancouver Community College (VCC) | VCC SOCI 1100 (3) |
| Vancouver Island University (VIU) | VIU SOCI 111 (3) |
Course Offerings
Summer 2025
| CRN | Days | Instructor | Status | More details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
CRN
22024
|
Tue | Instructor last name
Tseng
Instructor first name
Anne
|
Course status
Waitlist
|
| CRN | Days | Instructor | Status | More details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
CRN
22095
|
Wed | Instructor last name
Fozilova
Instructor first name
Dilsora
|
Course status
Waitlist
|
| CRN | Days | Instructor | Status | More details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
CRN
22742
|
Mon | Instructor last name
Fozilova
Instructor first name
Dilsora
|
Course status
Waitlist
|
| CRN | Days | Instructor | Status | More details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
CRN
22988
|
Wed | Instructor last name
Tseng
Instructor first name
Anne
|
Course status
Waitlist
|