From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 3 06:15:32 1995 Date: Fri, 03 Nov 95 09:08:07 EST From: "T R. Young" <34LPF6T@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Organization: Central Michigan University Subject: Betty Lee (fwd) To: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOCIOLOGY Two grad students at Texas Woman's University, Heidi Henrickson and Mindy Ephraim, are doing a book on Women in Sociology. They asked me to spread the word...I forward the latest posting so those of you interested in the project can contact them directly. If you have any suggestions re: BettyLee or about other women you think should be included, do contact them. TR Young T.R.YOUNG@CMICH.EDU ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Date: Thu, 02 Nov 1995 21:15:21 CST From: GREEN WITCH To: 34lpf6t@cmuvm.csv.cmich.edu Subject: Betty Lee T.R. Thank you for getting back to me with the names and suggestions. Mindy and I heard from Jim Galliher today - he sent us an outline of his presentation to AHS on the new book. We telephoned him about the project and asked for her number, which he supplied but was unable to talk for very long. We will be calling him on Monday to speak for a longer period of time. We got a hold of Jerry Starr via GTE or Bell and spoke with him at his office at West Virginia. We asked him about Betty Lee's physical condition, whether we should call her sons, etc. He advised us to call her directly, she is an independent, strong woman without the filtering of her children. He believed she may actually be offended or frustrated by going through her children first for "permission". Mindy telephoned her and set up an appointment to see her in two weeks time in Durham for interviews. Mindy is the only one of us with a decent income, so she must go. It breaks my heart that we both can not go, but alas, priorities call for this approach. I have ordered the Galliher book federal express from SUNY and will begin library searches of her work, articles about the Lees, etc. We are also interested in receiving bio information from people who have known Betty and would like to tell us stories, describe her impact to sociology, etc. Please give us further suggestions about who to contact in this regard. We thank you for your support in this project. Please pass the word that we are doing it for a book on Women in Sociology, a project created by students (not professionals) in sociology - a project Betty Lee would promote. This book is intended for upper level students in sociology and is being written out of the interests of students who took Brenda Phillips' Women in Sociology graduate course this last summer. She, too is involved in the editing process along with Cal Easterling (Oral Roberts Univ) and Patricia Nation (University of North Texas). We are so excited we can't stand it. I hope to hear from you soon. P.S. Joe and I will be returning to Michigan in June. I will have completed my program at that time. Heidi From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 3 14:33:23 1995 From: michael carley Subject: Call for Papers (fwd) To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Fri, 3 Nov 1995 14:30:56 -0800 (PST) This call for papers was posted to the progressive sociologists network with a message to forward it to other lists. Forwarded message: > From owner-psn@csf.colorado.edu Fri Nov 3 06:43:49 1995 > Message-Id: <199511031423.JAA08654@youth.yth.mtu.edu> > Date: Fri, 03 Nov 1995 09:23:46 -0500 > Reply-To: dassbach@mtu.edu > Sender: owner-psn@csf.colorado.edu > From: dassbach@mtu.edu (Carl H.A. Dassbach) > To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK > Subject: Call for Papers > Mime-Version: 1.0 > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > X-To: PSN@CSF.COLORADO.EDU > X-Authentication-Warning: youth.yth.mtu.edu: Host social2.yth.mtu.edu claimed to be social2 > X-Sender: dassbach@youth.yth.mtu.edu > X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Version 1.4.4 > X-Listprocessor-Version: 7.1 -- ListProcessor by CREN > > Please forward to other lists.................... > > Theme: The Internet and Social Change > Where: 91st Annual Meeting of the American Sociological Association > New York City, August 16-20, 1996. > > Papers are being solicited for a session or sessions on the theme "The > Internet and Social Change." The theme is loosely defined in order to > accommodate all types of concerns and perspectives on the Internet and its > social impact. > > Papers will be reprinted in a special issue of the Electronic Journal of > Sociology and possibly an edited volume. > > Send abstracts, proposals or completed papers to Carl H.A. Dassbach at the > address below. > ----------------------------------------------------------------- > Carl H.A. Dassbach E-mail: DASSBACH@MTU.EDU > Dept. of Social Sciences Phone: (906)487-2115 > Michigan Technological University Fax: (906)487-2468 > Houghton, MI 49931 USA > > From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sat Nov 4 17:33:43 1995 Date: Sat, 4 Nov 1995 20:27:41 -0500 (EST) From: Jim Cassell To: Sociology Graduate Student Discussion Subject: POSITION ANNOUNCEMENT> McREL: Research & Evaluation Specialist (fwd) fyi ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Cassell jwcassell@UNC.EDU Institute for Research in Social Science Phone: 919-962-0782 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Fax: 919-962-4777 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3355 USA ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 1 NOV 1995 16:23:26 MST From: Gene Glass Newgroups: bit.listserv.aera Subject: POSITION ANNOUNCEMENT> McREL: Research & Evaluation Specialist Mid-continent Regional Educational Laboratory (McREL) seeks experienced research and evaluation specialist to assist in: gathering education demographic, economic, and attitudinal data; developing and pilot testing data collection instruments; preparing technical papers, and evaluation plans and reports; and designing and implementing evaluations of educational programs and services. Applicants should possess a doctoral degree in psychology, education, sociology or related field. In addition, applicants should have at least three years experience in conduction research and evaluation on K-12 programs and issues with federal, state, and local agencies. Applicants should be proficient with microcomputer applications including WP, SPSS, and database applications; and be able to demonstrate strong analytical ability, success in proposal writing and development, timely completion of contract work, and ability to work under pressure and closely with other team members. Competitive salary, commensurate with experience and an excellent benefits package. Position closes November 13, 1995. Please send vita and salary history to: Senior Research Associate, McREL, 2550 S. Parker Rd., #500, Aurora, CO 80014. No phone calls, please. McREL is an Equal Opportunity, Affirmative Action Employer. [%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%] Posted by Gene V Glass, Editor of AERA LISTSERV. gene@asu.edu To post messages, mail them to AERA@asu.edu . This LIST is for announcements to the educational research community (jobs, conferences, publications, relocation of AERA members, etc.). For open discussion of education research, email to LISTSERV@asu.edu and include the message SUB ERL-L . Specialized discussions take place on the AERA Divisional Lists; e.g., to join AERA-A, mail the message SUB AERA-A to LISTSERV@asu.edu. [%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%] From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 5 04:55:34 1995 Date: Sun, 05 Nov 95 07:36:54 EST From: "T R. Young" <34LPF6T@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Organization: Central Michigan University Subject: The Social Location of Crime and Control To: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOCIOLOGY This is the third in a series of mini-lectures on crime from the Red Feather Institute for Advanced Studies in Sociology and made possible in part by the Sociology Department of Central Michigan University and by the managers of the Socgrad Network. Mini-lecture 34: In this mini-lecture, I will set forth the social location of each major form of crime discussed in the first of this special series on crime; then I will list and locate each of the many social control systems which are established to deal with the forms of crime discussed. You will have to use your imagination a bit; draw three pyramids; one of the class structure, one of the structure of racism and one of the structure of gender relations...we will need these to locate the forms of crime and the forms of control. The Class Structure. In this pyramid, draw a heavy line at the very top. It contains about 1/2 of one percent of the population and includes the very rich; mostly chief executive officers of the Fortune Five Hundred and their Major stockholders. They own about 60% of the wealth of America. The Next line is more open. It contains white collar professionals, middle managers, owners of small businesses and a few top academics. It contains about 15-25% of the population and owns about 20% of the wealth of America. The third line is very open; people at the top part of this class are the highest paid workers; they get wages and salaries. They own about 15% of the wealth of America and comprise about 60% of the population. Those at the bottom work as waiters, maids, in construc- tion, transportation, and other low paid service jobs. Below them is a large and growing 'surplus' populations; they are marginal to the class structure; go in and out of jobs and depend heavily on family, state welfare, part-time work, and sometimes, crime. They are not, of course, surplus to the human project, just surplus to the labor needs of business. About 35 millions are below the working class; they are mostly poor white women and their children but excluded minorities make up a disproportional segment of this 'underclass.' Let's take a look at each form of Crime in this Social Pyramid and consider the control systems used to police it. THE UPPER CLASS: Most corporate crime is committed at this level. Price fixing, violation of environmental law, tax law and consumer protection regulations are engineered by those at the very top of the class structure. They are policed only by the ADMINISTRATION JUSTICE SYSTEM. Their former and future employees make up the top officials in the Ad Jus System. It includes the FDA, OSHA, EPA, SEC, FTA, FAA, IRS, and other federal and state regulatory agencies. The CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM seldom concerns itself with such crimes although the number of people left dead and the amount stolen is by far the most serious form of crime. Most political crime is committed by those at the very top of the state sector; wars are fought over markets, raw materials and control of the labor market between the rich industrial countries and in what is called the third world. There is no control system for state engineered crime. Jeffrey Ian Ross has put together two volumes on this form of crime if you are interested in reading more. The form of justice used in the social control systems mentioned center around DISTRIBUTIVE JUSTICE. Fines are levied and court orders are issued to restore, repair and repay but they are so small in terms of the total budget of a really big corporation, they have little deterrent effect. THE MIDDLE CLASS. The middle class commits mostly white collar crime; recall that white collar crime involves a breech of trust and misuse of the social power invested in doctors, lawyers, professors, managers, brokers and others who provide expert advice and service. These crimes are usually policed by the PEER REVIEW SYSTEM. The PRS is made up of colleagues; it is very concerned with due process, rights of the accused and the public image of the profession involved. In recent times, the failure of the CJS or the PRS to police the middle class has lead to an explosion in the Civil Court System. Both professionals and corporations lead a fight to reduce the policing capacity of the civil court system since the juries are not composed of peers but rather of customers who tend to take the standpoint of the complaining party. The from of justice dispensed by both the PRS and the CCS revolves around DISTRIBUTIVE justice...if the white collar criminal [or his insurance carrier] pays for real damages and/or promises to quit and desist, the ends of justice are said to be served in these justice modalities. THE WORKING CLASS: The working class is by far the most law-abiding and productive class. It has little need of policing and is not usually policed by the CJS. Those who work for large and small business are policed by the PRIVATE SECURITY SYSTEM. The PSS is by far the largest control system in the USA and is growing. It polices customers, middle and lower level employees and the compet- ion of large businesses. When one is put through the PSS, there is little due process or other Constitutional protection...on the other hand, the ends of justice are served by DISTRIBUTIVE justice. Employees who steal are required to pay back the monies stolen; customers are usually asked to not return; competitors often enter into informal pricing agreements with large companies and cease to strive for larger market share or to pay better wages. THE UNDERCLASS: Absent social power or economic power, those in the underclass engage in what is called 'street crime' or more simply, property crime. They rob, steal, mug, burglar, and shop- lift. They also sell their labor power to organized crime; they run the numbers, sell the drugs, hi-jack trucks carrying electronics, cigarettes [remember the opening scene in Beverley Hills Cops??]. Most of the people in the underclass do not commit crime; instead they depend upon family, state welfare, occasional work and, some times a bit of shop-lifting or other petty theft. The Underclass is policed by the CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM. It is the second largest control system in the USA. Its logic of justice is RETRIBUTIVE. Pain, punishment, degradation, humiliation, and incarcerartion informs the control ideology of the CSJ. It is not very effective. Since it polices the underclass, most of those brought into its purview are excluded minorities. Especially young minority males. Since most of the judges, lawyers, police and jailors are from the lower class strata and mostly white males, the capacity for violence on either side is very great. THE GENDER SYSTEM: The system of social control for women is very different from that of men. On the class system you drew above, put in a diagonal line that runs from near the bottom of the class system to about 3/4ths of the way to the top. Label the top part of the two sections, Male. Label the bottom part, Female. If we look at upper class white males, there are very few control system policing their behavior yet they commit most of the corporate crime, most of the white collar crime, nearly all of the political crime and benefit from organized crime; either as professional servants or as customers for drugs, sex, pornography or stolen goods. Policing Women: The tactics for policing women have changed greatly over the years. For most of human history, in patriarchal societies, women were policed by men. Fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons in turn control women...usually by force...as women go their their life cycles; girls are controlled by fathers [and mothers], by brothers if fathers die, by husbands after they marry and by sons if they survive husbands. Women not policed [protected] by males are 'fair game.' They are raped, enslaved, enlisted in brothels and/or low wage jobs. Women usually commit property crimes when they do commit crime. The most frequent crimes of which they are charged are writing bad checks, shop-lifting, prostitution and of late, embezzlement. You will note these are economic crimes and reflect the social location of women at the bottom of both class and gender structures. Again most women do not commit crimes but still they are heavily policed. Male control tactics are a seamless part of the lives of most women [more later in other mini-lectures about female response to such control tactics]. In addition, the MEDICAL CONTROL SYSTEM is large and growing. It involves doctors, psychiatrists, drug companies [most of the prescriptions written are tranquilizers; most of the people taking them are women], 'therapists' and a wide range of institutions; hospitals, asylums, clinics, 'ranches' and such. Women in the underclass are controlled by the WELFARE SYSTEM and social workers. This is not usually seen to be a control system but it qualifies since it has a set of rules and a cadre of social workers to enforce them as well as penalties for violation. Last time I counted, there were about 1.1 million private police, about 800,000 public police, about 700,000 doctors and about 300,000 social workers. By class strata: Upper Class women are controlled by men and by medical profession. Professional women are controlled by male supervisors. Working class women are controlled by men. Under class women are controlled by all of the above plus state social workers. In addition, there is a RELIGIOUS JUSTICE SYSTEM which polices mostly women in the lower working class. Women who are 'bad' mothers or wives; women who commit 'sins;' women who resist and rebel are said to be possessed of the Devil and are expected to confess these sins to priests or, in some churches, in open services. They confess, are forgiven and are encouraged to 'sin no more.' As such, the form of justice encountered is both distributive and restorative. THE STRUCTURE OF RACISM. Note I do not refer to race but to racism. The genetic boundaries between the various 'races' are so loose [fractal] that the drawing of them is both a poetics and a politics...as much as I like poetry, I don't encourage its use here. Then too, the relationship between the groups we define as Black, White, Brown, and Yellow dis- appear in non-racist societies. And, if you look closely at crime in American, most of the more serious crime is committed by older 'white' males. It is not that 'whites' are more criminal by nature than are 'Blacks' or 'Browns' but rather they occupy the top positions in corporations and in politics where this crime is committed. POLICING Racial Conflict; Most of the policing done to retain and reproduce the structure of racism is done in the state sector; Congressmen, state legislators, top state functionaries and lower echelon functionaries systematically discriminate in the making and the enforcing of law. Yet most of the racist effects is found in the disjunction of the forms of crime...the kinds of crime white males commit are policed gently by compassionate peers if policed at all. The kinds of crime that poor minority males commit, absent the strategic location to commit corporate or white collar crime, is policed heavily and often, brutally. In addition to the the Criminal Justice System, minorities are policed by UNDERGROUND policing systems. These run from an informal 'black-list' to the secret violence of the KKK, the White Citizens Army, the various 'Religious' churches which shout about white supremacy and a whole host of ad hoc policing by young ethnic gangs who fight over 'turf' in the slums of decaying cities. Not so much in Canada but very much so in many US cities. All in all there is much crime in the USA; a great many social control systems in the 'freest country in the world.' Next time I will discuss theories of crime with the help of my good colleague, Bruce Arrigo, of Duquesne University. Then, for the last in this mini-series, I will set forth the structural features of low-crime societies drawing on the work of Lars Hulsman in Holland, Ron Kramer at W. Mich. University and Ray Michalowski at N. Arizona University. T.R. Young T.R.YOUNG@CMICH.EDU From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 6 09:58:19 1995 Date: Mon, 06 Nov 1995 11:06:20 CST From: GREEN WITCH To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: contact Help! Socgrad'ers from University of Maryland - College Park! Please pass my e-mail address onto Dr. John Pease in Sociology! I have lost his address! Much appreciated, Heidi Henrickson Texas Woman's University g_henrickson@venus.twu.edu From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 7 00:02:22 1995 Date: Tue, 7 Nov 1995 02:59:23 -0500 (EST) From: Michael Aguilera To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU suscribe 1024322772@compuserve.com socgrad From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Thu Nov 9 14:46:04 1995 From: "Julian B. Dierkes" Date: Thu, 9 Nov 1995 17:12:27 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: Organizations, Occupations, and Work The web-pages of the Organizations, Occupations and Work Section of the ASA are now open for business and hoping for comments at http://www.princeton.edu:80/~orgoccwk. Cheers, Julian B. Dierkes ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ | julian b. dierkes | | O jdierkes@eworld.com | | / \ jdierkes@princeton.edu | | / /\ http://www.princeton.edu:80/~jdierkes | | . \/ \ \ dept. of sociology | | princeton university | | | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Thu Nov 9 17:58:39 1995 (PMDF V4.3-10 #10451) id <01HXFXMQ1BES8XA2LG@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Thu, 09 Nov 1995 14:18:12 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 1995 14:18:12 -0500 (EST) From: SCOTT BLAKE Subject: For People is Boston (Sorry to others) To: rockers@medisg.stanford.edu From: BINAH::BLAKE "SCOTT BLAKE" 9-NOV-1995 14:16:14.59 To: @SOC CC: Subj: Peace by Peace: An End to Violence TO: All Graduate Students Brandeis University THOUSANDS ARE EXPECTED AT RALLY TO SUPPORT THE CONTINUATION OF YITZHAK RABIN'S LEGACY OF PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST. November 16, Thursday, 6 - 7:30 p.m. COPLEY SQUARE The G.S.A. has endorsed this event that is being organized by a grassroots movement of students and community members from across the movement of students and community members from across Boston and beyond. Speakers include: --Avraham Burg, Ex. Dir. of WZO and Jewish Agency --Gordon Fellman, Brandeis Professor --Leonard Fein, writer, teacher, activist --Lynn Lyss, Chair of NJCRAC --Jehuda Reinharz --Itamar Rabinovich, Israeli Ambassador to US --Camilia Sadat -- Performers include David Broza, David Paskin, Fred Small, and more... For more info: The Brandeis Coalition for Peace X3585 axelrad@logos.cc.brandeis.edu or Mark Rosenberg, G.S.A. Rep. CHIST X6100 mrosenberg@binah.cc.brandeis.edu From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 12 06:03:56 1995 Date: Sun, 12 Nov 95 07:16:26 EST From: "T R. Young" <34LPF6T@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Organization: Central Michigan University Subject: Theories of Crime; Crimes of Theorists To: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOCIOLOGY No. 35 in a series of mini-lectures at the leading edge of American Sociology; made possible by the good offices of the Socgrad Network, by the Sociology Department of Central Michigan University and supported by the Red Feather Institute for Advanced Studies in Sociology. ======================================================================= Part 4 of a five part mini-series on crime and social justice. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Theories of Crime: a Postmodern Critique. With Bruce Arrigo, Duquesne University. 1. I would like to begin this discussion of theories of crime with work from my colleague, Bruce Arrigo. Bruce is combining semiotics chaos theory and other work from a postmodern philosophy of science and knowledge to help reflect upon the practices and ethics of pre-modern, modern and postmodern criminology. A. Bruce makes the point from Lacan that practices/theory of crime reside in a linguistic structure. Once inside that linguistic structure, the SUBJECTIVITY of the criminologist and all those who work within a justice system is thereby flattened out and reduced to the significations possible within the rules of discourse of that linguistic/semiotic system. Much as one cannot speak/think about balls and strikes when playing football, one cannot speak of disease, treatment, or oppression when one works out of a utili- tarian frame work which emphasizes rational calculation of rewards and punishment. In American criminology, there is a system of production of signs and signifiers which is located in the law making and law enforcing system which renders the moral agency of police, lawyers, judges and jailors subservient to that linguistic system. The process of law production involves appeals courts at state and federal level as well as supreme courts at state and federal level. The net effect of their linguistic work is to simplify and to exclude both situated meanings/interpretations as well as alternative meanings/ interpretations of an act. Thus language about crime becomes a fetish which cripples both imagination, mercy and a wider ethics which could help change to a low crime society. In particular, Bruce says [and I agree], that which is defined as ethical and just flows from a language system pre-structured to serve the demands of advanced monopoly capital infused and mediated by both patriarchy and racism. If we want to break out of this closed ethical system, then we must subject theories and practices in American Criminology to critique. More than that, we must consider alternative discourses; discourses which include desires and devices other than or in addition to market/racist/sexist discourse which now shape the ethics of police and other practioneers in the criminal justice system. Let us begin. 2. Pre-modern theories of crime. a. Religious theories. Religious theories were/are openly partisan on behalf of a given social life world. They define behavior incom- patible with their own god-given ethical system as evil, sinful, corrupt or the work of the devil. For most of human history, pre-modern theories of crime were based upon and limited to the boundaries of the tribe/clan. Sometime about 5000 years ago, along with the appearance of hydraulic agriculture, the structure of religion began to expand to accomodate a wide variety of cultural practices within a single legal domain. The Code of Hammurabi is generally cited as the first such code. Deuteronomy is based in part upon it. Out of the turmoil and expansions of emire, there gradually arose three great 'universal' religions; Christianity first, then Islam and Buddhism. All three accomodated diversity in ways not permitted more tribal religions. The ethical structure of pre-modern theories of crime were non- linear. There was room for mercy, compassion, repentance, for- giveness and redemption. Modern science rejected both the divine sources of deviancy and the non-linear response to it. b. Modern theories of Crime. Modern science is based upon euclidean geometry, aristotlean logic, newtonian physics and leibnizean math. It posits a knowable, discoverable set of natural and social laws from which judgments about crime/deviancy can be made. The essence of modern science is an assumption that rational, linear dynamics describe both law-making, law-breaking and law enforcement behaviors. The INDEPENDENT variables which CAUSE crime in linear fashion vary from theory to theory. There is room for multiply causality still operating in a linear, ratio-nal fashion. 1). Geographical theories: these assume that climate/terrain shape both the nature and the incidence of crime. Northerners are sup- posed in general to be more rational and law-abiding than those south of the equator. This, of course is a thinly disguished racist theory of crime which ignores the Viking raids with pillage, rape and ravaging as well as German, British and American forms of political, corporate and white collar crime. 2) Physiological theories. Physiological theories point to gene- and/or bio-chemical sources for crime. It ignores that fact that both biology and genetics are very stable across generations while crime rates flucuate dramatically within any given genetic grouping. The magical thing about physiological theories is that they reduce crime to individual behavior/pathology and thus ignore the features of the larger society which might promote/discourage crime. 3) Psychological theories. There are any number of psychological theories of crime, some of which go beyond bio-chemistry and genes to focus upon child hood trauma, socialization in 'deviant' sub- cultures and/or trauma to the brain/cortex. In the more freudian theories of crime/deviancy, mother is a particularly harmful agent in that she does not help the child through the stages of psycho-sexual development, the end of which is a strong ego, a well-constrained id and an easy acceptance of society/superego. Father comes in for his share of blame in that his jealousy of son and seduction of daughter cripples them for life and results in resistence and rebellion apart from the structures of racism, class inequality or patriarchal tyranny. 4) Interactional theories. There are a wide variety of such theories with many virtues, few of which have much to do with the sources of crime. a) Differential Association. This well venerated theory of crime is not a theory of crime at all but a much more general theory of socialization/formation of the self structure. It may be true that people do in fact differently associate with criminals, have an excess of definations favorable to crime and go on to a career in crime. But the same thing may be said of doctors, lawyers, sociologists and Japanese. We all variously differentially associate with/learn from a special ethnic, work, religious, or political group. Differential association theory too often ignores the larger structures/systems which funnel persons into association with some and exclusion from others. Class, race and gender system pre-shape association and provide linguistic systems favorable or hostile to forms of behavior said to be deviant/criminal. Then too, a great many white collar criminals do not differently associate; they are bright enough and motivated enough by the dynamics of income and expenditure to figure out all by them- selves how to cheat customers, steal from employers, over-pre- scribe for patients or raid trust funds of their clients. Then too, a great many people who differentally associate with good, law-abiding, church-going, bill-paying people wind up as thieves, child abusers, spouse batterers and rapacious employers. b) Labelling theory. As much as I like and respect Howie Becker, I have to make the same critique of labelling theory as of Diff- erential association theory. The point in fact is a lot of people labelled as Christians, Democrats, Republicans, Generals, and Corporals do commit a lot of political crime. But those labels are seldom used in crim texts to make the point. Becker points out, rightly, the harmful effects of a police/court prison system which funnels people into a life of crime. But, as with diff/assoc theory, labelling theory does not ask why these people engage in the first, second, nth crime. The tendencies of racism, class inequality, marketting and gender politics are not included in most interaction theories of crime. They do shape and pre-shape the pathways for most young people. 5) Culture of Poverty theses. There are a good many self-serving problems with these linguistic systems which offer to direct the attention of policy makers, law makers, law enforcers to crime. First it ignores all the w.c.c. professionals do; all the crime corporations commit and most of the political crime committed by well paid functionaries of the state. Secondly, it ignores the fact that most poor countries around the world have much lower crime rates than does the USA and many of the other 'advanced' industrialized societies. The fact is that poor people have lower crimes rates and give more to charity than do we white collar criminals and/or corporate criminals. One could argue that affluence produces crime but that would be equally tedious. It is being poor and powerless in a consumer society with a large surplus population and disappearing jobs which pay well which tend to make some forms of street crime attractive to some small percent of the underclass. 6) Structural-Functionalism. Structural functionalism sets some structures as essential/normal to all complex societies. Failure to work within these 'essential' structures is explained variously by genetics, bio-chemistry, socialization, diff/association, and by other failings; other than the structures of the complex society itself. In radical, marxist, feminist and critical theory, these very structures, held to be essential, promote crime. Hierarchy, inequality, class differentials, gendered divisions of labor, and the pyramids of political power are exculpated by S-F theories. If one rebels or fails in a large, well lighted and highly special- ized university, the problem is with the student rather than with massified, depersonalized, labor market education. If one refuses to give men free domestic service; refuses to accept sole responsibility for parenting, refuses to confine herself to the status-roles assigned her gender by this rational, essential division of labor, she is said to be mad, bad or ill. If workers demand better wages, safer working conditions, job security, health care or pension plans, they are not accomodating themselves to the realities of the labor market and need to be disciplined by competition with workers from the surplus labor pool. One by one, the structures of American society are themselves in- dicted as the source of much distress and much pre-theoretical resistence and rebellion we call crime...not excluding racism, hate crime and xenophobia. If we want a low crime society, we have to break out of the linguistic system which exculpates those social structures which benefit so few so much and which push so many to resist in so many harmful ways; harmful to themselves, to others and to social peace. In the last of 5 mini-lectures in this mini-series, I will lay out the structural features of low crime societies. We have much to learn and much to teach as criminologists; some of it comes from pre-modern knowledge systems; some of it comes from postmodern critiques and all of it comes from the human head and the human heart. TR Young T.R.YOUNG@CMICH.EDU From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 12 15:44:36 1995 Date: Sun, 12 Nov 1995 18:37:56 -0500 (EST) From: thomas conroy Subject: assigning grades To: list Just wondering what advice others on this list have about grading their students. I've been spending the past couple of days grading mid-term exams, a task I never really like. While I do like the opportunity to give my students some feedback, as well as to see what they've learned/understood, I don't particulary care for the act of ranking their work. For one thing, some of the students take bad or mediocre grades personally. Alternatively, I sometimes wonder whether or not I'm being too lenient, and implicitly encouraging a lack of full effort. Also, as someone who is way below the rank of tenured prof, I know that student evaluations are going to carry some weight toward whether I get to teach regularly or not as I strive to complete. I am now facing handing back 30 mid terms, where around 1/3 to 1/4 of the class performed rather poorly; The students are required to do the course evaluations at the end of the month, before they have a chance to turn in the remainder of their work. I worry that the students will take their frustrations out on me in the form of highly negative evaluations. I am certain that I have given the students a chance to ask questions, to come talk with me, etc., but most have not done so. Perhaps I am making a big deal out of this, but thinking about these things is reminding me about the parts of teaching I am not all that comfortable with. I'd be interested in hearing what others have to say about these matters. Thanks Tom Conroy From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 12 16:34:14 1995 Date: Sun, 12 Nov 1995 19:26:22 -0500 (EST) From: "Mauri A. Casano" To: thomas conroy Subject: Re: assigning grades yes, this hits close to home, especially this time of year! It's a tough dilemma. I teach writing part-time at two universities (while pursuing my PhD in Social Science), and the evals are a constant threat. I am also chair of our teacher evaluation committee, for the first time this year, and it appears that there is a history of evaluation which seems to display a critique of teachers based on evaluations where evaluators seem to imagine that all evals are somehow written by "the ideal student" and so therefore complaints seem to carry much more weight than perhaps they should. Our department gives us the opportunity to respond and contextualize the evals, but even this can be seen as a "defensive" posture. Should the evals carry that much institutional weight? Should all students, including ones who never show up, are doing badly in the class, etc., have the opportunity to rank a class and a teacher they never engaged with? Does their assessment of me outweigh my assessment of them? Hell...I've gotten called out on the carpet for that one, but I think they are valid questions. The grading questions you pose are tougher. Is it a written/essay midterm, or a question/answer? If you have writing to work with, you can grade according to content, and perhaps comment verbally or in annotations to supplement (though not justify), the grade. Or you could "slash grade" for content/form, or what have you. I have known many teachers who hand back a student's paper in a one-to-one conference and go over it right there with them, so that, perhaps in the case of a student who is doing badly, but you don't want to "lose them," you can explain options and frame the situation more positively than you can simply by handing back a piece of paper. Should you inflate grades to protect yourself? Well, honestly, I would say absolutely not, but in a situation where (particularly non-tenured and part-time) teachers are getting blasted from students and receiving little support from their departments, this kind of dishonesty may very well be the only coping mechanism or survival strategy available. But you are also assuming that an A student will not give you a bad eval: wrong again. As far as when to "grade hard" and when to "lighten up" well, it's a judgement call. I tend to be very tough with the grades in general, but I also meet with students 5-6 times a semester to make sure there is a conversation contextualizing those grades. I am also easier, a little bit, early on, as I explain to them that I do not expect them to "know it all" especially in the beginning, but that if they do not show improvement, or if they continue to make the same errors over and over, then I respond more and more severely. Anyhow, good luck, and I am also anxious to see what others say... Mauri Casano On Sun, 12 Nov 1995, thomas conroy wrote: > > Just wondering what advice others on this list have about grading their > students. I've been spending the past couple of days grading mid-term > exams, a task I never really like. While I do like the opportunity to > give my students some feedback, as well as to see what they've > learned/understood, I don't particulary care for the act of ranking their > work. For one thing, some of the students take bad or mediocre grades > personally. Alternatively, I sometimes wonder whether or not I'm being > too lenient, and implicitly encouraging a lack of full effort. Also, as > someone who is way below the rank of tenured prof, I know that student > evaluations are going to carry some weight toward whether I get to teach > regularly or not as I strive to complete. I am now facing handing back 30 > mid terms, where around 1/3 to 1/4 of the class performed rather poorly; > The students are required to do the course evaluations at the end of the > month, before they have a chance to turn in the remainder of their work. > I worry that the students will take their frustrations out on me in the > form of highly negative evaluations. I am certain that I have given the > students a chance to ask questions, to come talk with me, etc., but most > have not done so. > > Perhaps I am making a big deal out of this, but thinking about these > things is reminding me about the parts of teaching I am not all that > comfortable with. I'd be interested in hearing what others have to say > about these matters. Thanks > > Tom Conroy > From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 12 17:22:50 1995 Date: Sun, 12 Nov 1995 20:26:10 -0500 To: list From: danryan@minerva.cis.yale.edu (Dan Ryan) Subject: Grading Papers -- An Instrument! Greetings, Here's a paper grading scale that I put together a few years back. Before you react that it's overly quantitative, I should say that I come from a NONGRADED background and I do generally qualitative sociology. Grading, especially the first few times, IS difficult and one has no first hand sense of how the "world" will react to one's putting one's judgements of other people (actually, it's of their work, not them -- an important distinction). I think it's easy to get too caught up in this side of it, but remember, we are being paid to be subjective, that is, to make judgements based on our intellectual experience. I think we often get confused by questions of fairness when the issue is more one of honesty and clarity. It IS a real challenge to articulate what we mean by quality, to assess people's work according to this and communicate our reactions, but that's our job. If it was easy, they wouldn't be paying us so much :). My purpose in using the scale is to make myself and my students think clearly about what makes a good paper. I find it pedagogically useful to say: here are the things I'll be looking for when I read your paper, and the students can then use it as a sort of craftperson's checklist as they work on their paper. The exact values you give to each item and what criteria you might add to or delete from this list is pretty much up to the individual instructor. Even when I wasn't using it in a strict manner, I found it really quite useful to go down the list and ask myself a series of questions about each paper as I read it. An added advantage is that, if you force yourself to actually answer the questions (not always easy as we often grade rather impressionistically rather than thinking carefully about just what we'd tell the student to do differently next time), you can almost always defend your grade and if you tell the students ahead of time that this is the scale you are using and afterward that this is how their paper stacked up then they are much less likely to challenge you just for the hell of it (a common practice here at Yale that, if you think about it, is completely rational -- doesn't cost much to grouse and if it pays off 10% of the time you probably come out ahead). Another thing I've coupled with this sort of grading scale is the requirement that all petitions for reconsideration be made in writing. This cuts out the spurious complaints almost completely and in the process of making the case that something was better than I'd graded it, one of three good things often happens (1) student realizes s/he has no case and thinks about the work itself rather than thinking "i've been screwed over by my teacher," (2) student learns the material by working over it again, or (3) student makes a good case and I reconsider and learn something about both that student's work and my grading practices. Again, I'm always revising the details -- the point is to think about the process. Cheers, Dan Here's one version that I used in social psychology of organizations a few years back. Category Point Values Paper turned in 0 no 1 yes Outline included 0 no 1 yes Appropriate Title 0 no 1 OK 2 Great title! Clear what Q you're answering 0 No; invented topic w/o specifying; rambling mish-mash 2 Somewhat; too general; not delimited enough for short paper 4 Yes, clear statement of limited focus of the paper Do you answer it 0 Despite what you may have said, you do not talk about what you said you would. 2 Sticking to the issue, but less than total success. 4 On the money -- you do what you said you set out to do. Free from writing flaws 0 A writing atrocity; an embarrassment; not in English; full of run-on sentences, non-sequitors, etc. 2 Rough writing; not free from flaws, but not full of them either. 4 Well written; few if any writing errors. Technical Competence 0 Disregard for proper forms of citation, bibliography, etc. 2 Not a bad job, not a model for how to do it. 4 Model for how to do it. Pizazz 0 Little or none. 2 Some style 4 Written with style and a command of the language and ideas Understanding of sociological ideas 0 Demonstration of lack of understanding. 2 Suggestion of misunderstanding. 4 Suggestion of understanding. 6 Demonstration of understanding. 8 Clear mastery. Grade scale In addition to the scale below, the following "excellence" requirements must be met: To get an A(+/-) -- no zeros, at least 6 in sociological ideas, at least two 4s. To get a B(+/-) -- no zeros, at least 4 in sociological ideas, at least one other 4. Scores in the A range that don't meet these additional requirements will receive a B+, papers in the B range that don't meet them, will receive a C+. Here's the score ranges: 30-32 A+ 24-28 A 21-23 A- 19-20 B+ 17-18 B 15-16 B- 13-14 C+ 11-12 C 9-10 C- 7-8 D+ 5-6 D 4 D- 0-3 F From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 08:11:31 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 08:06:31 -0800 (PST) From: "G.W." Subject: UW To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU To socgradders(if anyone is out there), There was one person that used to post on here that went to University of Washington. I am considering there Phd. program and would like to get some opinion of what it is like. anyone on here going there right now? any info would be cool thanks. greg From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 08:29:44 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 10:24:10 -0600 (CST) From: Michael Gibbons Subject: Re: Grading Papers -- An Instrument! To: Dan Ryan grading sure sucks! i am sometimes amazed at the work some of our students turn in. i wonder how they graduated from high school. and when you are at home grading, you just get annoyed and want to give them grades that reflect your frustration. but then when you hand back the papers in class and you are giving them to real people who don't want to flunk (even if they don't test or write like that) you feel guilty for giving crusty grades. and, being only a master's level student, i am not that far from undergrads and remember well the attitudes which justin displays justified uneasiness for. as republican as it sounds, it would be nice if the students took responsibility for the work that earned them their grades instead of insisting that it is the professor's bias. i would also agree that evaluations often seem little more than a tool for bashing professors that students take issue with. not that student's input isn't important, just that it would be nice to take evals at a face value of evaluating teaching instead of attitudes. michael ps, dan's grading scheme looks pretty good. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 08:55:19 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 10:48:25 -0600 (CST) From: Tricia Robinson Subject: Grading To: Sociology Graduate Students A short warning.... A student I know in a PhD program engaged in grade inflation in defense of poor evaluations. All went well, the evaluations were great, and the student thought all was well. The institution however had a safeguard against this. The grades the instructor assigned were compared to the students' other grades at the university. A trend was found; the PhD student was inflating grades RELATIVE TO OTHER PROFESSORS AT THE SAME INSTITUTION in other courses who had the same students. The PhD student was given a dressing down by the supervising professor for grade inflation. My point in this story? Grade inflation may seem like a quick fix to poor evaluations, but it can come back to haunt you. SKEE From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 09:22:37 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 11:15:51 CST From: GREEN WITCH To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: assigning grades Thomas Conroy brought up some very important issues with regards to teaching, grading and student evaluations. I have many of the same concerns and I believe his comments reflect very common concerns of teachers at all levels, TA's like myself, not-yet-tenured profs, and even tenured profs who care what their students have to say, grading procedures, etc. I believe it is a very subjective issue and I encourage people on socgrad to discuss it for all of our benefit. Please - students especially - give some input. Heidi Henrickson Texas Woman's University g_henrickson@venus.twu.edu From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 11:15:38 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 14:05:48 -0500 (EST) From: thomas conroy Subject: assigning grades To: list Just to contextualize my first post a bit further: The course I am teaching is one that I taught one time before. It's a course in the sociology of mass media. Before I taught the course, I had limited background in media studies. What expertice I had came from having studied soc. as both an undergraduate and as a grad. However, my areas of specialization are theory and sociology of knowledge (and, more recently, social problems), not from having any real background in media. Thus, the course had its share of rough edges. It was more or less being put together week to week. (Incidentally, and I hope this doesn't sound like I am feeling sorry for myself, because that is not my intention, but at Boston University, at least in the Sociology dept., grad students are so underfunded that it is not unusual for people to work two or three part time jobs, while still trying to write/work on their own stuff. Hence, the quality of one's teaching, or at least one's level of preparation, is necessarily going to be limited by such a state of affairs. In my opinion, it is of questionable ethics for a university to set up/maintain a doctoral program and then to let it flounder, though this is another thread, which perhaps can be explored at some other time.) Anyway, to make a long story short, the course did not go as smoothly as I had hoped it would. I tried to teach the course from a number of perspectives, including both critical conflict and structural functionalist points of view. I tried also to bring in ideas from the sociology of knowledge and from more recent work in cultural studies. I probably was overwhelming the students with theory. However, for the assignments, I tried to get the students to address specific topics, as well as analytic concepts. I recognized that some of the students seemed, by and large, disinterested. Still, I thought that most of the students were with me. It turned out, however, that they were not. I got slammed, big time, on the evaluations. The course was taken away from me, and I had to fight to get it back. The course, also, was not administered through my department, but through another college entirely. I am still a bit mystified as to why the students had the reaction that they had. Their complaints varied from not liking/not understanding the readings (some of which I tried to take up in class), not enough discussion (I was shocked by this, given that discussions were built into the course), to my reserved manner (alright, but not everyone has great performance skills). Some of the evaluations were outright hostile and insulting. This time around, I am trying to keep the students as involved as possible. I have the course set up so that they are attempting analyses of media content. I am using e-mail to communicate with them. I think, though, that I still don't necessarily have a rapport with the class as a whole. I have asked, periodically, if the students have questions, though I am sensing that some may have been having some misunderstandings and not giving me an indication of this. Still, I will probably have some anxiety between now and the time I get to see the evaluations, some time in the Spring semester. In the meantime, I am going to do as much as I can to treat my students fairly and with basic respect, and hope that they are dealing with me in good faith. Tom From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 14:40:56 1995 From: michael carley Subject: grading To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 14:35:15 -0800 (PST) I am still a first year graduate student so I come at the grading question mostly from a student's perspective. What students usually want is not inflated grades but clarity in the reasons for the grades assigned. In essay questions I am most frustrated by grades with no explanation or with only cryptic notes in the margins. I find myself reacting more positively (and learning more) when the instructor includes an explanation of what I failed to include in my answer. Of course this is made difficult by time constraints placed on the instructor, which students may not always understand. The best grading takes into account: the student's mastery of English, the strength of their arguemnts, their understanding of the material, and the coherence of the paper holisticaly. Of course if the class had been proceeding poorly, this also should be considered. Mike From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 18:52:26 1995 Date: Mon, 13 Nov 1995 18:51:20 -0800 (PST) From: Laura Miller To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: grading Just to raise the anxiety level a little, I've heard that the grading question only gets worse when you have a real faculty position. At least in my experience, grad students don't suffer any material consequences (i.e., no future TAships or funding) if they get poor evaluations -- just some very hurt pride (which can be bad enough, I know). But some have told me that it's suicidal for untenured faculty to be "hard graders" as grades do have some, if not perfect, correspondence to student evaluations. And student evaluations are a mjor component of evaluating teaching abilities when it comes to things like tenure. As someone who ends up being a tough grader, without trying to be, I find the whole issue terribly frustrating. I also hate ranking students, I think grades are terrible motivators for getting students to do the kind of work we want them to do, I think despite anyone's best intention, there's a huge measure of arbitrariness built in to grading papers & essays (think about those experiments that find inconsistency between teachers grading the same work) -- but even with all that, I object to endorsing really sloppy, low-effort, poorly-written work with "good" grades. What to do? I wish I knew. Laura Miller lmiller@ucsd.edu From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 13 22:32:32 1995 From: BREKHUS@zodiac.rutgers.edu Date: Tue, 14 Nov 1995 01:30:32 -0500 (EST) Subject: grading To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU While I'm sure there is a slight correlation between giving high grades and receiving higher course evaluations I'm not convinced that the connection is as strong as we might think. At least in my experience so far I've noticed surprisingly little connection between the grades I've assigned and how well I'm evaluated by students (this is especially true in small classes where students get to know you personally, but even in larger classes I haven't noticed that much of a connection). I think there are ways to maintain high standards without alienating students. Some things I try to do are.. First, if you let students know up front that you expect a great deal ofthem they'll be more accepting of tough standards than if a "D" just drops out of the sky onto their first paper or exams. Telling students you expect a lot from them right away solves some problems. I usually like to spend the first day of class giving the lecture "Why You Should Drop This Class." In it I remind them that they're consumers paying for a product and that they should choose their investments wisely. They have the right to purchase an easy "A" or an easy 3 credits..but that if that's what they want then this class isn't a very wise investment (since they can find much cheaper A's). I stress that my expectations and grading standards are very high (exaggerating a little just to be safe) and let them know up front what to expect. Then if they're still interested I tell them why they should want to buy the product I'm offering anyways (i.e I'll try to make it interesting etc.). Second, I usually start out "very tough" and ease up a little towards the end. I usually have some small things early on--quiz, small paper etc. that allows them immediate feedback. I grade these very tough as a way of showing students I expect a lot out of them, won't accept sloppy work etc. It does work for many as an incentive to work harder (a few drop the class which isn't all bad either). While doing this may make the first day of returning grades unpleasant it saves nightmares later on. You can have it out about grading standards, expectations right away before most of their course grade depends on it. Also (as an earlier post suggested) it helps to be as clear as possible about how you're assigning grades. One should try to be as precise about what criterion one is using as one can. Finally, since most of the opinions on student evaluations have been negative, I'd like to offer something in defense of them. I do think student evaluations taken as a whole provide important feedback for how to improve our instruction. Sure there's outliers in every class, but taken as a whole student comments can give us a pretty good picture of how we're doing in terms of conveying information, maintaining interest etc. I don't think they should be taken too seriously as evaluative tools when someone is teaching a course for the first time. But taken over the long run from one class to another over a period of 4 to 5 years if someone is consistently getting outstanding evaluations and student comments provide some picture of what the person is doing effectively then I think the student evals. should be given quite a bit of weight. Likewise if over a period of years a professor continues to get very poor marks, then that should hold weight as well. At the extremes, and taken over a period of time, I think student evals. are useful. If someone gets both many high and many low marks then it becomes more difficult to interpret, but if they're consistently at one pole or the other it's probably telling us something. All in all, I think most undergraduates actually take evaluating instructors pretty seriously and do a pretty decent job of providing feedback. Wayne Brekhus Rutgers From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 14 05:48:31 1995 Date: Tue, 14 Nov 1995 08:43:44 -0500 (EST) From: "Mauri A. Casano" To: Laura Miller Subject: Re: grading Yes, as a TA-turned-non-tenured faculty, I can honestly say that the risk level for being a rigorous grader went up--being int the "learning" position protects you, and there is little chance your stipend will be yanked, unlike the ease of having a teaching contract cancelled at the end of the year--even though my courses go along well, the majority of the students fair from average to excellent, and those that don't fail. Still, we can take a beating in our own annual teacher rating and evaluation (depending on our contratcs we have to submit a teaching portfolio along with evals), and it is somewhat ironic that we can be blasted for being tough on students. Although, from what I hear, FTF have it tough, too. It recently came to my attention that more understanding and context is being incorporated into the reading of part-time teacher's evals, since even FTF who teach rigorous courses are getting laid out in evals, and this has some departmental or tenure-related impact. It is never easy to grade, no matter what level of teaching you are at, and there are always risks of some sort or another. TAs evals and teaching record could be the platform for future employment, I suppose. But either way, though we have shared some good ideas and "tools" here, there is no easy way out--if there was, anyone could do the job! ;) Mauri On Mon, 13 Nov 1995, Laura Miller wrote: > Just to raise the anxiety level a little, I've heard that the grading > question only gets worse when you have a real faculty position. At least > in my experience, grad students don't suffer any material consequences > (i.e., no future TAships or funding) if they get poor evaluations -- just > some very hurt pride (which can be bad enough, I know). But some have told > me that it's suicidal for untenured faculty to be "hard graders" as grades > do have some, if not perfect, correspondence to student evaluations. And > student evaluations are a mjor component of evaluating teaching abilities > when it comes to things like tenure. As someone who ends up being a tough > grader, without trying to be, I find the whole issue terribly frustrating. > I also hate ranking students, I think grades are terrible motivators for > getting students to do the kind of work we want them to do, I think despite > anyone's best intention, there's a huge measure of arbitrariness built in > to grading papers & essays (think about those experiments that find > inconsistency between teachers grading the same work) -- but even with all > that, I object to endorsing really sloppy, low-effort, poorly-written > work with "good" grades. What to do? I wish I knew. > > Laura Miller > lmiller@ucsd.edu > From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 14 05:56:29 1995 Date: Tue, 14 Nov 1995 08:53:33 -0500 (EST) From: Bill Sakamoto White To: BREKHUS@zodiac.rutgers.edu Subject: Re: grading Just my two cents.... My students complete their evaluations before they turn in their final project or take their final exams. The only "graded" material they have in their hands is their midterms and an article critique. If someone looked at the final grades I give, they might say that I "inflate" the grades. But, for the most part, my students DO turn in good work, because they know what to expect from the midterm and critique. If they have problems with their writing or research skills, I'll help them out. In the best of all worlds, I would like to work with someone in the English Department to consult with the students on their writing. Grading may seem like a tedious and time-consuming exercise for us, but remember it is very important to most of the students. As one person mentioned yesterday, perhaps what is most important for the student is the "critiques" on the grades. Good critiques early in the course should translate into better products later in the course (they know what to expect) and less "critiquing" on your part later. _________________________________________________________________ William Sakamoto White "You cannot have a Revolutionary Dept of Sociology Movement without a Revolutionary Georgia State University Theory." socwawx@gsusgi2.gsu.edu --V. I. Lenin _________________________________________________________________ From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 14 06:49:20 1995 Date: Tue, 14 Nov 95 09:37:13 EST From: "T R. Young" <34LPF6T@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Organization: Central Michigan University Subject: Grad Student News Editor To: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOCIOLOGY I edit a newsletter, FROM THE LEFT. Sara Schoonmaker, Redlands Univ. has suggested we add/devote a page to grad students about issues on which they are doing research and/or dissertations in progress [or recently completed. I think it a fine idea and would invite self/other nominations for Assistant Editorship of the newsletter from among members of the Socgrad Network...we would then issue a special report to all members on socgrad and the Progressive Scholars Network and to readers of the hard copy sent out quarterly by ASA. If you have the time, the interest and the energy, send me a one-page application on email with name, central interests, very brief personal history and any other relevant info you can pack in a page. In the meantime, I will do the collating and compiling. Those of you who are doing progessive/emancipatory sociology and would like to share a brief report of the problem/research tactics/findings, please do so and send them to my address above. There is still time to get it in the Fall issue of FROM THE LEFT. I will send in stuff to ASA around 1 December. The Winter issue will come out in Feb...I'd like to have a Grad Student Page Editor in place for that one. Let me know, TR Young T.R.YOUNG@CMICH.EDU From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 14 13:44:06 1995 Date: 14 Nov 95 16:37:06 EST From: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> To: list Subject: grading I'm new to this list but thought I'd put my two cents in about grading. A couple of people wrote messages about how they felt bad about giving poor grades, that they remember what it was like to be subject to such a thing. I'm a TA at a university where the students can't even string sentences together, much less write anything of substance. I believe they should be graded accordingly. A good paper gets a good grade, a lousy paper gets a lousy grade, all with helpful and useful comments of course. If students aren't graded according to the work they do, if their grades are inflated, they have no reason to try and do better. Laurie From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 14 17:21:18 1995 Date: Tue, 14 Nov 95 20:14:54 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: Grading and evaluations To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU I don't think anybody should feel guilty about "grading tough", if you are very clear about what the standards will be in the beginning of the course. It is also possible that if you grade "too easily" too early in the semester, students will think they can cruise to an easy C or B-. This is, of course, coming from someone who walked out of class 15 minutes today after no students were giving examples of how the media produces social change and manufactures deviance. As for evaluations, being someone whose evaluations tend to be all over the place, I have found that the best policing of instructors occurs in Universities with either no evaluations or relative infrequent evaluations. At these Universities, students are more likely to report poor instructors to the Department Head directly, and will have to substantiate very clearly what the problem is with a particular instructor. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 15 04:06:46 1995 Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 06:58:56 -0500 (EST) From: Jim Cassell To: Sociology Graduate Student Discussion Subject: Immigration Job Opening (fwd) FYI ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Cassell jwcassell@UNC.EDU Institute for Research in Social Science Phone: 919-962-0782 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Fax: 919-962-4777 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3355 USA ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 09:36:46 +1000 From: Diana Crow To: demographic-list@postbox.anu.edu.au Subject: Immigration Job Opening From: msk@us.net (Mark Krikorian) Subject: Immigration job opening Position Opening for Writer/Researcher The Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington, D.C., think tank studying= =20 the impact of mass immigration on the United States, seeks a=20 writer/researcher. The position requires: =95 the demonstrated ability to write clearly for a wide audience; =95 a master=92s degree or better in demography, economics, sociology or=20 related field involving quantitative analysis; =95 a general sympathy for immigration reform (though there is no policy=20 litmus test). Naturally, familiarity with immigration-policy issues is preferred, as would= =20 be knowledge of a foreign language.=20 The responsibilities of the position would include: =95 Conducting policy-oriented research on immigration issues and preparing= =20 the results for distribution to the news media, policymakers, academics and= =20 others; =95 Developing proposals for new research projects that are timely,=20 instructive to policymakers, and capable of attracting funding; =95 Editing the work of outside researchers and overseeing production of=20 reports based on their work; =95 Assisting journalists and policymakers with queries about immigration= policy; =95 Writing articles for the Center=92s quarterly publication, Immigration= =20 Review, as well as op-eds, congressional testimony, letters to the editor,= =20 and other materials. For more information, contact executive director Mark Krikorian at (202)=20 466-8185 or msk@cis.org. (11/95) ------------------------------------------------ Mark Krikorian, executive director Center for Immigration Studies 1815 H St. N.W., Suite 1010, Washington, DC 20006 (202) 466-8185 (phone); (202) 466-8076 (fax); msk@cis.org From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 15 15:17:28 1995 Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 17:11:03 -0600 (CST) From: VALERIE VINSON Subject: reference on Mead To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Can anyone out there please provide some books that better explain H. Mead's Philosophy of the Present. Currently reading this in a grad. theory class and I am at a lost as to where he is going. I would appreicate a reply on the socgrad so that others out there with the same problem may be helped also. Thanks in advance Valerie Vinson University of Ne. @ Omaha From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 15 17:15:59 1995 From: "Shannon A. Williams" Subject: Reading suggestions? Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 21:15:25 AST To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU I am currently looking into taking a Reading Course on the Sociology of Knowledge/Culture. My particular interest is in Human Rights. I would appreciate the group's opinion on what would be a " must read " in these areas. Thanks, Shannon Williams From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 15 18:25:50 1995 Date: Wed, 15 Nov 1995 18:27:55 -0800 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: lichter@nicco.sscnet.ucla.edu (Michael I. Lichter) Subject: "Brown Peril" Question Hi. A friend of mine who is a graduate student at the University of New Mexico (Albuquerque) asked me to do some fact-finding for her. Some person or group of persons plastered her campus with flyers warning that the U.S. is being overrun by Mexicans, and something must be done to preserve our white racial purity, or something like that. It was signed "Students Against the Brown Peril." She and some of her colleagues are interested in finding out whether these flyers represent the work of a single psycho (my guess) or a large group of people, and how widespread the dissemination of these flyers has been. She heard that they were also posted at the University of Colorado. I haven't seen any at UCLA. Is anybody familiar with "Students Against the Brown Peril", or has anybody else seen these flyers? You can e-mail me directly. Thanks. Michael -- Michael Lichter UCLA Department of Sociology From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Thu Nov 16 00:36:43 1995 Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 00:33:40 -0800 (PST) From: Eileeneke To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: orphanages I am currently working on my senior honors these in sociology and am going to focus on the trend of certain policymakers who are advocating the return of orphanages as a form of out-of-home care. I am going to look at the current push towards orphanages and how policy is changing while taking a cross-cultural or historical perspective on why an institution that was all but abandoned in the United States is being brought back. If anyone has any comments on this trend or suggested sources, I would really appreciate it. I am still at the "idea formation" state and could use any help I can get. Thanks! Eileen ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- | Eileen Gieskes "I am all over it" | gieskese@pe.net | gieskese@watmail.ucr.edu ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Thu Nov 16 13:32:18 1995 by KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU (PMDF V5.0-5 #13311) id <01HXPS3DQZ808X59TU@KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU> for socgrad@UCSD.EDU; Thu, 16 Nov 1995 15:26:49 -0600 (CST) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 15:26:49 -0600 (CST) Date-warning: Date header was inserted by KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU From: 1k1mgm@KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU (Christopher Gunn) Subject: Re: grading To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU >[...] But some have told >me that it's suicidal for untenured faculty to be "hard graders" as grades >do have some, if not perfect, correspondence to student evaluations. My wife, who's in social psychology, has told me there are real studies that show a correlation of something like 0.93 between course grades and teacher evaluations. We're both busy and I'm not going to press her too hard to find the cites, but I'll ask.... Christopher Gunn Molecular Graphics and Modeling Laboratory 1k1mgm@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu University of Kansas Phone: 913-864-4428 or -4495 Malott Hall Lawrence, KS 66045 From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 04:04:17 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 04:02:53 -0800 (PST) To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Joe Surfer Subject: Women in Sociology A couple weeks back TR Young forwarded a request for Women in Sociology citations / references. Through doing research for another topic I found a book that may be of interest. I'm posting it here in case someone else is interested. Women in Sociology: A Bio-biographical Source Book by Mary Jo Deegan Prof of Soc at University of Nebraska-Lincoln This book is a survey of women sociologists from 1840 to 1990. I didn't count, but it looks like there's at least a hundred entries. It gives a couple page profile, overview of their major themes, critques, list of authors' writings (date, title, published in), co-authored works, studies *about* that author by others, unpublished works, etc. Gives achivements (ie Noble Prize, chair at Uni.), and has a timeline chart of every featured woman. It seems a very readable work. If I had the time, I'd get it myself for historical reference. You can find it in your library at : HM 19 W59 1991 (Ref) or ISBN 0-313-26085-0 Alas, back to work on my own "mother of Marx's Manifesto" term paper that's due week after Turkey Day. - - - . . . Lack of a sense of humor is the root of all Fascism From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 06:20:43 1995 From: Cognard-Black-A%g94%OHSTSOC@OHSTSOCA.sbs.ohio-state.edu Date: Fri, 17 Nov 95 8:53:45 EST To: Subject: Space X-Incognito-SN: 214 X-Incognito-Format: VERSION=2.01 ENCRYPTED=NO BEGIN MESSAGE November 17, 1995 Socgrads: **"space is fundamental in any form of communal life; space is fundamental in any exercise of power." -- Michel Foucault, "Space, Knowledge, and Power"** I've recently been turned on to the importance of place/space in social theory, specifically with regard to issues of power. Subsequently, I've trying to read in the area and have found some interesting things by M. Foucault, P. Bourdieu, D. Harvey, H. Lebebvre, and I just bought a book called _NowHere: Space, Time, and Modernity_, a fascinating collection of essays edited by Roger Friedland and Dierdre Boden. However, there aren't a lot of people in my department who are too interested in the idea. Indeed, one guy makes jokes, referring to Star Trek, the "final frontier" and so on (not that Star Trek is bad, mind you, but I hate to have my ideas reduced to television allusion). So I was wondering if there's anyone else out there who has read anything in the area, has any suggestions about good books/essays/articles to read, or has anything to say about space. Anyone? Obviously, geographers are a good place to start, but does anyone know of any sociologists who are concerned with issues of place/space. I can see space having implications in many of the things that we sociologists talk about: ethnicity, rising global nationalism, gender, bodies, cities (perhaps too obvious), modernization, labor processes, stratification in general. Does this stuff pique anyone's interest as much as it does mine? Any responses are appreciated -- both the ones that tell me I watch too much Star Trek (although I don't really) and the ones who think space is critical to our ideas about social inequality. Thanks, Andrew Cognard-Black, END MESSAGE From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 06:32:54 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 06:28:31 -0800 (PST) From: John Youhan Choi Subject: Re: Women in Sociology To: Joe Surfer There's also a book called "Gender and the academic experience: berkeley women sociologists" 1994 I think. a good read. John Choi On Fri, 17 Nov 1995, Joe Surfer wrote: > A couple weeks back TR Young forwarded a request for Women in Sociology > citations / references. Through doing research for another topic I found a > book that may be of interest. I'm posting it here in case someone else is > interested. > > Women in Sociology: A Bio-biographical Source Book > by Mary Jo Deegan > Prof of Soc at University of Nebraska-Lincoln > > This book is a survey of women sociologists from 1840 to 1990. I didn't > count, but it looks like there's at least a hundred entries. It gives a > couple page profile, overview of their major themes, critques, list of > authors' writings (date, title, published in), co-authored works, studies > *about* that author by others, unpublished works, etc. Gives achivements (ie > Noble Prize, chair at Uni.), and has a timeline chart of every featured woman. > > It seems a very readable work. If I had the time, I'd get it myself for > historical reference. You can find it in your library at : > HM 19 W59 1991 (Ref) > or ISBN 0-313-26085-0 > > Alas, back to work on my own "mother of Marx's Manifesto" term paper that's > due week after Turkey Day. > > > - - - > > . . . Lack of a sense of humor is the root of all Fascism > > From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 06:39:53 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 08:37:21 -0600 (CST) From: "Deborah R. Bronson" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: Space I did a paper on fortification that had an emphasis on space and the meaning of spaces, how and why we mark territories. I also looked at the gender and power relations denoted by space. I don't have my references handy, but recommend some Psychology books as an informative place to start. I was fascinated by the topic. Let me know where you go with this. Regards, Deb From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 07:42:16 1995 From: SHAFER@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU (PMDF V4.3-10 #10451) id <01HXQWEHX2AO8XO12V@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:40:58 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:40:58 -0500 (EST) Subject: fyi To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: IN%"RUSSELLJ@ECSUC.CTSTATEU.EDU" 16-NOV-1995 18:15:54.41 To: IN%"psn-cafe@csf.colorado.edu" "PSN-CAFE" CC: Subj: Criminology opening Return-path: id <01HXPY066P8G8XNLBJ@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Thu, 16 Nov 1995 18:15:50 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 13:08:31 -0500 (EST) From: "JAMES W. RUSSELL, SOCIOLOGY" Subject: Criminology opening To: PSN-CAFE SOCIOLOGY. Assistant Professor in Sociology. Ph.D. in Sociology with specialization in Criminology required and expertise in the area of criminal justice. Applicants must demonstrate promise of successful teaching and scholarly work. Applicants should be able to teach courses in criminology/criminal justice, other courses in sociology and supervise student field work. Screening will begin immediately and continue until positions are filled. Respond to Glenn Nilson, Search Chair, Department of Sociology, Eastern Connecticut State University, Willimantic, CT 06226. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 07:43:32 1995 From: SHAFER@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU (PMDF V4.3-10 #10451) id <01HXQWGV05BK8XO12V@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:42:50 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:42:50 -0500 (EST) Subject: fyi To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: IN%"p.meiksins@csu-e.csuohio.edu" 16-NOV-1995 18:17:04.69 To: IN%"psn-cafe@csf.colorado.edu" "PSN-CAFE" CC: Subj: vacancy Return-path: id <01HXPY1NPU5S8XO4PC@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Thu, 16 Nov 1995 18:17:01 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 14:56:20 -0500 From: p.meiksins@csu-e.csuohio.edu (peter meiksins) Subject: vacancy To: PSN-CAFE Hi: I gather that the job announcement I sent out somehow was encoded. Here is a second copy of the announcement. Hope it arrives in English. The Department of Sociology announces a tenure track position at the Assistant Professor level. Must have a Ph.D. in Sociology by 9/15/96. We are looking for candidates with specialization in the areas of criminology, law, deviance and social control. An ability to teach undergraduate statistics is desirable. responsibilities will include teaching at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. Salary competitive. Send a letter of interest, curriculum vitae, and three letters of reference to Recruitment Chair, Department of Sociology, Cleveland State University, Cleveland OH 44115. Deadline for receipt of applications is Feb. 1, 1996. Cleveland State is a major public urban university enrolling 18,000 students, with many opportunities for funded, field based research. Cleveland State is an affirmative action, equal opportunity employer. Minorities and women are encouraged to apply. Position contingent upon funding. Peter Meiksins Department of Sociology Cleveland State University Cleveland OH 44115 p.meiksins@popmail.csuohio.edu 216-687-4518 From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 07:44:06 1995 From: SHAFER@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU (PMDF V4.3-10 #10451) id <01HXQWHOV9ZQ8XO12V@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:43:31 -0500 (EST) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:43:31 -0500 (EST) Subject: fyi To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: IN%"RUSSELLJ@ECSUC.CTSTATEU.EDU" 16-NOV-1995 18:15:54.41 To: IN%"psn-cafe@csf.colorado.edu" "PSN-CAFE" CC: Subj: Criminology opening Return-path: id <01HXPY066P8G8XNLBJ@BINAH.CC.BRANDEIS.EDU>; Thu, 16 Nov 1995 18:15:50 -0500 (EST) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 1995 13:08:31 -0500 (EST) From: "JAMES W. RUSSELL, SOCIOLOGY" Subject: Criminology opening To: PSN-CAFE SOCIOLOGY. Assistant Professor in Sociology. Ph.D. in Sociology with specialization in Criminology required and expertise in the area of criminal justice. Applicants must demonstrate promise of successful teaching and scholarly work. Applicants should be able to teach courses in criminology/criminal justice, other courses in sociology and supervise student field work. Screening will begin immediately and continue until positions are filled. Respond to Glenn Nilson, Search Chair, Department of Sociology, Eastern Connecticut State University, Willimantic, CT 06226. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 07:47:31 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:50:32 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: danryan@minerva.cis.yale.edu (Dan Ryan) Subject: l'espace Spain, Daphne. Gendered spaces. Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, c1992. and a short version in an article in Sociological Theory in 1993 or so. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 08:16:22 1995 From: "Vincent J. Roscigno" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 10:03:54 EST Subject: Space and Place X-Confirm-Reading-To: "Vincent J. Roscigno" If interested, check out: Gottdiener, Mark. 1985. The Social Production of Urban Space. Austin: University of Texas Press. Has good theory and critical focus. ********************************************************************** Vincent J. Roscigno Box 8107, Department of Sociology North Carolina State University Raleigh, North Carolina 27695-8107 Vincent_Roscigno@ncsu.edu Office: (919) 515-3143 ext. 65 Fax: (919) 515-2610 ********************************************************************** From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 09:07:03 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 18:05:05 +0100 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Czerlinski@mpipf-muenchen.mpg.de (Jean Czerlinski) Subject: Re: Space I don't have notes and references handy, but here are some leads. I also don't have a framework to put the references into. For that I'd suggest going to the library and looking up the word "space" in some of the sociology dictionaries there. For more references I'd do a keyword search on "space" in the journals... or books. Some of the first sociological writings that took space into account were done by the Chicago School (early 1900's). They mostly discussed the "human ecology" of the city. They discussed the different natural areas of the city and which groups lived where (new immigrants, older immigrants, the workers, the professionals, the rich) and how the spatial arrangements changed over time through the competition for space. (The inspiration was from biology, e.g. trees dominate the forest, ferns live in the clearings, mushrooms thrive in the dark & damp parts, etc.) You already mentioned David Harvey. I'd also suggest Lash & Urry *Economies of Time & Space* It's a nice "history" of the changing feel of space and time with special focus on the speed-up and shrinkage of the modern world. I've seen some cool work about how spatial layouts affect social relations, e.g. if the boss has a window overlooking the workers. Another article was about how the spatial arrangement of scientific labs affected the style of research-- and the quality/quantity of research. I've also seen some work combining network theory and space. Psychologist Bibb Latane (at Florida Atlantic) does some work related to this though not exactly this-- can't think of others at the moment. If you REALLY want to get heavy into the theory stuff, you can read some Immanuel Kant or explanations of Kant. His basic idea (for anyone who might not be that familiar with Kant) was that almost everything we know about the world can be learned through experience, e.g. that things fall down, that rocks are hard, that 1 apple plus 1 apple is 2 apples. But we can't learn about the concepts of time and space through experience, for they are the SETTING of experience, the substrate of experience. Experience happens IN time and space but is not itself time and space. So, Kant concluded, our knowledge of time in space must be a priori, innate in us, for it enables us to have experience at all. Kant's writings were very influential, and ever since then time and space have been very popular topics of discussion and argument about HOW (and sometimes if) they organize our experiences. >However, there aren't a lot of people in my department who are too >interested in the idea. Indeed, one guy makes jokes, referring to Star >Trek, the "final frontier" and so on (not that Star Trek is bad, mind you, >but I hate to have my ideas reduced to television allusion). Is this because your colleagues don't know quite what you mean by "space" and don't know how it relates to sociology? Or they know what you mean but don't see why it should be exciting and important in contrast to reading about another opinion survey or log-linear analysis of birth rates? The former should be easy to remedy. In the latter case, I would suspect that they also think of space as the substrate of experience (as Kant argued) BUT as a FEATURELESS one without any ORGANIZING POWER. So you'd have to convince them that space-- the organization of space-- has social effects. Maybe a simple experiment would convince them, e.g. one day sneak in to a class early and rearrange the seats in some strange way, maybe with the chairs not facing the professor but arranged in a circle or ... well, a figure eight perhaps! (I once heard of some students who put all the chairs and desks on the CEILING of a classroom, but perhaps this is just an urban myth.) ...However, I do not take any responsibility for the social effects of this suggestion! Only trained experts can perform such feats; please do not try this at home, kids! Best of luck, and tell us your deep insights, Jean Czerlinski From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 09:23:14 1995 id <01HXRELV6N5S8WX21V@JOYL.JOENSUU.FI>; Fri, 17 Nov 1995 19:22:16 GMT+2 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 19:22:13 GMT+2 From: Marko Toivanen Subject: BOURDIEU - Discussion of Pierre Bourdieu's philosophy and sociology To: Marko Toivanen A N N O U N C I N G B O U R D I E U - DISCUSSION OF PIERRE BOURDIEU'S PHILOSOPHY AND SOCIOLOGY BOURDIEU is an electronic forum for discussion and debate inspired by the philosophical and sociological thought of Pierre Bourdieu. BOURDIEU is an open list - all interested parties are invited and encouraged to take part in posting and discussion. All topics related to the thought of Pierre Bourdieu are relevant for discussion on this list. In order to give an opportunity to a larger audience this list will be bilingual - discussions can be either in English or in French or in both. For more information, send the following command as an e-mail message to majordomo@lists.village.virginia.edu info bourdieu To subscribe bourdieu, send the following command as an e-mail message to majordomo@lists.village.virginia.edu subscribe bourdieu Discussions approriate for this list include among other themes the following: -Bourdieu and the classical sociology (e.g. Marx, Durkheim, Weber) -Bourdieu in the field French and international philosophy and sociology -Bourdieu and the critical theory -Bourdieu's study on education -Bourdieu and structuralism/poststructuralism -Bourdieu and masculine domination -Bourdieu and feminism -Bourdieu and politics -Bourdieu and anthropology (kinship, ritual, etc.) -Bourdieu and body (embodiment) -Bourdieu and arts (literature, painting, etc.) -Bourdieu and philosophy -Bourdieu as a "public scribe" -Autonomy, role and commitment of intellectuals in society -Theory and methodology in social sciences -The status of sociology and sociologists in society -Power use and abuse in academia -Cultural, social, symbolic capitals -Habitus and social classes -Symbolic violence From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 11:20:55 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 14:14:50 -0500 (EST) From: Jim Cassell To: Sociology Graduate Student Discussion Subject: BOURDIEU - Discussion of Pierre Bourdieu's philosophy and sociology (fwd) FYI - Jim ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Cassell jwcassell@UNC.EDU Institute for Research in Social Science Phone: 919-962-0782 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Fax: 919-962-4777 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3355 USA ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 19:22:13 GMT+2 From: Marko Toivanen Subject: BOURDIEU - Discussion of Pierre Bourdieu's philosophy and sociology A N N O U N C I N G B O U R D I E U - DISCUSSION OF PIERRE BOURDIEU'S PHILOSOPHY AND SOCIOLOGY BOURDIEU is an electronic forum for discussion and debate inspired by the philosophical and sociological thought of Pierre Bourdieu. BOURDIEU is an open list - all interested parties are invited and encouraged to take part in posting and discussion. All topics related to the thought of Pierre Bourdieu are relevant for discussion on this list. In order to give an opportunity to a larger audience this list will be bilingual - discussions can be either in English or in French or in both. For more information, send the following command as an e-mail message to majordomo@lists.village.virginia.edu info bourdieu To subscribe bourdieu, send the following command as an e-mail message to majordomo@lists.village.virginia.edu subscribe bourdieu Discussions approriate for this list include among other themes the following: -Bourdieu and the classical sociology (e.g. Marx, Durkheim, Weber) -Bourdieu in the field French and international philosophy and sociology -Bourdieu and the critical theory -Bourdieu's study on education -Bourdieu and structuralism/poststructuralism -Bourdieu and masculine domination -Bourdieu and feminism -Bourdieu and politics -Bourdieu and anthropology (kinship, ritual, etc.) -Bourdieu and body (embodiment) -Bourdieu and arts (literature, painting, etc.) -Bourdieu and philosophy -Bourdieu as a "public scribe" -Autonomy, role and commitment of intellectuals in society -Theory and methodology in social sciences -The status of sociology and sociologists in society -Power use and abuse in academia -Cultural, social, symbolic capitals -Habitus and social classes -Symbolic violence From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 11:49:52 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 14:48:07 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: froman@bgnet.bgsu.edu (Florian R. Oberhuber) Subject: Re: Space I did no work on this issue, but I can remember that Anthony Giddens makes quite a few remarks about space in social theory in his "The constitution of society". He also deals with some geographic theories about space (and time), particularly an approach called "Time Georgraphy". Regards, Flo. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Florian R. Oberhuber Bowling Green State University University of Salzburg, Austria e-mail: froman@bgnet.bgsu.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 11:57:40 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 14:55:33 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: lak3@cornell.edu (Lisa A. Keister) Subject: Unsubscribe Sorry to bother everyone with this, but I can't seem to unsubscribe from this group. I have tried three times to send the delete message to the listserv, and all three times I receive a reply saying that I am no longer subscribed (or something like that). Somehow, though, I don't seem to actually be unsubscribed. Any suggestions? Thanks, Lisa From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 13:52:18 1995 Date: Fri, 17 Nov 1995 16:50:52 -0500 (EST) From: Bill Sakamoto White To: Cognard-Black-A%g94%OHSTSOC@ohstsoca.sbs.ohio-state.edu Subject: Re: Space Try the work by M Gottdiener. He has a clear idea of the relationship between power, space, and culture. His work is more urban, but I think you'll get a clear picture on how we socially construct space for a variety of purposes. Lefebvre's work and his conceptualization of the second circuit of capital should also help you understand space issues. Bill _________________________________________________________________ William Sakamoto White "You cannot have a Revolutionary Dept of Sociology Movement without a Revolutionary Georgia State University Theory." socwawx@gsusgi2.gsu.edu --V. I. Lenin _________________________________________________________________ From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 17 15:30:26 1995 Date: 17 Nov 95 18:25:57 EST From: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> To: list recipients Subject: Space Try Marcus Felson for some interesting ideas on space/place from a criminological point of view. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sat Nov 18 12:53:46 1995 Date: 18 Nov 95 15:45:15 EST From: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> To: list recipients Subject: Weber My current theory professor has presented me with a problem I was hoping you all might be able to help me solve. My main area of interest is popular perceptions of youth and crime, or, put another way, I am interested in the discourse surrounding youth in relation to crime. My professor has asked me to discuss this in terms of Weber. I have no problem discussing crime itself in terms of Weber, but how do I discuss the DISCOURSE or popular perceptions in terms of Weber? I am told it's there, just look harder. So, does anybody have any ideas on articles and/or books which might address this issue? Any Weberians out there who might provide me with a hint? HELP! Laurie From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sat Nov 18 13:39:34 1995 Date: Sat, 18 Nov 1995 16:33:07 -0500 (EST) From: Dale Albers To: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> Subject: Re: Weber Your professor's reply to your question sounds suspiciously like "I know something you don't know". This is bad pedagogy to say nothng of the worst kind of aternalism. Your job is not to play twenty questions wityh the professor. Maybe, this should be stated the other way around, the professor shouldn't be playing twenty questions. I think you can ask for specific references to Weber's work and I think your professor should tell you where to look. This could go on forever. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 05:52:16 1995 Date: Sun, 19 Nov 95 06:50:32 EST From: "T R. Young" <34LPF6T@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Organization: Central Michigan University Subject: Structural Features of Low Crime Societies To: GRADUATE STUDENTS IN SOCIOLOGY This is the final mini-lecture in the series for those of you who are/ will teach criminology and/or social problems. There are two sections; first I will lay out the structural features of low crime societies and then I will offer a brief treatment on Crime, Chaos and Complexity in order to add depth and nuance to the concept of 'structure.' Most treatments of structure are much too mechanistic and much to simplistic to serve the human interest in social peace and social justice. A. Structural Features of Low Crime Societies: 1. Community processes: Nils Christie has identified many of the patterns/practices of low crime communities in Scandanavia. They include: a. Interpersonal relationships are encompassing and deep. The massified relations at work, school, church and state agencies in the USA promote the kind of impersonality and indifference endemic in both crime and retribution from which our poor society suffers too much. b. Power is distributed widely. Christie refers to political power and the right to vote and to get response from the state but economic power in the market place adequate to a decent life style is important. Social power in everyday interaction is also important; racism and sexism defeat/stratify social power. Moral power is most important; the dramas of the holy which sanctify and/or demonized people cripple social peace. Finally, there is physical power...those alienated by/from social, economic and moral power all too often resort to the only kind of power left to satisfy needs and desires. c. Those in power; those who pass judgments are accountable to those who are subject to that power/those judgments. More about this later in the section on policing for social peace. d. Social relationships are interdependent rather than dependent. Most forms of private and public organization take the form of the bureaucracy. Max Weber has been ruthless in his autopsy of the bureaucracy. He calls it 'an iron cage.' There are different forms of social organization; interactively rich and information- ally rich forms of work, school, church and public life. Those interested in low crime societies should work toward such forms. e. Sanctification, as an entirely human social process, extends beyond the family and the tribe to encompass all persons as part of the sacred. Durkheim spoke of the ways in which societies sanctify and profane persons and places in pursuit of solidarity. Those in the Green Movement and in Animal Rights argue that sanct- ification, again as a social process, should include all creatures great and small. f. Christie adds that the size of the community is important; that they should be small enough to provide for face to face interaction in matters of local concern. Hutterites, who live in the Dakotas, Montana and the Canadian prairie provinces are case in point. They do most of the above and divide into new communities when they get too large. The potential of internet and virtual communities for interactively rich public policy is yet to be explored; perhaps there are hardware and software solutions to the problem of size. Finally, Christie offers suggestions which loosen up politics by term limits, selection by lot, or restrictions on spending to reduce the 'circulation of the elites.' 2. Elliot Currie has suggested innovations in policing which are most helpful to criminology as peace making rather than as punishment. a. He suggests innovative police tactics; foot patrols by citizens, by young people and by minorities. The Black Muslims have been very successful in lowering crime rates as have neighborhood watches. In Flint, Michigan, youth patrols are effective since they put young people in a pro-social role rather than a more predatory role. In Cuba, foot patrols by members of the CDR help keep the peace. Since the Million Man March, foot patrols of Black Men have greatly increased. b. Currie argues for 'middle' range sanctions rather than the sure, certain and severe sanctions called for in Control Theories. Those sanctions oriented to restoration and reparation are, in Currie's opinion [and I agree] superior to those which increase the total pain, anger and retribution in a society. c. Currie calls for supportive community milieu for young people. Yesterday, ABC reported that while crime rates in the USA have declined each of the last three years, crime rates among young people increase; this year, up 7%. Some such resources include recreation, pro-social jobs [lots of jobs for kids in the under- class but not all are pro-social], foot patrols mentioned above, outings to state and federal parks as well as special cultural events for and by young people. d. Currie suggest that we follow the example in Germany and provide intensive and relevant job training for young people. In Saginaw County here in Michigan there is a program in the school system which places high school students in part-time jobs. Valuable as it might be, still these are dead end service jobs at fast-food places, super-markets and local shops. On-the job apprenticeships which lead on to skilled, professional jobs are still better in the quest for social peace. e. Currie argues for stable [and pro-social employment] for all adults. In a political economy oriented to ever increasing productivity from an ever smaller labor force, these means that there must be some means to transfer part of the gross national product into low-profit but essential lines of production. In another mini-lecture, I will discuss 'market socialism' as one solution but the USA is quite wealthy enough to provide stable jobs for many millions of workers dis-employed by the great transformations taking place in a globalized economy. Poor countries may have an excuse for discarding workers, we do not. f. Currie insists that services and protection to victims of domestic violence is high on the list of a society oriented more to social justice than to criminal justice. Safe houses, health care, child care and transport are basic. g. Community based family support systems are essential; this relocated the parenting process from only the single mother or the struggling couple to the community at large. Health care, child care, head-start, decent housing and low-cost, energy efficient mass transport head the list of such services. h. Currie argues for better family planning...this means education in human sexuality and human intimacy; access to condoms and other birth control resources; helpful counselling for pregnant women; adoption placement programs and/or low cost and safe abortions [in the first tri-mester if at all. One day, I will give a mini- lecture on theories of population and over-population. For now, my view is that birth control and abortion should start with fast food places and personal automobiles; we can talk about restricting human populations later if you like. i. Paid work leaves before and after the birth of a child. All other advanced industrialized societies do this and some very poor societies provide this as evidence of the commitment to family values. Cuba provides for 3 months before and 6 months after the birth of a child. j. High quality, early education for the children of the poor. Those of you who have seen Hoop Dreams know the need for a much better educational system than is now available to kids in the ghettos, favelas, barrios and slums of American cities. k. Currie concludes with a general call for universal and gen- erous family support by the state. England, France, Germany, Sweden and many other countries provide this support with dignity and grace. Our system of welfare is too often cheap-jack, mean- spirited, suspicious and punitive...remember the scene in Hoop Dreams where Arthur Agee's mother had been cut off from welfare because she missed an appointment...think about the ugliness which comes when welfare is demeaning and without good grace. 3. Louk Hulsman, in the Netherlands, offers sound advice for a low crime society. He focuses on prevention more than punishment of crime. a. Community choice of what kind of crime is policed. Right now most police forces police street crime and ignore corporate crime, white collar crime, hate crime, domestic violence and other kinds of crime which besets minority communities. His point is that each community has different kinds of crime and needs different policing targets. b. Choice of the _means_ to deal with crime. Too often, crimes go to a very uncertain criminal justice system. Hulsman approves of the feminist practice of civil action and publicity for those who rape, batter or abuse women and children. Some women in the USA have put up posters with pictures of those convicted of child abuse and/or rape. c. Hulsman too, calls for community support of victims...post hoc policing and impersonal punishment are of little comfort to the victim and of little value in preventing crime. The point is to break the cycle rather than repeat it. d. In agreement with Currie, Hulsman calls for community patrols. Citizen Watch programs are effective; they lower crime rates in a neighborhood from 25% to 75% but..unless they are City wide, state wide and national in scope, they may serve to displace crime to unprotected neighborhoods. e. Citizen courts. In the USA, the overwhelming back-load of criminal cases is being shifted to private, for-profit courts. Without rejecting them, there is an argument for citizen courts. They adjudicate petty offenses; family disputes, petty theft, assault [a big item in a machismo culture such as ours], and complaints about neighborhood youngsters. Such courts are used in Cuba, Nicaragua, China, and one supposes, still in some of the former socialist countries in Eastern Europe. f. Released prisoner programs. It is folly to return those in- volved in street crime to the streets without support; housing, health care, jobs, and transport. Such help has reduced recidi- vism in Texas, Colorado, New York and Canada...Canada has an ex- tensive program; Canada has a crime rate about 1/5 of the USA. 3. Socialization and the location of moral agency. The structure of self is most important to a low crime society and complementary to the structural features of the larger society. Yet building a strong and pro-social self system fails if our young people and adults are put into social settings where moral agency resides in the office of those at the top of the various hierarchies in school, work, church and state. To get a low crime society, we must attend to mind, self and social structure. Socialization is basic but, all too often it is neglected and/or assigned to parents themselves isolated and powerless. Some suggestions. a. Parenting is a basic social process. It should be broadly distributed over a small group of concerned adults; biological and/or adoptive parents are most important but then so are teachers, clergy, other family members and child care specialists. Teenage pregnancy and birthing is a great problem when the girl is isolated in the parenting process...in a great many 'primitive' societies, Aunts, sisters, grandmothers and even uncles share the parenting duties. b. Social Identities. For most of human history, the socialization and educational processes were oriented to inserting social ident- ities into the self system of each and every child. In 'modern' societies, education becomes techinicized. Education is reduced to skills required on a changing labor market. Those who 'fail' such schools are left with a very fragmented self system. In a racist and/or sexist society, spoiled identities are inserted into the self system in a thousand ways in everyday life. These are not the best foundation for a low crime society. Much of what is called 'identity politics' can be understood as an effort to find a respected self/social identity in 'advanced industrialized' societies which care little for a strong and competent self system. c. Values. While skills and technical reason are most important, still there are spiritual values most congenial to the human pro- ject which must be part of school, work, church, family and play. There are, of course, sets of values which enoble and motivate but which do so at the expense of others; other religions, other ethnic groups, other genders, other nations. Much of the struggle about what is politically correct and politically incorrect in American schools is over the reach and range of values. Whatever the outcome in this struggle, the place of values in all of social life is central. d. The Social Location of Morality. Kohlberg scales of moral development do not begin to unravel the sources and solutions to a high crime society. Indeed, as Carol Gilligan has argued, it well may be the case that Kohlberg's definitions of morality create more social problems than they solve. They are compatible with the rationalization of work, school, courts, prisons and church but, as Gilligan notes, are short on compassion, caring, mercy, forgiveness and patience...all essential to parenting, teaching, rehabilitation and re-education. Then too, a division of labor combined with a stratification of authority results in the de-moralization of those at the bottom of bureaucracy and formal organization. It takes democracy at work, school, church and public policy to distribute morality and moral agency broadly through-out the important domains of life. Conclusion: I had thought to continue on with a mini-lecture on Crime, Chaos and Complexity in the Structures of Social Life...but this one is getting long and I'm getting tired. I'll do it week after next; next week we will all take a bit of time for thanksgiving and the giving of thanks to our family which has done/is doing so much to make us possible....don't forget your high school teachers and your clergy who help you come to the fullness of your own morality. TR Young T.R.YOUNG@CMICH.EDU From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 08:08:14 1995 Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 17:06:13 +0100 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Czerlinski@mpipf-muenchen.mpg.de (Jean Czerlinski) Subject: Grading-- What's Good Work, Anyway? Due to computer problems, I was not receiving mail for a while and only now got to catch up on the discussion of grading, so please excuse the lateness of this message. I would like to make 3 comments. First I want to comment on Dan's grading scheme. Second I want to discuss what sort of feedback *I* always craved from teachers-- and what really matters in doing work anyway. Third I want to reply to Laura Miller's distress about "what to do" if one is dissatisfied with current grading practices, which strikes me as a question of "Is there any other way?" -------------------- Dan's Grading Scheme Recall Dan broke up the different aspects of a paper and gave a numbered scale to each one. Then he added these up to get an overall number that was then assigned a grade. Basically, this is a simple linear model to estimate what the "real" grade should be. Robyn Dawes (currently at CMU) has written some convincing articles that such simple linear models are the better estimators for these types of things than overall, subjective judgements. He didn't discuss grading in particular but did examine data on college admissions and a few other things (I can't remember exactly what else). The linear models consistently did far better than the admissions interviews or overall subjective judgements by studying students' records in predicting students' future success. As distasteful as it may seem, because then we can't help out the "promising" student, linear models do better. They have the further advantage that, as Dan points out, students know exactly what they're up against. Finally, as Dawes emphasizes, there is still a big subjective, personal element to linear models because we decide both the variables we're going to use to feed into the model and (thereby) also what sort of scale we want it to predict (i.e. what we think student success means). I actually take some issue with Dawes' work, though. I think we don't always want to assign grades that most go along with current success. I think our decision-making powers are well-tuned to deal with changing situations, with the fact that what makes success now may not be what makes success later, or in other situations. For example, success in elementary school often consists of mindlessly conforming and following directions, while later success-- especially in graduate school-- depends on creativity and self-discipline. Workplace success also depends on social skills, which are rarely evaluated in educational settings. However, as I don't yet have a good way to explain this or prove this or deal with this (I'm working on it, though, as part of my current research in decision-making), I'm willing to concede that for now a linear model might be the best way of assigning grades. --------------- What's Good Work, Anyway? Above I already suggested that what's "good" work now may not be what's "good" work later or in a different setting. Another such example is the difference between "good" work as a student and as a colleague-- a difference I think should be lessened. Too often, I think, students' work is considered "good" merely if it displays a technical mastery of the topic at hand. But I remember always craving "real" feedback from my professors and not just an "A-- Well argued" on my paper. I wanted to know if what I said was *important* and *worthwhile* and whether it helped advance the arguments we studied in class and whether I'd *convinced* the professor, and if so what was the other evidence for it, and if not, what were the arguments *against* what I said????? Later I learned this is exactly the sort of feedback one expects from *colleagues*, in their reviews of journal articles and so on. Sometimes one gets comments on the style of argument, but most of the comments are (or *should* be) directed at the *substance*-- as, I think, they should be for students. Think, for example, of what makes great literature. *The Old Man and the Sea* is not great just because it's well-written and uses beautiful language and powerful metaphors and so on. It needs that, yes, but it also has to treat eternal human themes, it has to talk about things that matter, and it has to approach these themes in a way that makes us feel we understand things better, perhaps have some insight on reality, and we are moved. So I think good sociology should be, whether from students or colleagues. It's not just a question of whether an argument is well-presented, whether the experiment was done correctly, whether the right statistical tests were used. A few months ago, for example, I saw an article in the AJS about "booing" behavior, and the abstract helped no more than the title in convincing me this had any relevance to anything important in social life. (Perhaps it did, but then the authors should bring it out.) For all I know (I didn't read it), this was an incredibly well-done piece of sociological research. But does it matter? Is it "good" sociology? My own inclination is to say no. I know that sociology has a lot of problems with methodology these days, and sometimes a well-done piece of research is hard enough to accomplish. But my reply is that, after going to all that trouble to do technically perfect research, shouldn't it at least be about something important?? So, in short, I wish that in judging our students we treated them more as colleagues-- giving feedback in terms of *substance* too, not just technical perfection. And I wish we emphasized substance even more with our colleagues-- and in our own work-- than we do. -------------------- What Else To Do? I don't intend to try to solve all our grading problems here. But I do want to point out that other forms of grading *are* available-- and are being used. Here's what Laura wrote: >grader, without trying to be, I find the whole issue terribly frustrating. >I also hate ranking students, I think grades are terrible motivators for >getting students to do the kind of work we want them to do, I think despite >anyone's best intention, there's a huge measure of arbitrariness built in >to grading papers & essays (think about those experiments that find >inconsistency between teachers grading the same work) -- but even with all >that, I object to endorsing really sloppy, low-effort, poorly-written >work with "good" grades. What to do? I wish I knew. Okay, first of all, there are colleges that do not give grades but give narrative evaluations instead. I went to such a college (and so did Dan, the same one)-- after transferring from a more standard college-- and was thrilled to finally get some "real" feedback. However, the quality of feedback did vary from professor to professor. But the big fear at such places is always how it will interface with the rest of the graded world. Dan's and my college worked in part because it's highly selective in its students and demands a senior thesis from every single one of them, giving it a good reputation among grad schools and companies that know of it. Also, it's small enough that teachers *do* get to know their students and can write detailed recommendations which, along with GRE scores, basically decide grad school admission. DISADVANTAGES: I don't think such a scheme can work at every university, and I think it would be a disaster to try to have your own classes be ungraded if the rest of the school is graded-- you'll just get the lazy fruits. Second, most of Europe assigns "grades" only on the basis of a series of final exams, which are then graded by committees of faculty in the relevant subject area. Thus *teaching* is separated from *grading*, with the idea that teachers can focus on the important stuff and have good relations with students that aren't so power-based (at least, this is the justification sometimes given for it). So how it works is that students go to a bunch of classes and seminars, whatever they like or think will help them for the exam, and then at certain points in the year they take giant exams for everyone studying the same subject. I think this *would* be easy to implement, would take pressure off people who want to be "teachers" rather than "graders" (as Laura seems to want), might improve student-faculty rapport, and would be more "fair" in the sense that a whole committee looks at the occasional exams that are held. DISADVANTAGES include that students have less frequent feedback and that feeling sick or stressed-out on exam day can have huge repurcussions for students, which isn't fair. ----------- Conclusion Those are two vastly different grading schemes I can think of off the top of my head. I liked the one at my own college best, but I recognize that it can't necessarily be widely implemented, at least in its present form. I *would* like to see evaluations used, though, even if grades are used to. I mean narrative (or verbal) discussion of the *substance* of the ideas. If grades are used in addition, then one could use Dan's scale. If teachers don't want to be graders at the same time, the European scheme could be used, possibly with the committee using Dan's scale. Any other suggestions? I'm sure there are other schemes out there, and other opinions about what "good" work is!! Jean Czerlinski From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 08:10:38 1995 Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 11:06:53 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: dread@acs.bu.edu ('Killer' Miller) Subject: space I liked "The Geography of Nowhere" by James Kunstler -Andrew ================================================== == dread@acs.bu.edu == Andrew P. Miller == ================================================== == Boston University == Department of Sociology == ================================================== == "Wake up and live !" - Robert Nesta Marley == ================================================== From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 10:20:13 1995 Date: 19 Nov 95 13:17:49 EST From: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> To: list recipients Subject: Re: Weber Dave Albers wrote: My current theory professor has presented me with a problem I was hoping you > all might be able to help me solve. My main area of interest is popular > perceptions of youth and crime, or, put another way, I am interested in the > discourse surrounding youth in relation to crime. My professor has asked me to > discuss this in terms of Weber. I have no problem discussing crime itself in > terms of Weber, but how do I discuss the DISCOURSE or popular perceptions in > terms of Weber? I am told it's there, just look harder. So, does anybody have > any ideas on articles and/or books which might address this issue? Any > Weberians out there who might provide me with a hint? HELP! Although, I'm not too sure about it, I'll take a try on this: What distinguishes modernity from its predecessors in political terms is the spreading of public and private bureaucracy as form of organization and domination. Thus, 'youth and crime' - as any other social problem - is forced into a bureaucratic narrative. The individual criminal becomes a *file* among other files. Social programmes are not designed for special cases, but each individual is treated according to the same formal rules. The action of administrators toward the criminal youth is governed by affective neutrality and the formal rationality of bureaucracy. This bureaucratic discourse spills over to public discourse. Outrage about or sympathy toward the one or other criminal youth - irrational in the bureaucratic narrative - is partly replaced with the *rational* bureaucratic way of thinking about the problem. Regards, Flo. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Florian R. Oberhuber Bowling Green State University University of Salzburg, Austria e-mail: froman@bgnet.bgsu.edu ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 15:24:03 1995 Date: Sun, 19 Nov 1995 15:25:47 -0800 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: lichter@nicco.sscnet.ucla.edu (Michael I. Lichter) Subject: Re: "Brown Peril" Question I would like to thank those who responded to my question about flyers warning of the "Brown Peril" posted all around the UNM campus. Basically, people said that they hadn't seen these particular flyers, but that hate groups are ubiquitous and there are sources of information about them. Here are edited versions of the resonses: At 9:27 PM 11/15/95, JAMES BALLARD wrote: >Try the local office of the FBI. Each office has a domestic terrorist >person who follows such things. Ask local law enforcement about white >power groups in the area. Many police forces have spy units (if not SWAT) >Check the southern poverty center )Morris Dees( for info on hate groups . >He follows such things and is a great source of info. Lastly check a >good Latino/Hispanic studies progran for someone that knows about the history >of such hate groups. I remember something about a like thing happening >at a California university years ago. This sign may have a history and >like the KY Fried Rat story (a cultural myth) resurfaces every few years. > >In my opinion this is not just a single person. From you description it >sounds like a group of young tagger like thugs. Beer and hate make for >such nights on the town. As for another state having had such problems >it is usually a brother or friend that shares this c*^p and it is passed >along. > >Dave Ballard, UNLV At 9:21 AM 11/16/95, VALERIE VINSON wrote: > I am writing from the University of Nebraska @ Omaha. I have not seen >the flyers here however I have freiends who are on the West coast and it >appears to be problem in areas where there is a large concentration of >mexicans or migrant workers. I personally do not think that it is the work] >of one sick person. It is beginning to become the feeling of certain people >in our society who feel threaten by people of color or people different >from themselves. At 2:07 PM 11/17/95, beartwo@casbah.acns.nwu.edu wrote: >I haven't seen any of these charming posters, but they sound suspiciously >like those circulated around Chicago just before Harold Washington was >elected to >his first term (as the first black mayor). They were for Bernard Epton, the >Republican who almost won the damn thing (a Republican mayor has not been seen >in Chicago since before the Great Fire, I think). Anyway, his winning slogan >was, and I quote: > >EPTON -- BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!! > >Lovely, non? > >Audrey Davis At 11:40 PM 11/15/95, Andrew W Davis wrote: >I am from San Jose State University, and to my knowledge, there is no >"Brown Peril" group here. However, there is a group, whose name i do not >know, that was very active during the Prop 187 vote. Prop 187, FYI is >the initiative, which actually passed, that was aimed at essentially >ridding California of potential mexican-americans. > >Several flyers were disseminated stating thing like "throw out the >wetbacks" and the like. Much of the rhetoric was the same as you stated >above, but i do not remember that name. This may or may not be of help to >you, but i thought i'd write anyway. At 2:18 AM 11/17/95, Joe Surfer wrote: > just want to say I have not seen the flyers around San Diego State, >but there are occasionally other Aryan Nation propaganda things found around >town. Fallbrook, a city in North San Diego County, is the home of Tom Mezter >(I don't know the correct spelling) and he pops up in the local paper for >that "Rascists... right in your backyard!!!" interview every six months. > >Brown Peril is in reference to that one sociologist... what's his name... >who went so far into the community ideal he wrote about the negative effect >of the "Yellow Peril" threatening white American laborers during the >railroad construction, right? It's "Metzger". I suppose somebody had to come up with the phrase "yellow peril". Was it really a sociologist? In any case, wasn't the "peril" portrayed as more a threat to "our way of life" than to labor per se? Anyway, thanks again to all. Michael -- Michael Lichter UCLA Department of Sociology From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 15:50:37 1995 Date: Sun, 19 Nov 95 18:48 EST From: "Jetaway Dave" Subject: Re: Weber To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU >Laurie wrote: >> My current theory professor has presented me with a problem I was hoping you >> all might be able to help me solve. My main area of interest is popular >> perceptions of youth and crime, or, put another way, I am interested in >the > discourse surrounding youth in relation to crime. My professor has >asked me to >> discuss this in terms of Weber. I have no problem discussing crime itself in >> terms of Weber, but how do I discuss the DISCOURSE or popular perceptions in >> terms of Weber? I am told it's there, just look harder. So, does anybody >have >> any ideas on articles and/or books which might address this issue? Any >> Weberians out there who might provide me with a hint? HELP! >Although, I'm not too sure about it, I'll take a try on this: >What distinguishes modernity from its predecessors in political terms is >the spreading of public and private bureaucracy as form of organization and >domination. >Thus, 'youth and crime' - as any other social problem - is forced into a >bureaucratic narrative. The individual criminal becomes a *file* among other >files. Social programmes are not designed for special cases, but each l >individua >is treated according to the same formal rules. The action of administrators >toward the criminal youth is governed by affective neutrality and the formal >rationality of bureaucracy. My grip on 'discourse' is rather tentative at best. Or perhaps my grip is loose because many of the texts which use the term 'discourse' appear 'full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.' Or is that 'signifier?';) Anyway, examples of Weber's bureaucracy which has spilled over into the public discourse about youth and crime (and crime in general) are: 1) Mandatory Sentencing Guidelines--including fully structured systems such as the fed's, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and Washinton (state). 2) 'Three strikes and your out' laws. 3) Differential penalties for crack vs. cocaine possession/distribution. 4) Diversion of 'violent' juvenile offenders into the adult criminal justice system. In each case, 'rational' laws and legislative initiatives replace the informal, personalized conception of 'justice' which has been a hallmark of the Anglo / American justice system. Drawing complete blanks on names. Donald Black might be a good place to start. Michael Tonry, especially his yearly edited collection is sure to have something related to Weber, but not necessarily with a postmodern discourse edge. I would also suggest checking out some of the law review journals at your library. Believe it or not, the legal beagles are quite interested in postmodern discourse. JD From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 19 16:40:25 1995 Date: 19 Nov 95 19:37:07 EST From: "Laurie A. Duchowny" <102432.2772@compuserve.com> To: "\"Jetaway Dave\"" Subject: Re: Weber Just for the record, I wouldn't call what I'm doing "postmodern discourse." I'm simply looking at the disparity between what people think, and therefore how they talk, about juvenile crime, and the reality of juvenile crime. Is it happening as much as is represented on TV, the movies, in dinnertable talk? Are the juvenile crime rates rising dramatically enough (or at all) to justify new laws concerning them? This is not "postmodernism" it's just good, old-fashioned sociology. I can't stand being pigeon-holed like that. Laurie From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 01:02:38 1995 Mon, 20 Nov 95 10:04:27 GMT+1 From: "Christofer R Edling" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 10:04:16 GMT+1 Subject: Re: Space Don't know of that many sociologists that write good on the subject, except for the network theorists, but take a look at Torsten Hagerstrand. There is also a French writer who's name I think is Bruno Laplace. I think you're absolutely right - space is a most crucial think for almost every sociological study. //Christofer From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 03:52:26 1995 From: Jon Hindmarsh Organization: Soc Sci Faculty, Univ of Nottm To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:45:23 GMT0BST Subject: space you might like to check out: R.D. Sack (1980) "Conceptions of Space in Social Thought" (London: MacMillan) all the best, jon. --------------- Department of Sociology, University of Surrey & School of Social Studies, University of Nottingham. Postal Address: School of Social Studies, University of Nottingham, University Park, Nottingham. NG7 2RD. Tel. +44 115 951 5237 Fax. +44 115 951 5232 ---------------- From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 04:52:06 1995 Date: Mon, 20 Nov 95 07:50 EST From: "Jetaway Dave" Subject: Re: Weber To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU >Just for the record, I wouldn't call what I'm doing "postmodern discourse." >I'm >simply looking at the disparity between what people think, and therefore how >they talk, about juvenile crime, and the reality of juvenile crime. Is it >happening as much as is represented on TV, the movies, in dinnertable talk? >Are >the juvenile crime rates rising dramatically enough (or at all) to justify new >laws concerning them? This is not "postmodernism" it's just good, >old-fashioned >sociology. I can't stand being pigeon-holed like that. >Laurie Jesus Christ, sorry for posting. JD From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 05:40:34 1995 Date: 20 Nov 95 08:36:08 EST From: Annalaura <102400.2277@compuserve.com> To: Subject: applications: advice needed Hello! I am in the process of applying to graduate school and would really appreciate some advice from you 'veterans' on the following: - statement of purpose (how specific, what it should include etc.) - importance of GRE scores - areas of specialization (how you chose them, how binding are they. I am interested in theory, but I've only had one undergraduate course in it...) - any advice you would want to give an international student - any other tips on how to choose a good doctoral program Thank you very much. Annalaura D'Errico 102400,2277@compuserve.com From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 09:54:54 1995 by KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU (PMDF V5.0-5 #13311) id <01HXV5QG1JTC8XBFRG@KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU> for socgrad@UCSD.EDU; Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:51:49 -0600 (CST) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:51:49 -0600 (CST) Date-warning: Date header was inserted by KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU From: 1k1mgm@KUHUB.CC.UKANS.EDU (Christopher Gunn) Subject: Re: grading To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU >My wife, who's in social psychology, has told me there are real studies >that show a correlation of something like 0.93 between course grades >and teacher evaluations. I'm following up my own post to admit that my numbers were off.... W. J. McKeachie (_Teaching Tips_, 1986, Lexington, MA: D. C. Heath, pp. 273-94) cites a meta-analysis that shows the correlation of grades and teaching evaluations to be 0.47. If there's a study that shows a 0.93 correlation, I can't find it. Christopher Gunn Molecular Graphics and Modeling Laboratory 1k1mgm@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu University of Kansas Phone: 913-864-4428 or -4495 Malott Hall Lawrence, KS 66045 From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 11:18:46 1995 From: michael carley Subject: Applications To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 11:17:19 -0800 (PST) Annalaura and others, This is an important and stressful subject so I hope that many of us will address it. Here are my thoughts on Applications etc. Statement of purpose (personal statement): As the name implies, this should be personal!! Many committee members read only the first and last paragraphs, so they should be attention grabbers. The standard (in sociology) seems to be about two pages. You will want to include: Why you want to enter sociology, what your long-term career goals are, what are your major interests in the field (be both specific and general, this can be tricky). You shouldn't spend much, if any, time describing your qualifications. Not only is this boring, but there are probably a hundred applicants who are at least as qualified as you are. Rather, you want to show how much you are unique, set yourself apart from the other candidates. It may also help to include a one or two page resume of sorts, a list of your research and teaching experience, projects, memberships, interests, and honors. With this included, your qualifications cannot be overlooked. GRE scores: GRE scores are very important, but if you ask graduate advisors for specific guidelines, you're likely to get a vague answer. A good number to begin with is 1100. If your combined verbal and quantitative scores are below 1100 you should probably retake the test, especially if you are looking for financial help, assistantships etc. The emphasis placed on the analytical sections varies greatly so you can never be sure. Few sociology programs care about the subject test, so if the schools you are considering doesn't ask for it, you may be better off not to even take it. It is very difficult and very subjective. Areas of interest: As I mentioned before, you should be both general and specific in outlining your areas of interest in your statement of purpose and applications. If you are too specific, you could hurt your chances of getting in. At the same time, it is important to let them know that you do have some sense of what you want to do. Also, committee members who may want to work with you based on what your interests are. Being specific could then help you get in, and/or help you get funding. The best course of action, in my opinion, is to outline four or five areas in which you have interest. Of course, this is going to be the focus of your career, so choose carefully. When choosing schools, look up whether there are professors in your area(s) of interest there. And, look up their work--this is important because you could you choose a school based in part on shared interests and then find out that the professors studying that field are doing so in a different perspective than your own. In addition--Is prestige important? You want to attend the best school you can get into, but you also want to meet your own needs. One thing to keep in mind, when you enter the job market, you will not likely get a job at a school more prestigious than the one from which you recieved your Phd. This may or may not be important to you. At application time, don't shy away from applying to schools because you think you won't get in. The process is very subjective, and you never know what committee members will consider when making their final decisions. The best method, in my opinion, is to apply to at least six schools: Two you may not get into, two you think you can get into, and two you are fairly sure will admit you. At the same time, it is a waste of time and money to apply to a school you wouldn't consider attending. Resources There is a very good book, published annually called The Guide to Graduate Departments in Sociology. It contains a breif sketch of every department in the country, their enrollment their professors interests, etc. Good luck--Mike I would be interested in hearing from others on this subject. **************************************************************************** * Michael Carley | I am not a visionary, I claim to be a * * Department of Sociology | practical idealist--Mohandes K. Gandhi * * Stanford University | * * Stanford CA 94305-2047 | How far can you open your mind before * * (415) 497-7526 | your brains fall out? * * mcarley@leland.stanford.edu | * * * **************************************************************************** From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 12:20:14 1995 Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 13:53:12 -0600 (CST) From: Lori Holyfield To: michael carley Subject: Re: Applications Annalaura - I think Michael has given you good advice. I would especially take the GRE seriously. While the process is indeed subjective (sometimes more after than before admission) you should focus heavily upon your GRE scores. Take the test twice if necessary and shoot for above 1100 - some schools now will admit but not fund those with scores below 1300. LH From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 12:56:28 1995 Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 14:40:11 -0600 (CST) From: Tricia Robinson Subject: applications To: Sociology Graduate Students My two cents... I have been warned by many fellow students (and a few profs) that a typical student's scores will go DOWN when they re-take the GREs. Be careful when re-taking. Also, in some programs the scores are required by the graduate school, and NOT the program itself. In these cases, the scores CAN BE meaningless. I have knowledge of a program where the scores were required, and the people who sat on the admissions committee in the sociology department did not even look at the GREs, though the applicants were required to submit scores. The point? The more you know about the places you want to apply, the better. Current students are a great source of information. SKEE From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 16:05:27 1995 From: michael carley Subject: Applications To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 16:04:13 -0800 (PST) Another resource I didn't mention in my earlier message is the web page. It's been on the list before; it includes information about some of the major graduate programs in sociology, although it is far from complete. The address is: http//www.socioweb.com/~markbl/socioweb Mike **************************************************************************** * Michael Carley | I am not a visionary, I claim to be a * * Department of Sociology | practical idealist--Mohandes K. Gandhi * * Stanford University | * * Stanford CA 94305-2047 | How far can you open your mind before * * (415) 497-7526 | your brains fall out? * * mcarley@leland.stanford.edu | * * * **************************************************************************** From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 20 17:47:42 1995 Date: Mon, 20 Nov 1995 17:45:00 -0800 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Jerry Blaz Subject: Re: Weber Let me further recommend "Constructing Serious Violence and Its Victims: Processing a Domestic Violence Restraining Order" by Robert M. Emerson, which goes into the response of the legal system to domestic violence complaints and the issuance of restraining orders and how it is processed. It appears as a chapter in Perspectives on Scial Problems, Vol. 6, pp 3-28. (JAI, 1994.) Emerson, a neo-Chicagoan, does not list Weber qua Weber in his bibliography, but the discussion of the changes follows the Weberian understanding of continual rationalization of the bureaucratic process, aside from that, social construction also flows from Weberian underpinnings. At 07:50 AM 11/20/95 EST, you wrote: >>Just for the record, I wouldn't call what I'm doing "postmodern discourse." >>I'm >>simply looking at the disparity between what people think, and therefore how >>they talk, about juvenile crime, and the reality of juvenile crime. Is it >>happening as much as is represented on TV, the movies, in dinnertable talk? >>Are >>the juvenile crime rates rising dramatically enough (or at all) to justify new >>laws concerning them? This is not "postmodernism" it's just good, >>old-fashioned >>sociology. I can't stand being pigeon-holed like that. > >>Laurie > >Jesus Christ, sorry for posting. > >JD > > > Jerry Blaz/The BOOKie Joint 7246 Reseda Blvd. Reseda, CA 91335 (818)345-2983/(818)343-1055 ffdog@earthlink.net Outside of a dog, a man's best friend is a good book. Inside of a dog, it is too dark to read. G. Marx From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 21 11:40:06 1995 Date: Tue, 21 Nov 1995 14:36:55 -0500 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: dread@acs.bu.edu ('Killer' Miller) Subject: Drag and Auto Racing Hi, I'm looking for anything written about autombile racing. I'm specifically interested in drag racing (both legally-sanctioned and illegal), but due to the ostensible dearth of litereature, I'm looking for anything related. Thanks! -Andrew ================================================== == dread@acs.bu.edu == Andrew P. Miller == ================================================== == Boston University == Department of Sociology == ================================================== == "Wake up and live !" - Robert Nesta Marley == ================================================== From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 22 10:30:31 1995 Date: Wed, 22 Nov 1995 19:26:00 +0100 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Czerlinski@mpipf-muenchen.mpg.de (Jean Czerlinski) Subject: conference on complexity, society, and liberty (fwd) ....................................................................... COMPLEXITY, SOCIETY AND LIBERTY CONFERENCE UQTR, June 11-12, 1996 This is to remind everybody interested in presenting a paper to this conference that the deadline for submitting an abstract is November 30. This international, multidisciplinary conference will explore the relations between modern complexity theory and more traditional approaches in the humane sciences (economics, political science, sociology, psychology, philosophy, management, etc.). The conference will bring together a small group of scholars; like in our 1994 Chaos & Society Conference, about 20 original papers will be presented and discussed. The Conference Organizing Committee is presided by Dr. Jacques Plamondon, President of the University of Quebec at Trois-Rivieres, and includes Prof. Alain Albert, Prof. Jean-Paul Delahaye, Dr. Tim Cartwright, Prof. Bart Kosko, Prof. Gottfried Mayer-Kress, and Prof. Ralph Stacey. Our Web site (http://www.uqtr.uquebec.ca/complexity) contains all necessary information about the conference and how to submit papers. An on-line registration form is also available on the site. Sincerely, Pierre Lemieux (Visiting Professor of Economics, Universite du Quebec a Hull) Conference Director From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 22 11:09:58 1995 From: "Kimberly Clarke Simmons" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: Favorite Books Date: Wed, 22 Nov 95 12:55:47 -0600 Hi, I will be teaching soc 1001 in extension (mainly adult returning students) this winter. I hope to engage them in sociology, and would like to have them choose 1 full length book to read. I plan to give them a list of 10 to 20 books to choose from. While I hope the books will be methodologically and theoretically sound, my first criteria is READABILITY! I want them to be able to enjoy the book! So, I am solicting recommendations : what is your favorite (or memory of favorite when you first started reading sociology) sociological book? (Perhaps it would be best to reply to me personally - simmo003@maroon.tc.umn.edu - I'm not sure if the list will be of interest to the whole list, but I'd be happy to post a compiled list once I've recieved some responses). Thanks, Kim Kimberly Clarke Simmons U of MN Sociology simmo003@maroon.tc.umn.edu From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 22 19:21:48 1995 Date: Wed, 22 Nov 95 22:20:00 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: Review:Sjoberg, Vaughn, and Reynolds' book (fwd) To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU arnold@UConnVM.UConn.Edu, roth@UConnVM.UConn.Edu, shemtov@UConnVM.UConn.Edu This might be worth a discussion at some point. Have a good T-day. ----------------------------Original message---------------------------- Date: Wed, 22 Nov 95 16:53:34 EST From: Feagin To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK Subject: Review:Sjoberg, Vaughn, and Reynolds' book This is a review I did of an important book which some of you may have missed. I would welcome comments. Review of A Critique of Contemporary American Sociology, edited by Ted R. Vaughn, Gideon Sjoberg, and Larry T. Reynolds (Dix Hills, New York: General Hall, 1993). Pp. 342. Reviewed by Joe R. Feagin, Dept. of Sociology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 U.S. sociology is in decline, and not just because U.S. society is in decline. Sociology is on the skids largely because of commitments made since World War II to a bureaucratized, uncritical, and natural-science approach to research on social life. The often provocative arguments in A Critique of Contemporary American Sociology, edited by Vaughn, Sjoberg, and Reynolds, show how sociology lost its way. This is the first major book since Alvin Gouldner's The Coming Crisis of Western Sociology to raise in a fundamental way the philosophical and ethical foundations of contemporary U.S. sociology. At the heart of this project are the genius and inspiration of Gideon Sjoberg, one of sociology's most brilliant analysts. The first article, by Ted Vaughn, focuses on "The Crisis in Contemporary American Sociology." Vaughn begins with a discussion of official presentations of sociology in various recent handbooks. Numerous sociologists writing in these handbooks emphasize the need to standardize and require more quantitative- methodological rigor in sociology. Disagreeing with the natural- science approach to sociology, Vaughn underscores more fundamental problems: not one of the sociological commentators shows any sense of the current marginality of sociology within the larger intellectual community. The commonly discussed problem of excessive specialization in sociology is not the main problem. Much more important is the hegemony of quantitative research methods and the natural science model. The marginalization of sociology is not the result of too little "hard science" in the field but rather the result of the absence of a critical and ethical stance toward the state-bureaucratic context within which sociology usually operates. Vaughn argues that the growth of the national-security state, as well as the emergence of life-threatening environmental issues and the persistence of a severely deprived poverty class, are by-products of bureaucratic organizations created by the top classes. Modern bureaucracy has a built-in social triage favoring the privileged. The implications of this for sociological research are clear. To do research on the privileged classes and their bureaucratic structures, one needs more than conventional survey techniques. One cannot study deeply problems like the savings-and-loan crisis or the federal reserve control of the economy with the usual survey techniques. Surveys cannot probe the complex secrecy systems of modern private and state bureaucracies. In a second chapter on the bureaucratization of sociology Sjoberg and Vaughn focus on the reshaping of sociology after World War II into a discipline whose most prestigious members are often tied to a growing bureaucratic state that puts federal dollars into sociological research. Today, major sociology departments are nation-state-linked -- which makes it more difficult for researchers there to do critical research on privileged classes or state bureaucracies, some branches of which provide funding. In addition, the hierarchy of professorial and administrative authority, the stress on frequent journal publications, and the character of university promotion systems indicate that sociologists are bureaucratized in ways that decrease the likelihood of a critical stance toward bureaucracy and the modern nation-state. The superficiality of much sociological research is also underscored. Social surveys are typically superficial (surface-level) readings of human opinions, because they involve asking 20-second questions and the receipt of 10-20-second answers. Much of what we "know" as sociologists is from surface-level answers to brief questions, often framed from the viewpoint of the researchers. Before World War II sociology was rooted in small-scale research projects that mostly used qualitative methods. There were few grant-awarding agencies. After the war large bureaucratic agencies developed at the federal government level to fund social science research. These new federal agencies helped develop large research institutes at major universities. This bureaucratic underwriting of sociological research brought with it a new emphasis on quantitative methods and on social scientists as research "entrepreneurs." Major sociologists pressed to get federal funding from the National Science Foundation and presented the profession as moving in the direction of quantitative research in the natural science model; they also made a conscious attempt not to do research on controversial social issues. This tradition became dominant, with its emphasis on quantitative methods, on a "variables" approach, on demographic and survey techniques, and on the unimportance of substantive critical theory. The development of federally funded social science research on a large scale after World War II brought the large research universities into prominence, and they have produced many of the doctorates in sociology. Today these powerful research departments are able to attract well-published sociologists and high-quality graduate students, to get large amount of federal and other research funds, to control major publication sources (especially the flagship journals), and thus to control many intellectual debates in the field. In a third essay Sjoberg and Vaughn explore "The Ethical Foundations of Sociology and the Necessity for a Human Rights Perspective." They argue that the ethical presuppositions of sociology must be explicitly analyzed. They distinguish between (1) an ethicist position that accents the duties of individuals to their nation-state or community and (2) a human rights tradition that asserts that human beings have rights simply because they are human. Sjoberg and Vaughn are critical of the new communitarian ethics put forth by scholars like Robert Bellah and Amitai Etzioni. Although they commend them for raising moral issues and collective virtues, they see the communitarians as closely tied to the existing values of the white-middle-class and the bureaucratic state. The communitarian perspective ignores the perspectives of people of color and does not challenge the dominance of elites and bureaucratic organizations. Instead, Sjoberg and Vaughn suggest that a countersystem approach is needed, one in which sociologists try to step outside the thought patterns of the dominant positivistic paradigm to look critically at their society and nation-state. In their view only a human rights perspective permits a fully critical perspective on the modern nation-state. Human rights are much broader than civil rights, which are those guaranteed by a nation-state. A commitment to human rights transcends the boundaries of a particular nation state. In the broader framework of human rights each person is entitled to equal concern and treatment because they are human beings, not because they are members of some particular state. The human rights perspective may be out of fashion but it has deep roots. Drawing on John Locke, Thomas Jefferson in 1776 penned the language, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights . . . Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." Envisioned here are not only legal rights but also the basic rights people have solely by reason of being human. Jefferson and his fellow revolutionaries declared that the American minority of the British empire had rights that did not derive from British law but rather from natural law. Unfortunately, from the American revolution to World War II the human rights tradition received much less attention than one might have expected. It was not until after the war that the idea of human rights received reinvigorated attention, probably cause of the catastrophic character of the Holocaust. The most important postwar articulation of human rights, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights passed by the United Nations in 1948, stipulates that "all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights" and that "all are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law." Article 8 of this international agreement asserts: "Everyone has the right to an effective remedy . . . for acts violating the fundamental rights," and Article 25 states that these rights extend to everyday life: "Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and his family, including food, clothing, housing." This Universal Declaration affirms that human beings have rights independent of the particular societal and governmental conditions in which they live, and it presses governments to incorporate all basic human rights into their legal and political systems. In the view of Sjoberg and Vaughn, sociologists are in a favorable position to advance the understanding of the principles underlying this tradition of human rights. Sociology can provide a deeper understanding because a structural approach indicates that we must restructure the moral foundation not only of individual actions but also of the actions of private/state bureaucratic structures. Elaborating their optimistic perspective on human agency in the midst of oppressive institutions, Sjoberg and Vaughn develop (drawing on George H. Mead) the idea of the "social mind." This social mind is reflective and permits human agents to respond in a proactive way, even in totalitarian societies. The social mind is characterized by a wide range of social abilities, including thinking reflectively, making social observations, relying on social memory, and taking the roles of others. One interesting aspect of their analysis is accent they place on the importance of the human capacity to "take the roles of others and to recognize another's humanity and commonality with oneself . . . an essential step in recognizing the rights of others." This idea of human empathy is an important concept for sociological analysis. In a recent book, White Racism: The Basics (Routledge, 1995), Hernan Vera and I have explored the sociological significance of empathy and have argued that a critical step in securing everyday equality for African Americans and other people of color will be to develop among a large number of white Americans the ability to empathize with people of color as equal human beings. In this short review I have elected to focus on the work of Vaughn and Sjoberg. However, there is much additional material of interest in the rest of the book -- eight articles on issues illustrating points made in the opening essays. The first, by Norma Williams and Andree Sjoberg, argues that sociologists have generally taken the vantage point of the privileged in examining racial-ethnic and gender issues. In their view theory and research on gender must be integrated into racial-ethnic research from the "bottom up." An article by Boyd Littrell looks at the use of adversarial methods in social science research to get at bureaucratic secrets, while a piece by Stanley Saxton explores the utility of the symbolic interaction perspective as an alternative to mainstream positivism. J. David Knottnerus dissects the Wisconsin school of status-attainment research, arguing that an underlying assumption of this research is a too optimistic image of a modern industrial society as rational and efficient, an image ignoring class-stratified and racist dimensions of the society. Beth Hartung examines the increase in temporary faculty among sociologists, while Thomas A. Lyson and Gregory D. Squires analyze the development of applied sociology and non-academic marketplaces. Moustapha Diouf breaks with a U.S.-focused analyses and examines Western sociology and its development biases as they are applied to the post-colonial world. John F. Galliher and David Nelson assess the rise and fall of the journal, The American Sociologist, making the point that the ASA council may have stopped publication of that journal because it was publishing articles that were too qualitative or too critical of the discipline. One weakness of the book is the exclusive attention to human rights values and conceptions in the Western tradition. A more comprehensive analysis might have drawn more on the dissenting human rights perspectives of Native American, African American, Latino/a American, and Asian American traditions within this hemisphere. There are at least as vigorous human rights arguments and actions in those non-European traditions as in the often elitist and pro-property perspectives of Jefferson and the other "founding fathers." One thinks here of the brilliant speeches of Frederick Douglass and the various African American manifestos of the 19th century on equal rights. Critical too is the Native American tradition, including the collectivistic human rights tradition of the Iroquois confederacy, a federation Jefferson admired and cribbed from in his ideas about democracy. These non- European traditions frequently do not see "private property," in contrast to the white "founding fathers," as a bedrock for human rights. A fuller analysis of human rights would also draw on the U.S. feminist tradition, which has articulated human rights across the gender barrier (a barrier legitimated in the "all men" language of the Declaration of Independence). Moreover, a truly global analysis would include more on the human rights traditions of Asia, Latin America, and Africa. "Liberation theology," for example, is substantially a post- colonial perspective of great relevance to the human rights argument. There is also an Islamic human rights perspective and movement, although it has gotten little attention in a Western world intent on stereotyping Islam as "evil." The scope of a human rights analysis could be enhanced if it drew on global sources in non-European cultures. The major weakness of the book is that it does not go far enough. In my view a "liberation sociology" should not only deal with building a human rights foundation for critical analysis but also examine and assist the struggle against bureaucratized classist, racist, and sexist oppression. It should recognize and research the already existing internal struggles within state and corporate bureaucracies. Even within bureaucratic settings once excluded people of color, and women, are challenging the oppressiveness of bureaucratic settings and social triage benefitting the privileged. In U.S. society generally there are also many groups fighting back against oppression and reactionary attempts at social triage. Today, a "liberation sociology" needs to be built that will facilitate these struggles. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 22 19:45:51 1995 Date: Wed, 22 Nov 95 22:34:36 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: "White racism" Course "Tabled" at UCONN To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU, psn@csf.colorado.edu Given that this has not been forwarded to any of these lists from the original poster (Noel Cazenave), but was distributed to the Sociology department mailboxes at the University of Connecticut, I thought I would communicate this information: At each of its last two meetings, the University of Connecticut's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Courses and Curriculum Committee "tabled" a proposal I (Noel Cazenave) submitted to teach a course on White Racism. That proposal is not to institutionalize the course as a regular part of the curriculum (I plan to do that later). It is simply to teach the course in the Fall semester under a selected topics course number. There is strong (highly emotional and political) objection to the course title. At this time, I don't know exactly what "tabled" means. It is not clear whether the proposal will automatically be brought up again at the next meeting or whether it must be re-introduced. At the last meeting all but two of the more than a score of faculty department representatives to that committee voted to table the proposal. At the first meeting, when it was determined that my department (Sociology) approved the proposal, it was suggested that an inquiry was needded to determine if the department followed the appropriate procedure in making its decision. At the second meeting questions were raised about the appropriate subject matter of sociology and about the legitimacy of sociology as a discipline. The sociology department has been supportive of efforts to teach the course. The department chair has complained to the acting dean. The acting dean has promised to attend the next meeting to support the proposal. This also happened a number of years ago, when it took 3 years to get Race, Class, and Gender approved as a course. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 24 07:00:29 1995 Date: Fri, 24 Nov 1995 15:53:02 +0100 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Czerlinski@mpipf-muenchen.mpg.de (Jean Czerlinski) Subject: Re: Review:Sjoberg, Vaughn, and Reynolds' book (fwd) Hope y'all had a happy Thanksgiving....... >This is a review I did of an important book which some of you may >have missed. I would welcome comments. > > Review of A Critique of Contemporary American Sociology, >edited by Ted R. Vaughn, Gideon Sjoberg, and Larry T. Reynolds >(Dix Hills, New York: General Hall, 1993). Pp. 342. > > Reviewed by Joe R. Feagin, Dept. of Sociology, University of >Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 > I have not read the book, but from the review it seems that certain issues are being confused (presumably by the authors). > U.S. sociology is in decline, and not just because U.S. > society is in decline. First of all, I would think that the worse society is doing, the more we could use sociology's help; and the better society's doing, the less we need sociology. Note that dentists have almost driven themselves out of business now that frequent toothbrushing, flossing, and flouridated water have drastically reduced the number of cavities people get! > Sociology is on the skids largely because > of commitments made since World War II to a bureaucratized, > uncritical, and natural-science approach to research on social > life. ... > The marginalization of > sociology is not the result of too little "hard science" in the > field but rather the result of the absence of a critical and > ethical stance.... But this is the assertion that I think is even more confused. Economics is currently the most prestigious of the social sciences, and it's the one that has most kow-towed to the establishment and been most uncritical and most used the natural sciences approach. These days, economists solve at least as many differential equations as physicists. (Economists who don't are the marginalized ones.) Psychology is the second most prestigious and is likewise the very uncritical and very natural sciences oriented (more so than econ in some subfields like psychophysics). So how could it POSSIBLY be that sociology-- considerably more critical and qualitative than these two fields-- was marginalized because it was too uncritical and natural-science oriented??? On the contrary, I'd say, a field's prestige tends to FALL the more critical and non-natural-sciency it is. (By the way, I've used "qualitative" as a synonym of "non-natural-sciency", but that's not truly correct. Biology, for example, has LOTS of qualitative, descriptive work. I'm just using it as a shorthand.) However, what the book might be right about is that sociology has lost its original calling-- or what SHOULD be its calling-- namely to be the reflective critic of society, always re-examing things and considering their ethical implications. But that is something different from worldly success. Let us not confuse the two. We might well have to make a choice between a sociology we think is good and one society rewards with high prestige (witness the death of *The American Sociologist*). And this is not a technical question of how to do sociology "properly" but a VALUE question of what "proper" (good) sociology is. Value questions need to be argued in a different way than technical questions, but from the review I fear the authors have argued as if it were a technical question. In other words, I think the book should have spent more time arguing WHY we should value multi- cultural perspectives, qualitative research, non-positivist approaches (and which ones specifically!!), a critical stance, freedom from bureaucratic control and so on. Instead, it made these strange (and, I think, wrong) arguments about boosting the prestige of sociology and taking the above-mentioned values as implicit to the argument when they are NOT generally agreed-upon. I would be interested in anyone else's comments. Best wishes, Jean Czerlinski From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Fri Nov 24 21:25:17 1995 Date: Fri, 24 Nov 1995 23:16:53 -0600 (CST) From: Brent Myer To: Jean Czerlinski Subject: Re: Review:Sjoberg, Vaughn, and Reynolds' book (fwd) Howdy all... Just thought i would add a few comments to Jean's.... On Fri, 24 Nov 1995, Jean Czerlinski wrote: > But this is the assertion that I think is even more confused. > Economics is currently the most prestigious of the social > sciences, and it's the one that has most kow-towed to > the establishment and been most uncritical and most > used the natural sciences approach. These days, economists > solve at least as many differential equations as physicists. > (Economists who don't are the marginalized ones.) > Psychology is the second most prestigious and is likewise > the very uncritical and very natural sciences oriented > (more so than econ in some subfields like psychophysics). > So how could it POSSIBLY be that sociology-- considerably > more critical and qualitative than these two fields-- > was marginalized because it was too uncritical and > natural-science oriented??? On the contrary, I'd say, > a field's prestige tends to FALL the more critical and > non-natural-sciency it is. I'm not sure its all that possible to critique a book based on a review, esspecially a book like this one that is a compilation of articles, with different points of view. But i think that i can take a longish quote from a conclusion in the book to help address this critique. "The dangers posed by the hegemony of the natural science model are seriously undermining the social and intellectual foundations of the discipline. Sociology, by defining itself in terms of its technique and methods, is now placed in a highly vulnerable situation. These techniques and metthods can readily be appropriated by, or absorbed into, the ongoing activities of business schools, schools of communication, schools of social work, and schools of public affairs. Each of these academic enterprises has powerful constituencies outside the university for which sociology has no counterpart. Sociology cannot compete with them for resources. Thus if contemporary trends in the discipline are not reversed to some degree, sociology increasingly stands to lose its legitimacy within the academic setting" (pg. 99) This only nips at your question, but perhaps it clears things a little. > However, what the book might be right about is that > sociology has lost its original calling-- or what > SHOULD be its calling-- namely to be the reflective > critic of society, always re-examing things and > considering their ethical implications. But that is > something different from worldly success. Let us > not confuse the two. This seems to be a strange division, though i may not understand it perfectly. The books subject matter is sociology, the sociology of sociology. A reflective sociologist would have to examine the "worldly success" of sociology, since it is the the subject matter. Linking the discipline of sociology to social issues is the job of a sociologist dealing with this subject. What one of the articles mentions is that it is difficult for sociology to be critical of the bureaucracies that dominate us; that we have embraced. We latched into the beauracracies to get prestige, power, and the like. That which dominates us we have internalized; we produce data that is useful for government agencies, for the welfare state. But this data may not be helpful for liberating people, forwarding democracy and other nice things that some sociologist think are cool. > We might well have to make > a choice between a sociology we think is good and > one society rewards with high prestige (witness > the death of *The American Sociologist*). And this > is not a technical question of how to do > sociology "properly" but a VALUE question of what > "proper" (good) sociology is. Value questions need > to be argued in a different way than technical > questions, but from the review I fear the authors > have argued as if it were a technical question. The death blow of that journal (The American Sociologist) was given by sociologists, to quote a line from the opening section in the article that outlines this issue (by J. F. Galliher and David Nelson)... "The rise and fall of TAS is used in this chapter to illustrate how the discipline handles intellectual dissent and devience." (pg. 323). But one thing that was said i think is really cool, and interesting to boot. Why is it that value questions and technical questions need to be argued differently? I guess i'm not sure what the differences really are. Do we need different systems of logic for values than technical questions? If so, what would they look like? I hope i have addressed some of the issues that were raised... respectfully, Brent From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 26 05:51:32 1995 From: aljohnson@uhavax.hartford.edu Date: Sun, 26 Nov 1995 08:47:55 EDT To: socorg-k@vm.utcc.toronto.edu, sociology@think.net, socgrad@UCSD.EDU, rursoc-l@ukcc.uky.edu, psn@csf.colorado.edu, marxism@jefferson.village.virginia.edu, famlysci@ukcc.uky.edu, cjust-l@iubvm.cc.buffalo.edu Subject: A new dictionary of sociology I'm pleased to let sociologists on the list know that Basil Blackwell has just published a new book of mine, "The Blackwell Dictionary of Sociology: A User's Guide to Sociological Language." The dictionary is distinctive not only in its combination of scholarship with a high level of accessibility for the average reader, but in its inclusion of a substantial number of biographical sketches of prominent women in sociology (current leading sociology dictionaries typically mention few if any women at all). The book is being published simultaneously in the U.S. and the U.K. and is available in both hardbound ($49.95) and paperback ($16.95). For examination copies (for courses with 12 or more students), you can e-mail Blackwell directly at: (UK) inspcopy@BlackwellPublishers.co.uk (US) blkwell@world.std.com Your request should include the title of your course and its usual enrollment. If you have any difficulty, let me know. Allan Johnson aljohnson@uhavax.hartford.edu  From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Sun Nov 26 17:11:16 1995 Date: Sun, 26 Nov 1995 20:08:05 -0500 (EST) From: blyden b potts To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: Re: GRE Scores My own rather limited knowledge of graduate sociology admissions decisions suggests to me that having good scores may help get you noticed and modestly good scores may be (almost) a requirement, but beyond that they do little or nothing for you. Other parts of your admissions package (e.g. academic record & statement) matter much, much more -- and not always in the ways you might think. Blyden Potts From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 01:05:57 1995 id m0tJzRX-0004z6C; Mon, 27 Nov 95 11:01 SAT from SOCSCI; Mon Nov 27 11:01:43 1995 From: "Karen Farquharson" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Mon, 27 Nov 1995 11:04:36 SAST-2 Subject: psn Hi all, Does anyone know how to subscribe to the progressive sociologists network? (Or if it's a worthwhile list?) Thanks, Karen From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 07:02:41 1995 Mon, 27 Nov 1995 06:56:23 -0800 for Date: Mon, 27 Nov 95 09:38:44 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: Progressive Sociologists list To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Like all e-mail networks, the Progressive Sociologists list is occasionally very interesting, and occasionally full of pablum. There are now two Progressive Sociologists lists -- one is psn-cafe, and this is unmoderated. The second is psn proper, for which a particular group of subscribers decides what from psn-cafe gets posted on psn. I do not think there are major differences between the two, the notion is to cut down on things like flame wars (person x, y, and z isn't a true Marxist, etc.). I myself subscribe to psn, the moderated version. The archives are also available via gopher -- csf is located in Colorado. To subscribe to psn or psn-cafe, send a message to listproc@csf.colorado.edu, and state either "sub psn name" or "psn-cafe name." From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 07:34:00 1995 Date: Mon, 27 Nov 95 10:25:25 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: The Vaughn, et al. book To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU There is also the issue of what is prestige in the University versus prestige in the eyes of the people we study and serve. The fact is, the reason why Economics has huge classrooms on the undergrad. level is it is a convenient major for people who for some reason don't get accepted into schools of business -- it has little to do with how scientific the methodology is. The same with Psychology. If one discipline is having difficulty proving itself useful to people below upper-middle to upper class, it is Psychology. People are still more likely to consult sociologists on issues related to less powerful populations -- which leads us to the choice that we can either attempt to liberate less powerful people or impose upper middle class standards of rationality and truth on them -- the sad fact is, Sociology as a discipline tends towards and rewards the latter. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 08:55:36 1995 Date: Mon, 27 Nov 1995 10:46:36 -0600 (CST) From: Brent Myer To: Alan Davidson Subject: Re: The Vaughn, et al. book I totally agree with Alan's latest post, noting the sad fact that sociology tends to pander to the upper classes (and upper middle). But why is that? I think in most sociologists heart of hearts, they desire to liberate all people, rich and poor. To forward, at a minimum, democratic values and freedom (don't most people love 'ol Mills and the Sociological Imagination?). But the poor, the powerless..well, they don't give sociologists money! Grants are not given to sociologists to rid the country of the poor, at the least they are given to understand them, that is not a move towards freedom, but giving ammunition to the dominant group; giving them the chains to fetter the poor. The trouble is, a sociologist *HAS* to obtain grants if she/he wants to hold a postion in a major university. The more money, the better. Alan, i think was right in saying that sociologists are consulted with issues of the poor, and that is a problem. Our research is generally not created to help the poor themselves, to have them help themselves. Normally we study them, as if 'them' were not us. And then hand that information over to the funding sources (welfare state), NOT even to the people we study! Now what about those psychologists? why are they so damn popular? I think they actually do reach the literate portions of the poor. But they reach them with their self help books. What do those do? Well i think one can argue that (meaning, i'm not sure if i want to argue that but i will anyhow) the poor are being passified by the psychologists 'help' . I have a great idea! Lets call low self esteem an illness, though not look at the cause (could it really be alienation?), and make those suffering *know* that it's an illness, and then... get this... we can write a book about how they can get over it!!!! YA HOOO!!! :) The popularity of psychology does not stem from thier science, nor their theory... it's because the isues they confront are personally relevant. they try to ease the suffering, stop the pain. They also write in a way that most people can understand ok, i'll stop now. :) Brent From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 12:08:01 1995 Date: Mon, 27 Nov 1995 12:01:20 -0800 (PST) From: Eileeneke To: Kerri , Terri , Dad , zorro@pathcom.com, e-Mick , Ben , Aunt Mary , Nerd , Ben , Catherine B Emmerling , SAY Officers , chene@watmail.ucr.edu, jaiswala@watmail.ucr.edu, loerac@watmail.ucr.edu, wange@watmail.ucr.edu, bfang@sdcc13.ucsd.edu, Thomas , pat@iosoftware.com, socgrad@UCSD.EDU Brian Fujimoto , laura sasso , Sophie Anderson , Snyder William Scott Subject: (COPY) Insanities of the world (fwd) I hate sending on forwarded mail, but this one....i couldn't resist so everyone gets it. Read it....send it on if you want....read all of it...inclueding the short little forwarded messages like this one.... ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Subject: (COPY) Insanities of the world (fwd) Read everything , including all the forwarded messages. This is not one of those jokes, this is... i don't know, just read it, everything. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > >Stephanie, sorry that I did not use your new address...Read all the >messages in between, there are quite a few of them, but they give you an >idea about how powerful the forwarded message is...love you girls and >miss you! > >---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Subject: Insanities of the world > >Just a little something that someone sent to me. It's not the usual >forwarded stuff. Read through all the little messages from others before >the actual message. It really makes you think about the insanities of >our world today. And I wonder, will anybody ever be able to fix the >moral wrongs and ignorances of the world? > Angie > > ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ > > >Just a little history lesson. Thought you might like to know. There are >some great quotes in all of the fowarding stuff. Don't breeze by them. > >Kim > >I don't know who has already recieved this but you should really read it and >take a moment to reflect on this crazy world. >--------------------- > > "The time is gone the song is over, > thought I'd something more to say." > Pink Floyd > > > >all I have to say is God bless all moderates, all people who value human >life enough that death is never revenge, all people who are the >middle men, the moderators. They actually accomplish what >extremists can only fight against. ------- Forwarded Message > > >mom and ellen and everyone, i really thought that this was worth reading, >it made me cry. love you all. el, please forward it to the whole >list. love, jess. > >I know that this message is long, and I apologize. I normally delete >the headers, but some of them say some interesting things, that go well >with the original message. This _is_ worth reading. Just so you know, >it deals with the recent assassination of Itzhak Rabin, and originated >in Israel on the very night of the assassination. A stunning event for >the world that hopefully will not reverse the great strides toward peace >that have been taken in recent months. > >Shalom, >Lee > >------- Forwarded Message > >I know this is to alot of you but the message is well worth the time it >takes to skip over the addresses. This isn't the normal funny or stupid >things we send to each other. Please read it. > >Love, >Helen > >Content-Type: message/rfc822 > >Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) >FROM: sshackel/unix_in////////RFC-822/sshackel#a#husc#f#harvard#f#edu@ns9000 > >There's not much I can say about this. It's so much more real than many >other "world tragedies" to me. Prime Minister Rabin has been in our news >so much lately, and he was going to be up here next week. It's just so >real. > >- --Stephen > >- ---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > > > >- ---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > > > >- ---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > >read this well, my friends. >love, >kevin. >(*deeply touched*) > >- ---------- Forwarded message ---------- >Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > > >Normally, I'll delete the beginning part (all the extraneous text before >these >forwards... or, at least i try to anyway). But, I thought you might want to >read what people had to say as well as the original message. So I just >deleted >all the addresses that this was sent to. If you've already gotten it then I >apologize. > >It's not the usual jokes and syrupy sweet messages we normally forward to >each >other. > >love, >vanessa > >- --- Forwarded Message from Ryan Miller --- > >>Date: 06 Nov 95 15:47:13 PST >>From: Ryan Miller >>Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > >Dear One of Over A Hundred People, > >This is a forwarded copy of an email I received from a friend of mine at >Carnegie Mellon University, who received it somehow, through some chain of >people, from Israel. I have forwarded it to every single email address I >have, >and some more that I don't have, impossible as it seems. I've forwarded it >to >you because I think that this is an extraordinarily interesting bit of >history, >a record of an event which may very well someday be looked back upon as being >among the most important in the shaping of the modern Middle East. I find it >rather amazing that such things as this are possible, i.e. this kind of >transfer of information literally around the world. Among you who are >reading >this are about 60 people in Portland, 30 people in Texas, and people all over >the U.S., Canada, Ireland, and Germany - just to give you an idea of the >truly >international capabilities of email. >Well, you might forward this message on to others who you think will >appreciate >it. It is good literature and good history. I certainly enjoyed it. > >Easily Amused, >Ryan Miller >rmiller@reed.edu >(503)788-6931 > >- --- Forwarded Message from Ashley J Wilson --- > >>Date: Mon, 6 Nov 1995 11:17:16 -0500 (EST) >>From: Ashley J Wilson >>Subject: Fwd: Israel (fwd) > >Sometimes we have to pull ourselves out of our little microcosmic worlds >and take notice of the pain and terror which ensues outside of our havens >of brick and ivy. As my friend who forwarded this to me said, this is >not the humorous banter which we usually forward...this is serious...it >deserves both our attention and our reverence. I share it with you and >hope that you will share it with others... >Lauren > >^^^^^yeah folks, she's got a point. i believe this to be an impotant >piece of writing... pass it on. read this >carefully -- it really touched me. pass it on. -- ashley > > >- -----------Forwarded Mail Begins Here----------------------- > >This letter has nothing to do with magic or elves. It is only a story I want >to tell to all of you brothers and sisters of my soul. A story of great >grief I have to share, and I invite you to be the ones who share it with me. > >To makes things clear, I first want to say that the "il" in my address >stands for Israel. And just to be sure you know (though I know it was >broadcasted all over the world earlier this evening), our prime minister, >Rabin, was murdered this evening by a right-winged extremist after speaking >in a huge demonstration in support of the peace process. I want to tell this >story. > >In the afternoon we went to the demonstration. It was a happy event - not >against anything, not to protest or fight, but to show support in our >government for it's efforts in building a new era of peace in this wars-torn >land. I don't know how many of you have ever been in such an event - the >sense of power is awesome. And it was huge. I estimate there were about 150- >200 thousand people there. We were filled with a wonderful feeling of joy, >of hope, seeing so many around us, great music, balloons, dancing, meeting >friends. A festival. And when the prime minister entered the stage, he was >greeted by a thunder off clapping hands. Not only because it was such a >joyous event, but also to show this man, a man that was cursed and spit upon >and called "traitor" by his adversaries time and again during the last few >months, a man that is blamed by them for every terrorist attack (because he >dares negotiate with the enemy), to show him people do believe in him and >admire what he does. > >I went home after he spoke, trying to avoid traffic, thinking the action was >nearly over. Little did I know. About an hour after I got home, we heard the >news - Rabin was shot. The first thing that rushed through my mind (after >"shit!"), was "Kennedy". I am sorry to borrow on your myth, Americans, but >this is all I could think of. And then, "oh gods, please let it end >differently". But it didn't. I decided to send a letter to the Elven Nation, >asking you to use any healing powers you might have to help him, but it was >too late. He died on the operations table and hour later. >After a few phone calls, we went back to the same square where the >demonstration was held. People started to gather - not as many as before, >but they kept coming. Wearing black, bearing candles and torches, engulfed >in smoke. And we just sat there, watching the white candles dripping tears, >the red torches dripping blood. Crying, hugging, singing softly (you >wouldn't believe how many songs of war and peace we have), shocked to our >bones. It was warm at the demonstration, but at two in the morning, it was >getting so cold. > >Every death is a tragedy. And Rabin was not an easy man. A hard man, and a >solider to the bone, which made him unpopular amongst both sides, pro and >con of the peace process. He was called "traitor" by both sides (which only >proves how well-fit he was for the job). But he lead this peace process >stubbornly, with full fait at heart. Being a soldier, he was hated by many >of the Arabs, but he also knew how much we need peace. He has brought us to >a point some of us see as a miracle in being (my father, who fought in many >wars with our neighbors, is going as a tourist to Jordan. You have no idea >how deeply he is moved by that). And for that I loved and admired him, even >though I didn't like many of the things he did in his life. The peace >process will go on. It can not be stopped, not by one murder. But this act >will definitely intensify the atmosphere of hatred that divides my country. >It is an act of violence that will lead to others. It scares the hell out of >me. >This is all. Tomorrow will probably be a day of national mourning. Now all I >have to do is takes a shower (after sitting in the middle of all that smoke) >and go to bed. But I keep seeing one picture. In the middle of the square, >someone used soul-candles (candles put on graves, usually) to form one huge >word. "Why?". > >Yael > > > **************************************************************************** >> "And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the >> winds long to play with your hair." >> --Kahlil Gibran >> >**************************************************************************** > > > > > > > > >- ------- End of Forwarded Message > > >------- End of Forwarded Message > > >------- End of Forwarded Message > > >------- End of Forwarded Message > >--- >Kristin A Etbauer >harolda@iastate.edu > > You will learn > Truth is given by God > To us all in our time > In our turn > > -Les Miserables From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Mon Nov 27 13:47:57 1995 Date: Mon, 27 Nov 1995 22:35:11 +0100 To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU From: Czerlinski@mpipf-muenchen.mpg.de (Jean Czerlinski) Subject: the role of sociology (...Vaughn et al.) Let me try again, being as clear as possible. A. First I'll review my critique of the argument about the cause of sociology's marginalization. B. Then I'll explain how the instrumental vs. value question applies to the role of sociology. C. Finally I'll sketch a bit what I think should be valued in sociology (new stuff). I hate to have such hyper-logical, stale organization. But I think it makes a long message more readable (people can skip to the part that interests them) and (hopefully) more clear (considering the misunderstandings of my earlier message). --- A. My critique of the cause of marginalization Here is the argument I am critiquing: "Sociology has become marginalized because of its excessive use of natural-science-inspired methods." I don't know if this argument was in the book, and perhaps it was not in the review, but I think it is a view held by at least some people. At any rate, I think it's useful to critique. 1. I believe most people making this argument are really critiquing the quantitative methods taught in the typical "Statistics for Sociologists" class, e.g. correlations, hypothesis- testing, significance assessment. However, most natural scientists do not use these methods much, even when they do quantitative work (and much work is also qualitative). How would I know? Well, first of all I did an undergraduate degre in physics. Second, I've read a (very) little bit about the history of methodology: see, for example, Gerd Gigerenzer's "The Superego, the Ego, and the Id in Statistical Reasoning" in *A Handbook for Data Analysis in the Behavioral Sciences: Methodological Issues*. (Gigerenzer talks mostly about psychology, but much of it applies to sociology.) 2. As I stated before, sociology has used the above-mentioned methods (the Fisherian & Neyman-Pearson mish- mash) considerably less than other fields such as economics and (areas of) psychology. 3. Not only that, but those fields that embraced those methods have been considerably more successful (i.e. gained more prestige and academic legitimacy) than sociology and other less "hard" fields. Thus, if anything, we might want to argue the inverse (of the reformulation): "Sociology has become marginalized because of its failure to sufficiently use the natural- science-inspired methods" such as a Fisher- Neyman-Pearson inspired mish-mash (as in psychology) or optimization through differential equations (as in micro-economics). ---- B. So what is the question? Value-rationality vs. Instrumental Rationality I'm not sure if the above claim is correct. If it is correct, I still wouldn't care to see sociology using those nat-sci-inspired methods. The correctness of the claim is a "technical" question that could be assessed with, for example, the nat-sci-inspired methods themselves (hypothesis testing!). Making sociology more nat-sci-inspired, like psych and econ, is also a "technical" question. We have a set goal and need to determine which way the goal can be most fully and most efficiently reached; we could perhaps determine this with some of the tools of micro-economics. Whether we WANT to reach that goal-- or what other goals we want to reach instead-- is a VALUE question. There is no hypothesis to test and no efficiency to measure. Remember that, similarly, the "preferences" used by economists in their optimizations are exogenous. Economists don't explain where the preferences come from; they just show how to most efficiently satisfy them, given what they are. This distinction between value questions and instrumental questions is not mine; it comes from Weber. See his methodology text or the article "Science as a Vocation." It is implicit in almost all his work that science (including sociology) can only address the instrumental questions; humans must address value questions (and scientists should not pretend to have some special insight into values, insight that the rest of us don't have). --- C. So what should sociology value? Here you get my totally biased opinion, since, after all, that's what opinions are. If I had wanted to do more natural science methods, I would have stayed in physics. If I had wanted to apply psuedo-nat-sci methods to social life, I could have done economics, or maybe social psychology. I think we are lucky to have another field, sociology, which offers something else, and I agree with the suggestions in the book / review that sociology should focus on these "other" methods. (BUT I would also include some of the neglected natural sciences methods.) But, unlike the book / review, I do not advocate them as a magic pill to boost sociology's success (which it might or might not do). I advocate them 1) so that we can have a variety of methodologies available (don't put all your eggs in one basket) and 2) so that we have some hope of finally understanding social life and improving it (which I think should be done). As (2) implies, I do not think the pseudo-nat-sci methods currently in use have done much in the way of understanding social life or solving social problems. Unemployment and inflation still happen as they will (witness Europe's current unemployment problems) and people still get unhappy and depressed. [Oops, wait, I forgot about Prozac... ;-) .] In fact, it's amazing that econ & psych have been as prestigious and legitimated as they have been DESPITE their failures. The stagflation of the 70's completely destroyed the venerated Phillips Curve of (macro) economics. And the succession of popular psych fads have each "disproved" all the previous ones. "It's bad to discipline your kids... No, now it's good to discipline them... No, now it's bad....." (I do not mean that popular psych and academic psych are the same-- I confess to stretching the point a bit.) The success of econ & psych despite their failure to really solve anything suggests that >> solving things has little to do with prestige and legitimacy <<. Instead I would think that cozying up with the Establishment is the Yellow Brick Road to success. Provide research "They" want to hear and you'll get your grants and status. At times the book / review seem to agree with this assessment; at other times they seem to say sociology has failed because it was too much of a bedfellow with the establishment. My guess (and this is an instrumental question that should yield to empirical research) is that sociology was not enough of a bedfellow to garner worldly success. Not too surprisingly, I think that sociology should be as independent of the establishment as possible... without, of course, entirely alienating it, because it needs the establishment's support. There is a delicate balance between being coopted on the one hand and alienating your support on the other. Perhaps it is an impossible balance, and no such thing as a critical "discipline" can exist. Similar problems are faced by social movements, of course. Finally, I agree with the book / review that a) indeed there ARE people who are oppressed (this is only implicit in the book / review) and b) sociology should focus on research that could be used to end such oppression. However, the research should be open-minded: if the data suggests that the current system is the least oppressive one feasible, then that must be admitted (which Weber also said). (Once I wrote a more explicit short essay that sociology should be concerned with _human_ _social_ _welfare_, with each of these terms analyzed, but I don't care to repeat it all here, so let me leave it at that.) Best wishes, Jean Czerlinski From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 28 10:56:48 1995 From: michael carley Subject: sociology position (fwd) To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Date: Tue, 28 Nov 1995 10:44:08 -0800 (PST) Forwarded message: >From owner-psn@csf.colorado.edu Tue Nov 28 09:28:21 1995 Date: Tue, 28 Nov 1995 11:33:19 -0400 (EDT) From: david jaffee To: PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK Subject: sociology position Please feel free to post this ad on any other listserve or newsgroup. Also, share with anyone who might be interested. David Jaffee Chair Dept of Sociology SUNY-New Paltz jaffeed @ npvm.newpaltz.edu *************************************************************** *************************************************************** STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK AT NEW PALTZ. The Department of Sociology invites applications for a tenure-track position at the Assistant Professor level beginning August 1996. Final approval for the appointment is subject to budgetary approval. The primary responsibility will be to develop and teach undergraduate courses in statistics and computer-assisted data analysis. Secondary areas of interest are open but preference will be given to candidates with research and teaching experience in such areas as criminology, race and ethnicity, family, social psychology, aging/life cycle, and research methods. A Ph.D. in sociology, with experience teaching statistics, is required. To apply please send cover letter indicating teaching philosophy and research interests,vitae, evidence of teaching ability, and the names of three references (do not send reference letters at this time) to: Sociology Search Chair, HAB 501, SUNY New Paltz, 75 S. Manheim Blvd., New Paltz, NY. 12561. Applications should be received by January 15, 1996. SUNY New Paltz is an AA/EOE/ADA employer. Women and minorities are encouraged to apply. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 28 13:40:57 1995 Date: Tue, 28 Nov 1995 15:39:00 -0600 (CST) From: Tricia Robinson Subject: ASA contact To: Sociology Graduate Students I was wondering whether someone out there could send me the contact information for the ASA. I am trying to order a copy of the ASA's Guide to Graduate Programs, but don't have a copy to look at in order to get the address of person to contact. Thanks in advance, SKEE From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 28 20:30:28 1995 Date: Tue, 28 Nov 95 19:29:35 EST From: Alan Davidson Subject: e-mail for asa To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU The e-mail address for ASA is asa@mci_mail.com. This may be incorrect, but from memory this is it. From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Tue Nov 28 20:41:29 1995 From: JWL3697@UTARLG.UTA.EDU id <01HY6XLSI5C09ZQOOY@UTARLG.UTA.EDU>; Tue, 28 Nov 1995 22:17:18 -0500 (CDT) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 1995 22:11:37 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Re: text book for "Deviance" To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Hello, socgradders: I just found out that I will be teaching "Deviance" in the Spring, and I am wondering any veterans out there that can recommend me your favorite text book or reader. I am thinking of "Deviant Behavior" by Erich Goode. Any opinion? This is my first time teaching this course and I need all the help I can get about ideas, projects, etc. I would like to assign one easy reader as text also. Appreciate any input. Thanks in advance...Julia :) _________________________________________________________________ Julia Lam Graduate School TEL: 817-273-3750 Department of Sociology FAX: 817-273-3759 University of Texas at Arlington E-MAIL: JWL3697@UTARLG.UTA.EDU P.O. Box 19599 Arlington, TX 76019 From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 29 04:13:36 1995 Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 07:05:44 -0500 (EST) From: Jim Cassell To: Tricia Robinson Subject: Re: ASA contact On Tue, 28 Nov 1995, Tricia Robinson wrote: > I was wondering whether someone out there could send me the contact > information for the ASA. I am trying to order a copy of the ASA's Guide > to Graduate Programs, but don't have a copy to look at in order to get the > address of person to contact. > > Thanks in advance, > > SKEE > Try sending a note to ASA_Publications@MCIMAIL.COM asking them how you can order a copy. Best, Jim ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Jim Cassell jwcassell@UNC.EDU Institute for Research in Social Science Phone: 919-962-0782 University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill Fax: 919-962-4777 Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3355 USA From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 29 10:19:59 1995 Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 10:17:48 -0800 (PST) From: Eileeneke To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: unsubscribe i seem to have forgotten how to unsubscribe from the group....can someone help me or jsut do it ofr me? i would appreciate it (i find myself not reading any of the mail i get so...) ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Eileen Gieskes | gieskese@pe.net | Walk into the wind, if it is the right gieskese@watmail.ucr.edu | way to go. :) | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 29 12:57:15 1995 Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 12:54:02 -0800 To: socgrad@ucdavis.edu, socgrad@UCSD.EDU, brookj@ceb.ucop.edu, flatta@ceb.ucop.edu, sbrook@brook.com, ebrook@state.ma.us, shawn@wavefun.com, elligur@aol.com, mjkinnuc@umich.edu, homerskid@aol.com From: CyberBrook Subject: MESSAGE FROM MICHAEL MOORE Hi everyone. Please keep the pressure on and keep writing. It's easy, fun, and effective! (and pass this message if you don't mind) Write Fox at: Foxnet@delphi.com in support of TV Nation (even if you think you have little or nothing to say---one line is sufficient) >Approved-By: TVNatFans@AOL.COM >Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 12:54:05 -0500 >Reply-To: "Fans of Fox' TV NATION Television Series" > >Sender: "Fans of Fox' TV NATION Television Series" > >From: Veronica Moore >Subject: MESSAGE FROM MICHAEL MOORE > > >Hey, everyone out there -- > >The response FOX has been receiving in the last few days regarding TV NATION >is overwhelming. Hundreds of letters, thousands of e-mail messages. I think >it's unlike anything they've ever seen! Apparently, their main switchboard >number got out last night and now their phone lines have been jammed. They've >just called me and asked that people please not use the telephone number >because, as of now, they are unable to conduct normal business at the >network. Many thanks to all who called, but let's let them get on with >tonight's episode of 90210! > >Feel free to e-mail them today at: > >Foxnet@delphi.com > > They are definitely reading these messages. I can't say if we'll succeed, >but if we don't, there is strong interest in this type of show at other >networks. Thanks again for all of your support -- I wish you could read these >incredible letters everyone is sending! They are many loyal citizens out >there in TV Nation!!! > >I'll send you another update tomorrow. > >Yours, > >Michael Moore > > CyberBrook@thecity.sfsu.edu ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "I think I believe everything I'm saying" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ From list-relay@UCSD.EDU Wed Nov 29 13:23:56 1995 Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 13:20:35 -0800 (PST) From: Laura Miller To: socgrad@UCSD.EDU Subject: how to unsubscribe Too much email in your life? If you want to unsubscribe from Socgrad, send a message to: listserv@ucsd.edu and in the body of your message, type: unsub socgrad Remember to send the message to listserv, NOT to Socgrad itself. Any problems or questions can be directed to lmiller@ucsd.edu