Conversations surrounding decolonial humanistic sociology have been guided by a moral imperative--to advance a radical critique of society for the purpose of reducing inequality. Storytelling has been used by marginalized groups to advance decolonization. Exactly how can instructors use the power of storytelling and maps to facilitate the study of…

Rural and first-generation students face unique challenges to accessing and persisting through college. While there is increasing literature on how to better serve first-generation college students, rural first-generation students have received far less attention. By associating student experiences with key concepts such as social groups, social…

The Alien Worlds project teaches ethnographic skills using the societies of dystopian, postapocalyptic, and science fiction texts as imagined field sites and targets for analysis. These exercises and assignments, which illustrate principles of qualitative fieldwork, were developed when COVID-19 precautions made it impossible to assign tasks that…

To increase students' engagement and achievement in introductory sociology courses, teachers should make them relevant to students' lives. Students' relevance perceptions may vary within the classroom, depending on the degree of fit between their sociocultural position and the teaching methods. To test this prospect, an experiment among 1,325…

Cornerstone courses bridge introductory content from lower-level survey courses with the more advanced theoretical and methodological content of upper-level, major-only courses. Cornerstones are implemented with the goal of better preparing students for advanced coursework and/or assisting them with understanding their major and its associated…

This article offers an example of a global approach to teaching the sociology of religion, a course that typically focuses on American religious phenomena. It builds on three interventions in the movement for a global sociology: connecting the local and global, moving beyond methodological nationalism, and developing an ethical orientation toward…

Developing a global mind-set in college students is a goal of many colleges and universities. Most often this goal is met by encouraging students to study abroad. This article explains how a service learning student engagement program at home achieves this goal by pairing Introduction to Sociology students with young immigrant children in a weekly…

Is there a distinct disciplinary core (or foundation of agreed on knowledge) in sociology? Should we define a core in our broad field to build consensus? If so, what should it look like? We address these questions by presenting three viewpoints that lean for and against identifying a core for department curricula, students, and the public face of…

Research has consistently shown the high value of mentorship for graduate students in various areas--program satisfaction, professional self-image, confidence, productivity, and so on. However, specific templates of how to best mentor graduate students, especially in the vital area of teaching, are lacking. This article outlines the mentoring…

Diverse college campuses have been conclusively associated with a variety of positive outcomes for all students. However, we still know very little empirically about how student diversity directly impacts the core task of the university: classroom learning. While students vary based on race along a broad spectrum of experiences and backgrounds, we…

Sociology instructors strive not only to teach their students the essential aspects of sociology but also to help students develop their critical thinking abilities. One way to help students become better critical thinkers is to assign projects that encourage students to critically assess their world by relating the course content to their…

In this article, the authors argue that one approach to teaching Introduction to Social Problems is to structure the course content around taken-for-granted beliefs that many students have about the social world. In doing so, the authors discuss the social construction of social problems, how sociology differs from common sense, and the importance…

This article discusses pedagogical exercises developed to help students appreciate the power of sociological perspectives as they seek to better understand their own lives and the world around them. The assignments are focused on fulfilling the particular course learning goal that highlights student mastery of the application of diverse…

Much of the sociological curriculum often represents society as tragedy. This article explores the incorporation of a society as comedy component in introductory courses at two institutions using the sociological insight and social critique of comedians. A general discussion of parallels between the comedic eye and the sociological imagination is…

In 2006 and 2007, two workshops on teaching work-family courses were held at the annual meetings of the American Sociological Association. This article examines the current challenges and strategies of teaching work-family, as identified by workshop participants, and the resources that are available through the Sloan Work and Family Research…