Professor Tim Newburn OLD 2.27

This course is compulsory on the BSc in Social Policy and Sociology. This course is available on the BSc in Social Policy, BSc in Social Policy and Criminology, BSc in Social Policy and Economics and BSc in Social Policy with Government. This course is available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit and to General Course students.

This course introduces students to sociological ideas and thinking and seeks to link these to some key illustrative areas of social policy. The course takes as its organising theme in the first term the idea of 'social order' and explores this through such concepts such as social hierarchy and stratification, social integration and interaction, social control, urbanisation and risk. In turn, these are then explored in greater empirical detail in the second term through social policy concerns such as: health inequality; education and social class; unemployment, poverty and deprivation; surveillance and social control; and globalisation and development.

10 hours of lectures and 9 hours of classes in the MT. 10 hours of lectures and 9 hours of classes in the LT. 2 hours of classes in the ST.

One essay per term is required.

There is no set text for the course, and a full reading list is provided at the first class. However, excellent background reading can be found in: Fulcher, J. and Scott, J. (2011) Sociology, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 4th edition; Giddens, A. (2009) Sociology, Cambridge: Polity Press, 6th edition; Mills, C.Wright, The Sociological Imagination (most recent edition, OUP, 2000); and Alcock, P et al., (2003) The Student's Companion to Social Policy, Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Exam (100%, duration: 3 hours) in the ST.