Classes
(Academic timetable)
(Undergraduate calendar)
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2026-27 SOSA Issues and Special Topics Course Offerings:
FALL:
SOSA 4001/5001: Quantitative Analysis in the Social Sciences I 鈥� Deena Abul-Fottouh
Tuesdays 8:35 a.m.-11:25 p.m.
*DESCRIPTION TO FOLLOW*
SOSA 4003/5003: Contemporary Perspectives in Ethnography 鈥� Robin Oakley
Thursdays 8:35 a.m.-11:25 a.m.
Human cultural beliefs and practices are extraordinarily varied and intricately nuanced. A minute gesture, expression, or object can convey bold messages to those who know the syntax of expression or be completely missed by those who don鈥檛. Whether these gradations of meaning are acknowledged, reproduced, reconfigured, cherished, reviled, contorted or erased depends a lot on the economic, political, cultural, social and environmental context that people choose to, and/or are forced to, live out their lives. Through the ages, cultural experts among us have studied, analysed, and depicted beliefs among their own societies and that of others. In more recent times this is often referred to as 鈥榚thnography鈥�. Also known as 鈥榳riting culture鈥�, ethnography is both a genre of expression and a tool kit of methodologies and methods that, if done well, provide valuable information that can inform different types of action in society.听 In this class we focus on the ways that people defend, forget, and/or reconfigure their cultural meanings through time and space, who gets to decide on which meanings are accepted at any given time, and how these processes have been explored through ethnography.
SOSA 4004/5004: Issues in Economy, Work, and Development 鈥� Liz Fitting
TOPIC: Capitalism and its Critics
Mondays 2:35 a.m.-5:25 p.m.
This seminar explores several key critiques of capitalism found in social theory and social movements. We read and engage critical texts and case studies in anthropology, sociology, and other disciplines in order to unpack concepts connected to past and present configurations of capitalism. Such concepts include accumulation by dispossession, imperialism, neoliberalism, social reproduction, the commons, and different 鈥渇orms鈥� of capitalism, like racial and disaster. 听听Students take up insights, frameworks, and concepts discussed in the readings when writing a final paper on a topic of their choice related to the course content. This is an advanced seminar which means all students must read the assigned texts prior to class, come prepared with points for discussion and questions, and contribute to the discussion.
SOSA 4016: Special Topics-听Karen Foster
TOPIC:听 Refusing Productivity: Alternatives to a growth society听
Thursdays 2:35-5:25
Economic growth is the pathway to a better world鈥� or is it? This course will engage with the work of social theorists and thinkers who have been arguing for a century, against orthodox economics, that economic growth actually isn鈥檛 good for us.听听From E.F. Shumacher鈥檚 Small is Beautiful to contemporary 鈥渄egrowth鈥� scholarship, we will critically examine alternative ways of organizing work, communities and economies.
SOSA 4017: Special Topics-听Emma Whelan
TOPIC: Health & Uncertainty听
Fridays 2:35-5:25
Health is so crucial to wellbeing that uncertainties about health pose serious challenges for individuals, social groups, and societies. As laypeople and patients, we must manage the unpredictability of aging, illness, and disability and uncertainties about current and future health, often based on conflicting, incomplete, or inaccessible information; we may be labelled ignorant, irresponsible or difficult based on our response to these uncertainties. Health care researchers and practitioners also struggle with uncertainty, trying to fit atypical patients and variable, vague symptoms into standardized diagnoses and treatments that may or may not work, to cope with proliferating medical research and calls for risk minimization, and to quell patient fear, resistance and uncertainty while maintaining expert authority. Societies and their governments try to manage, predict and prevent pandemics, superbugs and catastrophes that may threaten our health in a hazy and uncertain future. In this course, we examine the problems and politics of uncertainty, ignorance, and the unknown in health, along with some approaches (hope, prognostication, denial, avoidance, activism, rationalization) used to mitigate them--with varying degrees of success.
WINTER:
SOSA 4005/5005: Issues in Social Justice and Inequality 鈥� Chris Giacomantonio
TOPIC: Justice, Fairness, and Legitimacy
Tuesdays 2:35 a.m.-5:25 p.m.
Social theory offers a wide range of perspectives on justice and, by extension, injustice. For some, justice is an objective property of a state of affairs, measured against universal norms; for others, it is subjective and measured against socially-contingent expectations and perceptions of what is fair and appropriate. Often, though not exclusively, established through relationships between individuals, groups, and 鈥榯he state鈥�, the experience of (in)justice is a core element in determining whether people grant legitimacy to social and societal institutions. This experience of justice differs along cultural, geographical, class, race, and gender lines, which in turn has implications for imagining both universal and contingent forms of justice. In this course, we will review several key theories of justice, examine sociological and anthropological evidence that help us understand the practical implications of these theories, and consider different claims about how the concepts of justice, fairness, and legitimacy act to shape social relations.
SOSA 4006/5006: Issues in Critical Health Studies 鈥� Emma Whelan
TOPIC: Morality & Health
Thursdays 2:35 p.m.-5:25 p.m.
Drawing upon a variety of concepts and approaches, including healthism, medicalization, moral careers, moral regulation, moral panics, social problems, risk, responsibilization, discipline, and technologies of the self, this course explores how health is connected to social judgments about morality, with a focus on the particular forms of moralization of health common in British and North American societies. We will consider questions such as: Why do some health issues and practices make us vulnerable to stigma or moral criticism, while others bring us sympathy and support, or even enhance our moral standing? How has the moralization of health problems and practices changed over time? How is the moralization of health related to class, gender, race, age, sexuality, and other indices of social difference? How have health care providers and researchers鈥攁nd social scientists!--participated in the moralization of health, and with what effects? What is the role of the norm in definitions of health, and how do variations from the norm come to be defined as illnesses?
SOSA 4015: Special Topics听鈥� STAFF
TOPIC: Governing Uncertainties-Social policy, risk, and social change
Wednesdays 2:35 a.m.-5:25 p.m.
*DESCRIPTION TO FOLLOW*