Professor: Joe R. Feagin
Office: 431 Academic Building
Office Hours: Wednesday, 9AM - Noon and by appointment
Seminar Time: Wednesday, 3-5:45 PM

Purpose of Course: This is a field research seminar. It will focus on recent research on women and sexism, with an emphasis on forms of discrimination. The first section of the course will review major books. After a research break, the second section will be organized around oral presentations of research projects. All sessions will be discussion oriented.

Course Requirements:

1. Regular participation in seminar discussions;

2. Six short (4-5 pages) critique/comment papers based on readings from the books below;

3. An oral class presentation (20-30 minutes, given as at sociology convention) on your class project in second half of the course;

4. An 18-25 page research paper based on your field research project (due April 27). The course grade will be based on this formula: 50% on the short papers (and, to some degree, on class discussion), and 50% on the major research paper.
 

The Analytical Comment-Critique Papers:

Students will prepare six comment-and-critique papers on the reading assignments and will bring the papers to class for discussion. These comment-critique papers should analyzecritically one or two important issues in the reading assignment that you found particularly thought provoking or problematical. Analyze in some detail an issue of interest.

Use these approaches; 1) develop a logical critique of the arguments you analyze (for example, does the evidence support the arguments?); 2) compare and contrast material in the readings with material presented in class; 3) compare and contrast material in one reading assignment with that in another; 4) compare material in the reading assignment with other research you've done or studied. The point of the papers is to demonstrate you've thought over and analyzed critically important issues in the assignment.