Sociology Research Methods Syllabus

Here's a syllabus for one of the semesters, Spring 2006, that I taught Methods of Sociological Inquiry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I used to post teaching and research materials on UW's website but didn't move those after I left. In the future, I'll re-create it, but I will post this syllabus for now in case someone is searching for some teaching ideas. Many of the links are no longer OK. (Not all of this is aligning correctly, so I'll try to fix it later.)

My version seems to be more hands-on with a variety of research activities and includes lots more historical examples, such as from The Philadelphia Negro by Du Bois because of his use of systematic observation and interviews in the study of race. Many of the readings in my sections of research methods ended up examining the topics of race and order using different methods. In addition to Du Bois on race, Duneier used mainly participant observation but also interviews, conversation analysis, a simple field experiment, and historical research. LaPiere ran a famous field experiment in the 1920s followed by a questionnaire, and there are the field experiments by Pager (black and white men, with and without criminal records, applying for jobs) and by Massey and Lundy (undergrads at Penn calling landlords about apartments).This Spring 2006 syllabus has less on order than what I assigned in previous semesters. That topic pops up in Du Bois, Duneier, as well as Zimbardo on street vandalism.

Sociology 357—Methods of Sociological Inquiry

Spring 2006, the University of Wisconsin-Madison

Lecturer: Chuck Ditzler

Office 7105 Social Science Building             Office Hours: Tuesday 11am-noon,

Office Phone:   262-7458                               Thursday 11am-noon, or by appointment

Email: cditzler@ssc.wisc.edu

Class Scheduled: TR   9:30am-10:45am        Class Location: 6232 Social Science Bldg.

Course Description

This is a hands-on course that introduces methods of sociological research. Two themes thread throughout much of this version of the course: recognizing facts inconvenient for one’s position and developing one’s imagination or ways of perception in research. 

The primary task of a useful teacher is to teach his students to recognize “inconvenient” facts—I mean facts that are inconvenient for their party opinions. And for every party opinion there are facts that are extremely inconvenient, for my own opinion no less than for others. I believe the teacher accomplishes more than a mere intellectual task if he compels his audience to accustom itself to the existence of such facts. I would be so immodest as even to apply the expression “moral achievement,” though perhaps this may sound too grandiose for something that should go without saying.  Max Weber “Science as a Vocation”

Shams and delusions are esteemed for soundest truth, while reality is fabulous. If men would steadily observe realities only, and not allow themselves to be deluded, life, to compare it with such things as we know, would be like a fairy tale and the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments.  Henry David Thoreau “Where I Lived and What I Lived For” Walden

From the Undergraduate Catalog, 2003-2005:

357 Methods of Sociological Inquiry. (Crosslisted with Rur Soc) I or II or SS; 3-4 cr (I). Scientific methods and their application in the analysis of society; procedures in testing sociological theory: problem definition, hypothesis construction, collection and evaluation of data. P: So st; not open to stdts who have taken Soc 358.

Circus Wagons and Silent Movie: Overture Center 10th Anniversary events, Saturday, September 27, 2014

The event that especially interested me was the free showing of a Harold Lloyd movie, Hot Water, in the Capitol Theater. It has some funny moments but is definitely not as good as his more famous movies. Because it was free, I was surprised and disappointed that most seats in the balcony, where I sat, were empty. Opened in 1928, the theater is one of the few silent movie theaters left that has its original organ to accompany movies.

Capitol Theater, Overture Center; Madison, Wisconsin. September 27, 2014. Organ being played prior to show.

The theater was kept and renovated as part of the Overture Center, which has a much larger hall within the complex. I attended one of the first concerts in the Overture Hall--Dave Brubeck--but I disliked the "European seating" design in the balconies without aisles. The older Capitol Theater, on the other hand, is much more comfortable with its palace look.

Barnum and London Cage Wagon, 1883--along State Street, Madison, WI

For the anniversary of the entire center, a circus theme was chosen--I suppose because of the proximity of the Circus World Museum in Baraboo. About a dozen circus wagons from the museum were placed on streets surrounding the Overture Center. According to signs posted near each wagon, most of the wagons are over 100 years old. They included ones for caged animals, music calliopes (one of them was playing while I walked by), bands, and selling tickets. The band wagons reminded me of Dr. Seuss books.

One reason that I post this information is in case someone is considering moving to Madison, such as to teach at UW. In recent years, the sociology department has lost prominent professors through retirement, better salaries elsewhere, or family reasons. Some prospective professors and grad students maybe have the misconception of a boring Midwest, so they prefer one of the coasts. [I'd forgotten to post this after I created it this past fall.]

Circus calliope wagon

Circus steam calliope

Textbook costs
Too many textbooks cost about as much as I pay for food each month. In some fields, teachers have few, if any, alternatives, but I don't think that's the case in the social sciences. A lot of useful outside materials are freely available online. For criminology I can assign, among many things, short DOJ reports and public radio audio clips.

This semester I've assigned two required books: Cry Rape: The True Story of One Woman’s Harrowing Quest for Justice and Cop in the Hood: My Year Policing Baltimore's Eastern District. Because Cry Rape is about a Madison case written by an area reporter, more than 30 copies are in the local libraries. Last semester, my students talked for around one hour about the book without my saying much, except to choose sometimes who would talk next. Besides the crime of rape, it covers the perspective of victims and police mistakes, such as tunnel-vision and overgeneralization. But I worried that my students got too negative of an angle on the police, so this semester I've also chosen Cop in the Hood, by a sociologist who joined the Baltimore police. Much of the book is his take on illegal drugs, so the book serves more than one purpose. Students must also pick from a list a third book to borrow from the library to learn about a topic that interests them.

When I taught research methods at UW-Madison, I was able to assign an older edition that the bookstore sold for $15-20. The small improvements in the newest edition were definitely not worth the more than $80. I got this idea from a UW professor, and I wish that others would try it so that books are used more while they still are in OK shape and students can save money. Online textbooks might be a relatively inexpensive path, but the main response to outrageous prices is for teachers to force textbook writers to use cheaper publishers or even create their own textbooks. If I'd had access to the Web in China, I could have edited my own casebook for contract law using public domain court opinions. Why more law professors don't do this disappoints me, especially given their enormous salaries.