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Fields of Research
The program reflects the special expertise of the staff faculty and utilizes the unique facilities offered by the Kingston community. The program reflects the special expertise in the following areas:
- Critical Sociological Theory, including Marxism and Critical Race Theory
- Deviance and Criminology (especially among young offenders)
- Criminal Justice and Policing
- Feminist Sociology
- Social Movements
- Sociology of Cities and Urban Sociology
- Sociology of Law
- Sociology of Sport
- Cybersecurity and Surveillance
- Science and Technology Studies
- Digital Media and Culture
- Visual Culture
Research Methods
The Graduate program is divided into three fields:
- Power, Inequalities and Social Justice;
- Criminology and Law; Media
- Information and Surveillance.
Financial Assistance
All students will be considered for funding from a combination of Queen's Graduate Awards (QGA), teaching assistantships (TA-ships) in the department’s undergraduate courses, contributions from research grants and contracts, internal scholarships and awards, and external scholarships and awards.
Award stipends are typically paid in three equal instalments throughout the year with teaching assistant and research assistant salaries paid monthly.
Departmental Facilities
The Department of Sociology is housed on two floors of Mackintosh-Corry Hall. Our facilities include graduate student office spaces, conference room, and a lounge.
Faculty
Head
Hand. M.
Coordinator of Graduate Studies
Myers, N.M.
Professor
Baron, S.B.3, Burfoot, A. , Hand, M., Kay, F.2
Associate Professor
Abrams, T.J.1, Möllers, N.T., Myers, N.M. , Saulnier, A.1, Sytsma, V.A.
Assistant Professor
Golriz, G., Husain, F., Tuzcu, P.
Professor Emeritus
Beamish, R.B., Hamilton, R., Lele, J.K., Lyon, D., Pearce, F., Sacco, V., Silverman, R., Snider, L.
Cross-Appointed
Adams, M.L., Goebel, A., Jefremovas, V., King, S., Sismondo, S., Soederberg, S., Taylor, M.E.
- 1
On Leave July 2024-June 2025
- 2
On Leave July 2024 - December 2024
- 3
On Leave January 2025 – June 2025
Programs of Study
Applications for the M.A. and Ph.D. programs should be made in accordance with the general regulations of the School of Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs.
Courses
All courses are 3.0 credit units, except SOCY 898, 899 and 999, which are 6.0 credit units.
SOCY 881,891,892,893,894,895,896,897 Directed Special Studies
Courses arranged especially for those whose interests are not met by other courses.
SOCY 898 Master's Essay Research
Required in Program ii.
SOCY 899 Master's Thesis Research
Required in Program i.
SOCY 900 Professional and Pedagogical Skills
This course is designed to acquaint doctoral students with some aspects of the teaching and research responsibilities of a sociologist and faculty member. It has both theoretical and practical components, and will cover course planning, presentation and preparation as well as planning, organizing, funding and publishing research. Grading is on a Pass/Fail basis. Course is compulsory for doctoral students and is offered every other year. Three term hours. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 901 Sociological Theory
Core Course: All M.A. and Ph.D. students will normally be required to take this course. Ph.D. students who have already taken the course shall choose an appropriate replacement in consultation with the Graduate Coordinator. This course critically examines the main tenets of contemporary sociological theory. Key sociological concepts are studied in a variety of contexts spanning from the micro to macro levels of social action. Although heavily reliant on the main historical developments in sociology (Marx, Weber and Durkheim), emphasis is place on post Second World War II developments in sociological theory. Three term hours. Fall.
SOCY 902 Sociological Methodology
All M.A. and Ph.D. students will normally be required to take this course. Ph.D. students who have already taken the course shall choose an appropriate replacement in consultation with the Graduate Coordinator. This course deals with the main contemporary methodological approaches to the explanation of social phenomena. It will critically examine the strengths and weaknesses of the major strategies of social research (qualitative, quantitative and historical). The selection of specific problems areas may vary from year to year. Three term hours. Fall.
SOCY 903 Surveillance Studies
Surveillance is sociologically significant as a central means of governance. Surveillance is both a cultural and technical invention, especially dependent today on digital infrastructures and neo liberal policy. Personal data are gathered by many means and processed to create categories by which risks and opportunities are assessed, and through which people’s life chances and choices are influenced and managed. Three term hours. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 911 Contemporary Sociological Theory
This course enables an advanced engagement with contemporary sociology. It will focus on recent developments in sociological theorizing, directing these toward specific problem areas. The precise topics will vary from year to year in response to instructor expertise, student interest and need. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 916 Qualitative Methodology
Three term hours. Winter.
SOCY 917 Quantitative Methodology
This course serves as an introduction to a broad range of quantitative methods typically employed in the Social Sciences in a manner suitable for students at the graduate level. Students will learn to prepare data for analysis, carry out analyses, and interpret research results using a variety of statistical techniques. Students will be acquainted with the assumptions that are made while employing various methods, as well as the problems that arise with the use of such methods. Three term hours. Winter.
SOCY 918 Current Developments in Socio Legal Theory
This course will focus upon a variety of macro, middle and micro level theories in the socio legal area. The emphasis will be on historical and comparative critical analysis and evaluation using appropriate empirical evidence and studies. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 919 Current Developments in Socio Legal Methodology
SOCY 920 Advanced Issues in Socio Legal Studies
This course will examine issues and controversies in the socio legal area. Topics will vary, but may include some or all of the following: corporate crime, victimology, crime and the elderly, feminist criminology. Three term hours. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 921 The Social Construction of Science and Technology
The evolution of science and technology is neither linear nor cumulative. By drawing upon theories of sociology of science and technology, the course argues through the use of case studies that, like other forms of knowledge, scientific and technical knowledge is socially constructed and is embedded in general social relations. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 925 Feminist Sociological Theory
This course deals with feminist critiques of sociological theories, how such theories have been revised and appropriated by feminists and the various perspectives that feminists have developed for interrogating and transforming social hierarchies informed inter alia by gender, class, racism, and heterosexism. Three term hours. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 931 New Media Cultures
We live in cultures which are increasingly organized around or saturated with digital information or new media. In this advanced course we will engage with some of the major commentators on relationships between new media and culture, working through a series of key ideas and problems focused around intersections of theory and practice. Instead of maintaining a domination/resistance conception of cultural industries and practices, we will explore complex dynamics of innovation and consumption across a variety of arenas. There will be scope to engage with notions of mobility, speed, reflection, reflexivity, information, virtuality, consumption, in the context of different spaces or objects (city; home; archive; gallery; brand, memory, sounds, visions, events, body, etc.) and practices (photography, art, writing, listening, tourism, learning, etc.) which exemplify contemporary debates about new media in cultural sociology. Three term hours. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 932 Transnational Theories of Race, Gender and Sexuality
This course is designed for graduate students interested in questions surrounding the construction and perpetuation of categories of social difference. It explores current theories of concerning social relations of race, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, class and other dimensions of difference, and the ways in which these social relations are intersecting and interlocking. The aim of this course is to bring an intersectional analysis to contemporary social concerns, but also to ground that analysis historically. These questions are addressed through a range of theoretical approaches, including critical race theory, transnational feminism, anti racist feminism, anti racist theory, postcolonial theory and queer theory. Not offered 2024-25.
SOCY 934 Special Topics
This course explores a range of special topics in the area of surveillance, critical big data studies, and/or digital media. Topics vary from year to year. See the Departmental Graduate Studies website for details.
SOCY 935 Special Topics
This course explores a range of special topics in the area of criminology or sociolegal studies. Topics vary from year to year. See the Departmental Graduate Studies website for details.
SOCY 936 Special Topics
This course explores a range of special topics in the area of power, inequality and social justice. Topics vary from year to year. See the Departmental Graduate Studies website for details.
SOCY 937 Master’s Placement
Seventy-two hours of experiential learning in a community-based setting. Required in Program ii, Module B.
PREREQUISITE: SOCY 901, SOCY 902.
SOCY 938 Master’s Placement Report
Report situating student’s experiential learning experience within the related academic literature or scholarly debates and prevailing theoretical framework(s). Required in Program ii, Module B.
PREREQUISITE: SOCY 901, SOCY 902, SOCY 937.
SOCY 999 Ph.D. Thesis Research