Program Overview

Welcome to Sociology!  Thinking about Sociology as a major?  Excellent choice.  Sociology offers students new ways of thinking about the relationships between individuals and society.

The Sociology program at MPC offers students a broad and in depth introduction to the practice of sociology, and prepares students for successful transfer and further study.

Upon completion of the AA-T program, students will have demonstrated ability to:

  • Critically analyze and explain the relationship between individual behavior and society.
  • Describe how social structures of class, culture, gender, race, and sexuality affect life chances.
  • Explain the process of socialization in terms of human development in different social contexts and societies.
  • Develop appropriate research questions, design well-developed research projects at the undergraduate level, and effectively apply empirical methods to the study of society, generating well-evidenced, rational explanations for social outcomes, phenomena, practices, and processes. 

Sociology is the scientific study of human society, social interaction, and individual behavior.  Empirical and systematic, the sociological perspective includes a powerful toolkit of theory and method to critically analyze and understand human action in social context, at the local, regional, national, and global levels. 

The sociological imagination reveals the relationship between individual behavior and social structures, emphasizing how individuals build and are built by society.  Sociology looks closely at face-to-face social interactions in public and private, and examines the processes and effects of large-scale social institutions such as the criminal justice system, economy, education, mass media and popular culture, politics, and religion. 

Sociological research welcomes students into deeper understanding of taken for granted categories and structures, from intimate relationships, the family, and everyday life, to the worlds of global sports, work, and war, from social divisions of race, class, and gender, to arts, entertainment, cultural practices, shared values, and traditions.  Ultimately, sociology reveals how the structure of society influences individual behavior, and how individuals can intervene to change the structure of society. 

The MPC Sociology program offers a rich and dynamic core curriculum that combines general and topical courses.  All classes build on existing campus diversity by emphasizing multicultural approaches to teaching and learning.  Sociology instructors are well known for exciting, interesting curriculum and materials, and classroom pedagogies that create learning community.  By engaging students' own experiences and interests, sociology bridges school and community, offering students opportunities to apply new knowledge through participatory action research and service learning projects.

  

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