Catálogo de publicaciones - revistas

<jats:p> Sociology plays a key role in empathy development, which is central to addressing complex social problems. However, little is known about what types of courses work best to enhance empathy. In parallel, sociological animal studies (SAS) has evolved as a relatively new subfield focused on assessing human and animal relationships. SAS research suggests that our interactions with animals enhance empathy development. Combining these literatures, we assess if SAS compared to non-SAS courses impact affective and cognitive empathy for humans and animals differently. Findings reveal that students who take SAS courses demonstrate greater postcourse human and animal empathy even when controlling for precourse levels of empathy and other factors that drive empathy development. Although SAS remains on the periphery of the discipline, this study suggests that it should be a central component of the sociological curriculum. </jats:p>

<jats:p> This conversation outlines an undergraduate research project that I designed and implemented during the fall of 2020 and the spring of 2021 in an online Sociology of the Arts class at Queensborough Community College in New York City. The project involves original student research on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on three community-based arts organizations and the communities they serve. To showcase the problems and possibilities that emerged in assigning the project, I engage the contrasting and complementary lenses of Pierre Bourdieu’s structurally based theories of culture, capital, and social reproduction on the one hand and the pedagogical strategies that emerge from humanistic sociology on the other. The conversation concludes with reflections on issues faced by educators committed to teaching an interdisciplinary and humanistic sociology at the community college level and the ways experiential learning strategies can help students develop community connections and agency through the arts. </jats:p>

<jats:p> To what degree is explicit care/work policy taught in family courses in Canada’s leading research-intensive universities? We analyze family courses in sociology departments and in political studies and women’s/gender studies programs in Canada’s 15 R1 universities to make a contribution to the scholarship of teaching and learning. This national scan marks a methodological innovation from curriculum studies that generally adopt a single-program or single-site focus. From a Canadian universe of 74 family courses, we identify 15 whose formal course calendar description explicitly addresses care/work family policy (measures to reconcile caring for young children with employment, through early learning and childcare, parental leaves, and child benefits). Sociology predominates among courses where family policy is taught, yet care/work policy content is not common. Given growing concerns about the care crisis and the care deficit in Canada, the low profile of care/work family policy content in family courses is significant. This study sheds light on the value of national postsecondary education curricular reviews and suggests that family curriculum renewal is warranted. </jats:p>

<jats:p> We report on a cross-disciplinary collaboration between sociology and mathematics education to more effectively cultivate quantitative literacy (QL) in the introductory sociology course. Focusing on an instructional unit presenting the Gini coefficient (the most commonly used summary measure of income inequality), we engaged in iterative cycles of presentation, assessment, and redesign across four semester-long courses. Assessments were guided by insights from mathematics education—such as the procedural/conceptual distinction, student misconceptions, and student noticing—and characterized by extensive informal discussion and analysis of patterns in student exam responses. Assessments were formalized via coding of specific response elements and used to identify strategic foci for revision and redesign (including creating a brief instructional video series and an active learning exercise). In this article, we highlight the value of cross-disciplinary collaboration in QL pedagogy, demonstrate the effectiveness of analyzing specific elements and patterns of student comprehension to revise pedagogical presentation, and advocate for the strategic utility of the Gini coefficient for cultivating QL in introductory sociology. </jats:p>

<jats:p> Teaching introductory sociology is one of the primary means by which sociologists mobilize knowledge. Ongoing critical reflection on the content of sociology textbooks is therefore an important disciplinary enterprise. The current critical moment in which many nations, institutions, and publics face a reckoning with their historic and current relationships with Indigenous peoples presents sociologists with the opportunity to examine how Indigenous peoples, histories, and perspectives are to be found in these pedagogical materials. Drawing on Critical Indigenous scholarship that “disrupts the certainty of disciplinary knowledges[’]” concept of “connected sociologies,” we examine the state of inclusion of Indigenous content in introductory sociology curriculum. To achieve this, we conducted a content analysis of 10 of the top-selling English-language Canadian introductory sociology textbooks, and we drew directly from interviews with Indigenous scholars. By introducing the literature on solidarity and allyship in the final section, we conclude with teaching and learning actions to incorporate in sociology courses. </jats:p>