Objectives: After completing weeks 2-5 of this course, you will be able to:

• Understand, explain and give examples of contemporary applications of the social concepts (constructs) developed by the classic or seminal theorists
• Analyze how the ideas of the early theorists build on each other, differ, and evolve to create the major theoretical perspectives that we use to understand social phenomena today
• Apply the ideas of the early theorists to identify, explain and respond to the needs, issues and problems that face communities today

Allan

1st Ed. pp. 9-40; 2nd Ed., pp. 39-70

Blackshaw

Introduction & User's Guide; Setting the Record Straight (pp. 1-18) This will be available on e-reserve for those who do not get the textbook in time for this class. This is the ONLY reading from Blackshaw that will be available on e-reserve.

Other Required Readings

Edin, K. & Kefalas, M. (2010) Unmarried with Children. Pp. 536-542 in A.S. Skolnick & J.H. Skolnick, Family in Transition 16th Ed., Allyn & Bacon. e-reserve under Skolnick Read this quickly to get an understanding of the basic ideas -- no need to read for details. We will use this material in class.

Gavrilovich, P. & McGraw, B. (2000). People in P. Gavrilovich & B. McGraw (eds.), The Detroit Almanac. Detroit Free Press, Detroit, MI, pp. 88-119. e-reserve Do not read in detail. Select entries that are of interest to you and be prepared to share what you learned about the people of Detroit in class.

Other Class Preparation

You will be assigned one of the following two articles to read. Read the article for content, not for specific details. You need to be able to state the author's basic explanation as presented in the article in your own words.

Newman, K. (2009). Post-industrial widgets: Capital flows and the production of the urban. International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 33(2), 314-331. e-reserve

Milwan, K.G. & Provan, K.G. (2000) Governing the hollow state. Journal of Public Administration Research & Theory 10(2), 359-379. e-rserve

Recommended Readings

Hurst, C.E. (2000). Living Theory. The Application of Classical Social Theory to Contemporary Life. Allyn & Bacon, Boston, MA. Pages 1-20. e-reserve This is a good reading if you are "new" to social theory. It's quick to read and it is a good overview.

Additional Materials

Bairner, A. (2007). Back to basics: Class, social theory and sport. Sociology of Sport Journal 24 (1), 20-36.

Buechler, S.M. (1995). New social movement theories. The Sociological Quarterly 36(3), 441-464.

Buttel, F.H. (2000). Ecological modernization as social theory. Geoforum 31 (1), 57-65.

Clark, B. & York, R. (2005a). Carbon metabolism: Global capitalism, climate change, and the biospheric rift. Theory & Society 34 (4), 391-428.

Clark, B. & York, R. (2005b). Dialectical materialsm and nature: An alternative to economism and deep ecology. Organization & Environment 18 (3), 318-337.

Dahlberg, L. (2007). Rethinking the fragmentation of the cyberpublic: From consensus to contestation. New Media & Society 9 (5), 827.

Eder, K. (1985). The "new social movements": Moral crusades, political pressure groups, or social movements. Social Research 52(4), 869-890.

Gilbert, J. (2008). Against the commodification of everything. Cultural Studies 22 (5), 551-566.

Gordon, T. (2007). Towards an anti-racist Marxist state theory: A Canadian case study. Capital & Class, 91, 1-29.

Johnson, K.M. (2008). "The glorified municipality": State formation and the urban process in North America, Political Geography 27 (4), 400-417.

Kristjanson-Gural, D. (2008). Postmodern contributions to Marxian economics: Theoretical innovations and their implications for class politics. Historical Materialism 16 (2), 85-115.

Landau, I. (2008). Law and civil society in Cambodia and Vietnam: A Gramscian perspective. Journal of Contemporary Asia 38 (2), 244-258.

MacKendrick, N.A. & Davidson, D.J. (2007). State capital relations in voluntary environmental improvement. Current Sociology 55 (5), 674-695.

Mancus, P. (2007). Nitrogen fertilizer dependency and its contradictions: A theoretical exploration of social-ecological metabolism. Rural Sociology 72 (2), 269-288.

Skaburskis, A. & Moos, M. (2008). The redistribution of residential property values in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver: Examining neoclassical and Marxist view on changing investment patterns. Environment & Planning A, 40 (4), 905-927.

Valkanova, Y. (2009). The passion for educating the "New Man": Debates about preschooling in Soviet Russia, 1917-1925. History of Education Quarterly, 49 (2), 211-221.

Veneziani, R. (2008). A future for (analytical) Marxism? Philosophy of the Social Sciences 38 (3), 388-399.

Walby, S. (2009) Complexity theory, systems theory and multiple intersecting social inequalities. Philosophy of the Social Sciences 37(4), 449-470.

Wieviorka, M. (2005). After new social movements. Social Movement Studies 4(1), 1-19.

York, R. & Mancus, P. (2009). Critical human ecology: Historical materialism and natural laws. Sociological Theory 27 (2), 122-149.