Sociology offers a cutting edge undergraduate major for students interested in the social dimensions of politics, economics, history, psychology, and demography. Concentrators can deepen their understanding of globalization, and the program is designed so that students who wish to go abroad in the Spring of their junior year can do so.
Professors in the department study wide-ranging topics, including: the immigrant experience and immigration policy, the 21st century corporate firm, religious diversity, the mass media, school shootings, affirmative action, and growing up with a single parent. Our sociological perspective on all of these subjects tends to look at things from below, rather than from above. We are interested in revealing the exercise of power when none appears to be operating. We're interested in the social experience of groups that have, until recently, largely been invisible. We emphasize the careful use of evidence to develop and enrich our understanding of social processes, and we use a wide variety of statistical, ethnographic, and historical methods.
Sociology majors benefit from a smaller major where they receive individual attention from faculty. It is also the most diverse major in the university, attracting students committed to an environment of respect and acceptance.
Our students tend to do extremely well in applying to a wide range of graduate programs from medicine to law to business, because professional schools are increasingly looking for intellectual diversity and sociology provides a valued perspective in the contemporary professions. In addition, students who major in sociology go into a wide range of fields from investment banking to law to education, activism, and the non-profit sector.
