Professor Backman’s Musings Concerning the Selection of Courses

Things to remember

1. You are being educated and being trained
a. Core courses are intended to force you to become educated
b. Major courses train you
c. You can obtain education and training outside the core and major

2. USUALLY, your advisor is primarily concerned with making sure that you meet the requirements for graduation
a. Education and training are secondary considerations
b. Therefore it is up to you to ensure that you get the best possible education and training
1. In addition to what the college says you need to become educated (e.g., core courses), decide what you think would make you a well educated person (dare I say , citizen): better understanding of the constitution? an appreciation of your family’s country of origin? knowledge of Shakespeare or Freud or Darwin? Go for it!
c. Even if you think you know what you need or want to take, be sure to ask your advisor’s opinion
1. Feel free to ignore it

3. The Career Development Services office (www.auburn.edu/career) has a variety of tools that can help your long term planning. You can discuss what you learn from them with your advisor or professors in developing plans for your courses
a. Make an appointment to talk to your advisor about your long term plans before the time when you have to meet with him or her to discuss courses for the next semester

4. There is so much out there that is fascinating and valuable. Take full advantage

Recommendations

1. Do not take all your core courses in your first two years
a. You will be a much better student and will appreciate the material better when you are a junior or senior
b. Take some, especially in areas that you are considering for a major, but don’t take all of them

2. Take skills courses early
a. Math courses, drawing if you’re in art, statistics for social science, chemistry for bio and earth science

3. Take one more math course than you think you can stand

4. Take fabulous courses with fabulous professors
a. Every university has a handful of courses that are just fantastic intellectual experiences because of the way the professor presents the material. Find a few and take them
1. I don’t know which courses those are at Auburn. When I was here in the 1980s I think Drs. Flynt and Lewis in the History Department were thought of as offering such courses
2. Your best guide to such courses is probably other students, but you’ll have to ask
b. Every university has a handful of “gut” courses that give out high numbers of As and require little work. In general these courses should be avoided. Some, however, may have valuable content and may be worth your while. Just remember to work at them as if they were real courses.

5. Take a course or two in something you do for fun
a. Like sports? Try the Sociology of Sport. Like horses? Try Animal Science. Like kids? Try Early Childhood Education? Like shopping? Try Marketing. Love your Bible? Take a course or two on it.
b. You may not know the courses; a good advisor should be able to help
c. Be careful not to wander into a course for majors with a bunch of prerequisites you don’t have. Talk to the prof early if you have doubts

So you want to take more sociology!

          Beyond the first course in sociology, courses in sociology can generally be thought of in terms of four areas: microsociology; social institutions; social structure, organization, and processes; and methods of doing sociology. I will structure my discussion of what you can take next in terms of these categories, and I will mostly talk about what is in the catalog for Sociology at Auburn. In addition, there is a lot of interesting sociology that is not taught in the sociology department, and I’ll point out some of that, too. By the way, the official name of the sociology department is the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work, but I’ll just call it the Department of Sociology. There is also a Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology. Courses that I mark with an asterisk (*) in what follows are being offered in the Fall ’06 semester. I have only checked sociology, anthropology, criminology, and social work to see if they are offered this semester.

Microsociology. The next course in microsociology is SOCY2200* Social Psychology: Sociological Perspectives. Although the details of the course obviously depend on the professor, one focus is the process of interaction. Anyone who expects to do a lot of face to face work with people – say as a teacher, social worker, sales worker, manager, doctor, etc. – will benefit from the tools for examining interaction offered by social psychology. At the moment this is the only microsociology course offered in the Sociology program by the Department of Sociology. The Social Work program offers a pair of microsociological courses, SOWO3800 and SOWO3850* Human Behavior in the Social Environment I and II. Courses in other departments with (probably) some microsociological content include PSYC2510 Psychology of Sexual Behavior, PSYC3570 Theories of Personality, and PSYC3580 Social Psychology in the Psychology Department; COMM2410 Small Group Communication and COMM3450 Intercultural Communication in the Communications Department; and HDFS3060 Patterns of Family Interaction and HDFS3080 Development of Interpersonal Skills in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies.

Social Institutions. One of our most popular courses at Auburn is SOCY3200* Sports in America. Even more important than sports <gasp!>, in terms of its functions, is the family, covered in SOCY3300* Sociology of the Family. For juniors and seniors there is SOCY4200* Medical Sociology. The Department of Sociology knows so much about crime-related institutions that we offer an entire major in Criminology. Institution-focused courses in criminology include CRIM2000* Crime and Justice in America, CRIM3100* Police and Society, CRIM3200* Sentencing and Corrections, and CRIM3500* Delinquency and Juvenile Justice. There are numerous courses about the family scattered across the campus. I have a special fondness for ANTH3000 Culture, Marriage, and the Family because my mother-in-law taught this course at Auburn for many years. Auburn has an entire department with a family focus, the Department of Human Development and Family Studies. The starting points for courses in that department are probably HDFS1850 Current Issues in Human Development and Family Studies and HDFS2000 Marriage and Family in a Global Context. The latter course sounds like it would be very similar in content to the chapter on the family in our text. Economic and political institutions of course are crucial elements of social life. Economic institutions are the focus of the Economics Department (and the Agricultural Economics Department) as well as most of the College of Business. There are two important introductory economics courses, ECON2020 Principles of Microeconomics and ECON2030 Principles of Macroeconomics. Many of the ideas in microeconomics have been used by microsociologists. Related Business College courses include BUSI1010 and BUSI2010 Contemporary Issues in Business Administration I and II, MKTG3310 Principles of Marketing, and MKTG3410 Consumer Behavior. Political institutions are primarily the province of the Department of Political Science, where the key introductory courses are POLI1020 Political Economy, POLI1090 American Government in a Multicultural World, POLI2100 State and Local Government, and POLI3020 Introduction to Political Thought. If you are interested in agriculture as an institution, consider RSOC3109 Agriculture and Values or AGEC3010 Agribusiness Marketing, both in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology. Social welfare institutions are covered in SOWO2000 Introduction to Social Work and SOWO2650 History of Social Welfare. The mass media are covered in RTVF3300 Foundations of Mass Communication. Religion is covered in RELG1000 Introduction to Religious Studies, RELG2020 The Current Religious Scene, RELG3330 Eastern Religions, and RELG3340 Western Religions.

Social Structure, Social Organization, and Social Processes. The size, structure, and growth of the population of people on the planet constitute the subject matter of SOCY2100 Population and Society. I will be teaching this course in the Spring. Another course geared toward helping students understand issues facing Alabama, the US, and the world is SOCY2000* Social Issues. An important feature of all societies is covered in SOCY4100* Deviance. A course I strongly recommend for everyone is SOCY3500* Minority Groups. Rural Sociology offers RSOC3620 Community Organization, RSOC4610 Rural Sociology, RSOC4640 Sociology of Community Development, and the increasingly important RSOC4650 Sociology of Natural Resources and the Environment. Several anthropology courses are worthy of consideration, including ANTH1000* Introduction to Anthropology (strongly recommended, though it overlaps with SOCY1000 quite a bit), ANTH3100 Language and Culture, ANTH3200 Anthropology of Gender, and ANTH3700 Political Ecology. Criminology courses of note include CRIM3000* Criminology and, for juniors and seniors, CRIM 4500 Victimology, CRIM4550 Serial and Mass Murder, CRIM4600 Sex Crimes, and CRIM4650* Drugs and Society. There are several geography courses that look interesting (to me): GEOG1010*/1013* Global Geography, GEOG2010 Cultural Geography, GEOG2100 World Geography, and GEOG3300 International Travel and Tourism (tourism/hospitality is a surprisingly huge and expanding sector of the economy). Many departments have courses that offer social science approaches to particular regions of the world. In addition to the Middle Eastern Societies course in Sociology mentioned above, courses in Geography are listed covering the US and Canada, Alabama and the Southeast [not to be completely confused with the SEC], Latin America, Africa, Europe, and Asia, while Political Science lists courses on Russia, Latin America, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, Western Europe, and Asia.

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Selected Sociology Courses, Fall ‘06

SOCY2000	Social Issues
SOCY2200	Social Psychology: Sociological Perspectives
SOCY3200	Sports in America
SOCY3300	Sociology of the Family
SOCY3500	Minority groups
SOCY4100	Deviance
SOCY4200	Medical Sociology
SOCY5970	Stratification

Selected Other Department of Sociology, Anthropology,
and Social Work Courses, Fall ‘06

ANTH1000	Intro to Anthropology
ANTH2100	Intro to Archeology
CRIM2000	Crime and Justice in America
CRIM3000	Criminology
CRIM3100	Police and Society
CRIM3200	Sentencing and Corrections
CRIM3500	Delinquency and Juvenile Justice
CRIM4300	Criminal Evidence
CRIM5200	Sociology of Criminal Law
CRIM5650	Drugs and Society
SOWO2000	Intro to Social Work
SOWO2650	History of Social Welfare
SOWO3500	Child Welfare
SOWO3800	Human Behavior in the Social Environment