The COVID-19 pandemic forced all face-to-face college courses to transition to remote instruction. This article explores instructional techniques used in the transition, student perceptions of effectiveness/enjoyment/accessibility of those techniques, barriers that students faced due to the transition, and race/class/gender inequality in…

A modified version of Monopoly has long been used as a simulation exercise to teach inequality. Versions of Modified Monopoly (MM) have touched on minority status relative to inequality but without an exploration of the complex interaction between minority status and class. This article introduces Gender Stratified Monopoly (GSM), an adaptation…

Graduate students occupy social positions within institutions of higher education that are rife with role strain and, relative to broader power relations within these institutions, are marginalized. In this study, we inquire how the social positions and concomitant roles of graduate students shape their mental health experiences, investigating…

In this article, the authors describe a class activity that uses a combination of strategies to overcome obstacles students face when learning about the reproduction of inequality in everyday life. Based on Schwalbe et al.'s (2000) piece on "generic social processes," and following the idea of "making the strange familiar and the familiar…

Erving Goffman is one of the most important sociologists of the 20th century. Popular textbooks in sociology (e.g., Giddens, Duneier, and Appelbaum 2005; Macionis 2007) and social psychology (e.g., Aronson, Wilson, and Akert 2006; Cahill 2007; DeLamater and Myers 2007) devote large sections and entire chapters to Goffman's ideas concerning the…

In this article I explore the ethical terrain of experiential learning activities drawing on my experiences leading college students on field trips into criminal justice settings. Though there are numerous educational benefits to adopting experiential learning activities, the rewards must be evaluated in light of the potential harms to nonstudent…

Americans are said to have a love affair with cars. Recent magazine articles have addressed automobiles as objects of status and desire and how particular cars have become American icons. The popularity of "Car Talk" on National Public Radio and television shows like "Monster Garage" and "Overhaulin'" also suggest…

Presents a classroom exercise which asks undergraduates to assign a social class ranking to nine family names which stereotypically represent ethnic groups. Students are also asked to rate the degree to which they believe social class can be inferred from ethnic family names. Presents results from several years of data collection in different…

Suggest that teaching introductory level students about social class may be done using a technique involving family names and nicknames. Presents findings from a study of students asked to rank family names, male nicknames, and female nicknames from highest to lowest social class. Results suggest that students have social class biases. (DB)

At a small private liberal arts school such as Clark University, students are familiar with people from upper middle class backgrounds. Either they themselves are from upper middle class families or, if they are from working class or lower middle class backgrounds, they are acquainted with more affluent peers. Clark students have a clear image of…

Community service learning offers students the opportunity to cross socially constructed and epistemological borders of power and privilege, allowing them to come into contact with groups of people who are different from themselves and to learn in different ways. Peer facilitators, undergraduate student instructional leaders who guide others…

Proposes a conceptualization of the professionalization that is inherent in graduate school training as resocialization rather than developmental socialization. Discusses the possible negative effects of this process on students' self-concept. Responses by Jane Allyn Piliavin, Norman Goodman, and Joan Aldous follow. (LS)

Asserts that song lyrics illustrate important sociological concepts. Reports on a study using song-lyric packets with 23 students in an introductory college sociological course. Finds that students were very supportive of the strategy and includes an appendix illustrating the approach by presenting one song-lyric packet. (CFR)

Asserts that culture was and is a major focus of much sociological research and writing and that music is often a subject of such research. Proposes using music as a teaching tool in a course about issues of race, class, and gender. Describes the use of musical lyrics in the course, and reports on student attitudes toward the course. (CFR)

Uses the concept of oppression to teach about gender, race, and class in an introductory social psychology course. Discusses the intersections between them and suggests how issues about oppression can be integrated into the classroom. Directs course toward White, middle-class students who lack a comprehension of societal oppression. (Author/NL)