Sociology

30 MAJOR COURSES

Introduction to Sociology

This course provides an overview of the discipline by outlining the core concepts and theoretical traditions which are imperative to understanding the social forces and processes shaping society. It elaborates on the systematic and logical modes of inquiry providing an introduction to the methodological foundations of the discipline. The course will focus on global issues, as well as discuss relatable illustrations from Indian society to enhance learning. The course will help students build the foundation for a deeper understanding of the social world.

Indian Society and Culture

This course is aimed at presenting an integrated understanding of the Indian society and its diverse cultures. It explores the pluralistic composition of Indian society focusing on tribal, rural and urban societies; enabling students to comprehend the diverse nature of Indian society and its culture. By understanding the social structures and cultural patterns embedded within it, the course will also facilitate an intercultural and multicultural understanding of the society. Students will also engage in reflecting on issues of national integration and identity. Students will critically examine the processes of social change and continuity in contemporary India

Social Welfare and Legislation

This course introduces students to the basic concepts and foundations of social welfare, welfare state and development. The course exposes students to the making of the Indian Constitution and welfare provisions of it. The course engages with the interface between the state and society within the ambit of social welfare and development. The course discusses functioning and role of various institutions and stakeholders in the process of designing, formulating and execution of various social welfare schemes and legislations from historical as well as contemporary perspectives through sociological lens.

Self and Society

The ever-growing mental health crises among young adolescents and the youth today will be used as an entry point into a discussion on how we might begin to look for a sociological explanation for our intimate, private, often solitary and isolating, experiences. How do we situate our personal crises within larger societal trends? Is there an additional advantage, both intellectual and emotional, in locating the social within the personal, and vice versa? Can one then also look to the social for resolutions of such crises, that might complement solutions that focus around the individual? By academically engaging with the foundational ideas of C W Mills’ ‘sociological imagination’ and the feminist slogan the ‘personal is political’ (and by extension, necessarily social), this course will attempt to understand the ways in which both the ‘self’ and ‘society’ are implicated in each other. Classroom lectures and discussions will also touch upon how different cultures perceive the 'individual' and how commonly experienced feelings/emotions such as love, joy, anger, frustration, sadness, and pain, may be socially constructed and might look (and feel) different in another time and place and what that can teach us about our own selves and our experiences. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Sociology Goes to the Cinema

This course offers the opportunity to understand the role of cinema as a major cultural form that influences and shapes popular imagination, representation and identity formation. Using a range of Bollywood films, docuseries and OTT-based materials, this course will provide a visual trajectory of social change and continuity as we map India’s postcolonial realities through the lens of consumption, nostalgia and middle-class belonging. In the process, the course will attempt to offer a cultural commentary on how cinematic representations follow political patterns and market logics to create dominant narratives. Course assessment will involve critical reviews of films using sociological imagination, an in- class exam and group-based projects.

Sociological Theory

This course will take an extensive look at different theoretical frameworks in classical sociology. It will focus on the contributions of leading sociologists representing different schools of thought. It will expose students to the central tenets and arguments ranging from the "classics" to contemporary formulations with a focus on their strengths and weaknesses. This will enable students comprehend the social world by exploring distinct trajectories with intersections, critiquing the same and developing a perspective/orientation of their own.

Fundamentals of Statistical Data Analysis

This course introduces the rudiments of data analysis for students of social science. It will incorporate elementary but important methods for gathering and analysing data for answering questions of social, economic, cultural, political, and policy interest. By taking a models approach to understand data mainly from a practitioner’s perspective, this course will give students skills and knowledge to readily understand and analyse quantitative data.

Social Stratification

The course focuses on understanding stratification from a sociological perspective. It involves the study of social units, institutions, social formations and processes involving social stratification. This course will engage students in identifying and learning about the theoretical perspectives on social stratification and role played by various factors and institutions such as caste, class, race, gender and culture. The students will be exposed to the understanding and examining of concepts such as social status, role, power, social and natural inequality, poverty, hierarchies and differentiation. The course also focuses on processes of socialisation, networking, occupational mobility and change in the contemporary Indian society.

Gender, Culture and Society

This course critically examines the socio-cultural construction of gender and explores the gendered institutions such as family, education, work and media. It provides insights into the women’s movement, women’s studies and critically examines perspectives to understand gender inequality through intersectional and cross-cultural studies. As such, this course will be organized around three substantive themes. 1. Locating Gender/Theoretical Foundations This theme explores foundational thinkers on gender and sexuality including perspectives on "doing gender" and gender performatavity. 2. Gendered Identities, Gendered Institutions This theme focuses on gender and sexual identities, gendered institutions (family, higher education, work and media). Transgendered identities and queer theories will be examined to facilitate a broader understanding of gender conundrum. 3. Gendered Interactions This theme examines questions on bodies, intimacies, violence and masculinity.

Sociology of Family

This course examines the nature and functions of the family from a cross-cultural perspective. It focuses on the family as an institution influenced by cultural factors which is examined through various sociological perspectives. It explores relationship preferences, stages of coupling, marriage and parenting in contemporary context. Through this course diversity in family forms will be understood and challenges to the institution of family will be examined. The aim is to understand how families adapt to current social, economic and political environment.

Studies in Anthropology and Tribal Societies

The course introduces students to the subject matter, nature and scope of social anthropology. Major theoretical frameworks and approaches of social anthropology will be discussed while tracing the historical emergence and development of social anthropology from a global perspective. The course familiarizes students to the rich traditions of anthropological studies in India and their contributions in developing a knowledge domain and informed understanding of various aspects of Indian society and culture. The course has significant focus on the concept of ethnicity, ethnic diversity, and study of tribal societies. It discusses, in detail, issues related to definition of tribe, cultural practices, language, identity, constitutional status and provisions, changes and challenges faced by the Indian tribal societies.

Research Methods

The course covers the full cycle of conducting a research study in social sciences including design of a research study, data collection, analysis, and reporting. It aims to equip students with the conceptual understanding of current academic debates regarding different qualitative and quantiative research methods pertaining to social science research, and the practical skills to put those methods into practice in a research study. The course is organised in two parts - qualitative and quantitative research methods.

For the qualitative methods, the course covers the principal methods of collecting and analysing qualitative data: interviews, focus groups and participant observation. It analyses the various debates and challenges in qualitative research design with regards to research rigor and meeting the criteria of repeatability, reliability and validity.  It also addresses the challenges and opportunities of using new media, including visual images, social media and Internet research, in social science research and more specifically, in qualitative design. Three widely-used data analysis methods will be taught to students: thematic analysis, content analysis and discourse analysis. In addition, issues pertaining to literature review, research bias, data privacy and protection and ethics in a research study will also be addressed. Students will learn do basis data analysis using NVivo - a tool for analysing qualitative data.

The focus of quantitative section is on the use of statistical thinking to understand the social world. This section will familiarize students with basic tools of quantitative research methods that are adopted in social and political sciences. Topics include data as theory building, measurement validity and reliability, descriptive statistics (measures of central tendency and dispersion), bivariate analysis (correlation, contingency tables,), statistical inference (sampling, hypothesis testing) and introduction to statistical modeling (regression analysis). Additionally, students will learn to do some basic statistical analysis using Stata®, the software commonly used among social scientists.  
This course is a combination of lectures, in-class lab sessions and individual or group classwork. Student performance will be evaluated by their class participation, weekly homework/classwork, a quiz and the final exam.  

Contemporary Sociological Discourses

This course focuses on the sociological theories and discourses emerged during and after the mid-twentieth century. The course engages with the sociological discourses that continue to shape the contemporary debates and the empirical research in the area. The course carries forward the classical legacy of critical methods of sociological thoughts and brings in comparatively more contemporary developments and advances. The course exposes students to some of these major developments and their outcomes which are critical for understanding the contemporary world. The course highlights important developments, debates and discourses related to modernism, media, world-order, globalization and the ever changing socio-cultural dynamics at global and national level.

Rural Sociology

This course will engage students in understanding and examining the contours of rural society. The course focuses on describing the sociological dimensions of the rural. The course offers understanding of the rural society from different sociological and interdisciplinary perspectives. The course will involve study of the rural social structure, institutions, economy, culture and change. The students will study the distinctive character and composition of the rural from a global perspective. The theories pertaining to the rural will be critically examined. The course will reflect upon on various empirical studies of rural transformation, change and continuity. The course involves a rural immersion field visit to expose students to the real rural context and interact with different stakeholders of the rural. Rural governance and developmental issues will be studied during these enquiries.

Social Exclusion

This course aims to understand the social location and issues relating to socially excluded, marginalized and vulnerable communities in India. It focuses on the historically deprived sections of Indian society like Tribals, Dalits, women and minorities. It also examines the issues pertaining to communities like LGBT, urban poor and socially and educationally backward classes who are at the margins because of structural reasons and societal attitudes. Structural and phenomenological reasons for their social exclusion will be probed. Critical analysis of theories of identity and social exclusion will be undertaken. Finally, we reflect on the ways and means through which social justice may be achieved

Education and Society

This course provides students with an in-depth understanding of the mutually impinging relationship between society and education. It elucidates a comprehension of education against a theoretical backdrop. It also highlights focal areas shaping education in the form of curriculum and pedagogical practices. It will also explore the governmental and private influences in education.   It will bring the central issues that plague education to the forefront especially in the Indian context.

Ageing and the Life Course

This course is an introduction to the sociological study of aging across the life course. The course will adopt an intersectional lens and rely on interdisciplinary approaches to examine questions of gender, the body, family, identity, social practices, medical and legal discourses surrounding aging. Specific topics include: Theorizing aging across disciplines (history, demography, economics, anthropology and feminist studies); cultural representations of age and aging (body, self-image advertising, consumer culture and ageism); family structure, intergenerational relationships and personhood (social networks, care ethics and later life intimacies); later life in a transnational era (questions of identity, ethnicity, nation/transnationalism and digital sociality); the politics of aging; and social policy.

Sociology of Art

This course is an interdisciplinary course focusing on sociological discourses on artistic creations. It entails analysis of the relationships between social structures, patterns of artistic production and consumption. Number of themes related to the fine as well as popular arts will be examined through sociological perspectives. Through this course we will explore the nature of the art world by understanding and examining the interplay between art and society. Reflections on the reception and reputation of the artists will also be engaged through empirical research. Our goal in this seminar course will be to examine and understand the main traditions, concepts, themes and theories associated with the field of sociology of art. We also embark upon exploring the field’s most pressing current questions and concerns.

Urban Sociology

This course will engage students in understanding the contours of urban sociology. The course focuses on the dimensions and the perspectives in the study of urban society. The course will enable students to study the distinctive characterization of urban society. The theories pertaining to the urban will be critically examined. The various empirical studies of urban transformations will be reflected upon. The changing dimensions of space, power, caste, gender and class in urban society will be examined. Urban developmental issues will be probed.

Economic Sociology

This course is an interdisciplinary course focusing on sociological discourses on economy and material world. The course provides an understanding of the social and cultural bases of economic activity. It highlights the significance of sociological analysis for the study of economic processes in local and global contexts. It will provide an understanding of the historical processes of economic development and their contradictions. The course will focus on sociology of labour markets. Through this course India’s development experience in local and global context will be analysed. Formal and informal economic systems and their impact on social life will be discussed.

Migration and Diaspora

This specialised course is an in-depth study of migration and the associated concepts, theoretical models and their interlinkages from a sociological perspective. The course provides a holistic and critical understanding of the major debates around the social phenomenon of migration, its causes and consequences as well as the typologies and patterns of population mobility. It also explores the development of the concept of diaspora from its very specific origins to the range of theoretical and empirical frameworks it encompasses today. The course updates the students’ conceptual and theoretical understandings about migration as well as diasporic experiences in an ever-changing social system. To contextualise the learnings, the course explores the multifaceted nature of the contemporary global Indian diaspora and their transnationalism in detail.

Sociological Thought - Classics to the Contemporary

This course focuses on the critique of theoretical traditions, both classical and contemporary, that dominate ‘sociological thought’. It will entail reading the original works of thinkers, contextualised by the critical discourses around it - thus helping students develop a deeper understanding of theory in the social sciences. The course will equip students with the intellectual tools to reflect on the varied social crises of the present moment and enable them to appreciate the relevance of sociological thought while engaging with the world around them. The course has been conceived to approach the theoretical frameworks, that have contributed to our understanding of the social, through a critical lens. Case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises will be included in the pedagogy to assist students obtain the skills needed for employment.

Advanced Qualitative Research Methods

The objective of the course is to offer students an in-depth exploration of three types of qualitative research methods - ethnographic, content analysis, and oral history. This is an advanced methods course and therefore students are expected to have some basic understanding of the process of doing research and methods such as in-depth interviews, observations, and focus group discussions. These will be briefly recapped at the beginning of the course but there will not be time to go in-depth into these methods. For the ethnographic component of this course, we will read three ethnographies across gender, health, and disability studies that teach students how to write ethnographies as well as do them. Students will also be introduced to the autoethnographic methods including their benefits and limitations. For the part on content analysis students will learn how to analyse and interpret data shared on social media platforms as well as some of the thorny ethical dilemmas that such research engenders. Oral histories will be taught using a combination of oral history archives and books that use oral histories. Assessments for this course will be structured in a way that students will be working towards an original research project that involves primary data collection using one of these methodologies taught in this class that will be submitted at the end of the course. Each part of the assessment will build toward the final output beginning with a research proposal, a review of the literature, and finally a research paper or another output such as audio production or a film that involves substantial primary qualitative research. The approach will involve case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises to assist students acquire the skills necessary for the profession.

Advanced Urban Studies

Cities are sites of great cultural and ethnic diversity, economic innovation, and inequality, cultural expression, resource consumption, wealth generation, and political conflict and   cooperation. They are also increasingly shaped by global processes, which play a critical role in the shaping of societies. Advanced Urban Studies is a course designed to provide an integrated understanding of the social, political, economic, environmental, and cultural processes that shape urban life, with particular attention paid to how these processes operate in space and time. It focuses on the history, transformation, dissolution, restructuring and reinvention of the city. The purpose of the course is to give an in-depth insight into current research debates within the Urban Studies research field. The course is structured around three core themes that can be linked together as a whole: 1. The interface between actor and structure within Urban Studies 2. The interface between materiality and sociality within Urban Studies 3. Urban Environment Case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises will be included in the pedagogy to assist students obtain the skills needed for employment.

Sociology of Everyday Life

This course explores the sociology of everyday life both theoretically and in various empirical contexts. This course will encourage students to think sociologically about everyday life, by placing the ‘familiar’ under a microscope. The course will orient students to the key schools of thought in the field including but not limited to Symbolic Interactionism and Dramaturgy (Goffman, Blumer, and Hochschild), Phenomenology (Schutz) and Ethnomethodology (Garfinkel), as well as Standpoint theory (Smith and Collins). This theoretical understanding will enable students to utilize their sociological imaginations in connecting everyday activities and situations as well as seemingly ordinary behaviors and things with larger structural social forces and institutions. The course surveys a range of empirical studies including but not limited to studies of conversation, gender performance, etiquette, everyday violence, social media and new technologies. This course highlights critical theories of the ‘lifeworld’ or ‘habitus’ which seek to explain how everyday life is constrained by or resists more powerful structures and institutions. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Health, Medicine and Society

This course draws on established frameworks of medical sociology, public health and anthropology to unpack the complex relationship between disease, health and social inequalities. The course will encourage students’ critical engagement in understanding the embodiment of inequality and the larger historical, social and economic forces that shape people’s health experiences globally. In particular, the course will begin with a discussion on the links between science and colonialism and subsequently move on to more contemporary debates on the unequal distribution of disease, suffering and infections (e.g. HIV/AIDS and Ebola), social determinants of health and illness and intimate transactions (e.g. organ trafficking, surrogacy and stem cells). In the process, the course will touch upon questions of bioethics in global health practices and offer a critique of humanitarian aid and neoliberalism in the context of global health. The course will conclude with an examination of medicalized resistance to power and health as a human right.

Social Demography

This seminar-style course is designed to be a graduate level introduction to demographic scholarship. The course is organized around the following broad themes. Demographic Theories & Perspectives (e.g. Malthus, Marx, Demographic Transition Theory and anthropo-cultural perspectives of population change); Family Demography: changing nature of unions, family economics, marriage, divorce and cohabitation; Social Determinants of Health: Socioeconomic status (SES) definition and measurement; forms of discrimination; history, context and neighborhood mechanism to health disparities (readings on multilevel methods); social capital and health; Modernity, development and demography: ; Population growth and economic development debates, cross-cultural population policies with a focus on China. Politics of Reproduction: reproductive freedom, the Census and the Muslim question, global politics of population control and contraceptive choice; Migration: theories, global patterns and consequences of international migration. The course will attempt to discuss how methods and concepts in demography interrelate with the social institutions of marriage, family and society. This will be accomplished by engaging in critical population theories and empirical debates from both the Global South and North. In addition to the reading materials, this course will rely on short clips/documentaries, TED talks and other popular media to engage the class in interactive debates. Overall, this course intends to give students a broad perspective on the social science perspective to formal demography and its application to a wide range of social processes. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Sociological Thinking in the Digital Age

Sociological Thinking in the Digital Age is designed to critically examine various developments, implications, and inflections of digital technologies (including the emergence of the Internet) and their increasing use in daily life impacting lifestyles and societies across scales. This course will critically address three fundamental facets that have either guided conventional understandings of Sociology, or are emerging areas in the field, and are as follows: (1) Relevance of classical and contemporary sociological theories to meaningful sociological understanding in the digital age (including concepts of place/space, changing nature of social inequalities and institutions, and questions of movement and mobility) ; (2) Changing nature of sociological data (examining Big Data and/versus Thick Data); and (3) Doing sociological research in the digital age, including concepts of datafication, actor-networks, historical/archival methods, and retrospective versus prospective research designs. The course will address central questions such as: How have sociological theories evolved in relation to “digital”/”digitalization” of societies? How have new social/sociocultural theories developed in response to emergence of new areas such as computational social science? How have the practices of sociologists evolved in the digital age? By the end of the course, students are expected to develop a holistic understanding of sociological perspectives of/in the digital age, utilize new opportunities for meaningful data collection using sophisticated forms of computer-aided techniques, and build and execute mixed-methods approaches in sociological research through critical engagements with big and thick data.

29 MINOR COURSES

Introduction to Sociology

This course provides an overview of the discipline by outlining the core concepts and theoretical traditions which are imperative to understanding the social forces and processes shaping society. It elaborates on the systematic and logical modes of inquiry providing an introduction to the methodological foundations of the discipline. The course will focus on global issues, as well as discuss relatable illustrations from Indian society to enhance learning. The course will help students buil>  d the foundation for a deeper understanding of the social world.

Indian Society and Culture

This course is aimed at presenting an integrated understanding of the Indian society and its diverse cultures. It explores the pluralistic composition of Indian society focusing on tribal, rural and urban societies; enabling students to comprehend the diverse nature of Indian society and its culture. By understanding the social structures and cultural patterns embedded within it, the course will also facilitate an intercultural and multicultural understanding of the society. Students will also engage in reflecting on issues of national integration and identity. Students will critically examine the processes of social change and continuity in contemporary India

Social Welfare and Legislation

This course introduces students to the basic concepts and foundations of social welfare, welfare state and development. The course exposes students to the making of the Indian Constitution and welfare provisions of it. The course engages with the interface between the state and society within the ambit of social welfare and development. The course discusses functioning and role of various institutions and stakeholders in the process of designing, formulating and execution of various social welfare schemes and legislations from historical as well as contemporary perspectives through sociological lens.

Self and Society

The ever-growing mental health crises among young adolescents and the youth today will be used as an entry point into a discussion on how we might begin to look for a sociological explanation for our intimate, private, often solitary and isolating, experiences. How do we situate our personal crises within larger societal trends? Is there an additional advantage, both intellectual and emotional, in locating the social within the personal, and vice versa? Can one then also look to the social for resolutions of such crises, that might complement solutions that focus around the individual? By academically engaging with the foundational ideas of C W Mills’ ‘sociological imagination’ and the feminist slogan the ‘personal is political’ (and by extension, necessarily social), this course will attempt to understand the ways in which both the ‘self’ and ‘society’ are implicated in each other. Classroom lectures and discussions will also touch upon how different cultures perceive the 'individual' and how commonly experienced feelings/emotions such as love, joy, anger, frustration, sadness, and pain, may be socially constructed and might look (and feel) different in another time and place and what that can teach us about our own selves and our experiences. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Sociology Goes to the Cinema

This course offers the opportunity to understand the role of cinema as a major cultural form that influences and shapes popular imagination, representation and identity formation. Using a range of Bollywood films, docuseries and OTT-based materials, this course will provide a visual trajectory of social change and continuity as we map India’s postcolonial realities through the lens of consumption, nostalgia and middle-class belonging. In the process, the course will attempt to offer a cultural commentary on how cinematic representations follow political patterns and market logics to create dominant narratives. Course assessment will involve critical reviews of films using sociological imagination, an in- class exam and group-based projects.

Sociological Theory

This course will take an extensive look at different theoretical frameworks in classical sociology. It will focus on the contributions of leading sociologists representing different schools of thought. It will expose students to the central tenets and arguments ranging from the "classics" to contemporary formulations with a focus on their strengths and weaknesses. This will enable students comprehend the social world by exploring distinct trajectories with intersections, critiquing the same and developing a perspective/orientation of their own.

Fundamentals of Statistical Data Analysis

This course introduces the rudiments of data analysis for students of social science. It will incorporate elementary but important methods for gathering and analysing data for answering questions of social, economic, cultural, political, and policy interest. By taking a models approach to understand data mainly from a practitioner’s perspective, this course will give students skills and knowledge to readily understand and analyse quantitative data.

Social Stratification

The course focuses on understanding stratification from a sociological perspective. It involves the study of social units, institutions, social formations and processes involving social stratification. This course will engage students in identifying and learning about the theoretical perspectives on social stratification and role played by various factors and institutions such as caste, class, race, gender and culture. The students will be exposed to the understanding and examining of concepts such as social status, role, power, social and natural inequality, poverty, hierarchies and differentiation. The course also focuses on processes of socialisation, networking, occupational mobility and change in the contemporary Indian society.

Gender, Culture and Society

This course critically examines the socio-cultural construction of gender and explores the gendered institutions such as family, education, work and media. It provides insights into the women’s movement, women’s studies and critically examines perspectives to understand gender inequality through intersectional and cross-cultural studies. As such, this course will be organized around three substantive themes. 1. Locating Gender/Theoretical Foundations This theme explores foundational thinkers on gender and sexuality including perspectives on "doing gender" and gender performatavity. 2. Gendered Identities, Gendered Institutions This theme focuses on gender and sexual identities, gendered institutions (family, higher education, work and media). Transgendered identities and queer theories will be examined to facilitate a broader understanding of gender conundrum. 3. Gendered Interactions This theme examines questions on bodies, intimacies, violence and masculinity.

Sociology of Family

This course examines the nature and functions of the family from a cross-cultural perspective. It focuses on the family as an institution influenced by cultural factors which is examined through various sociological perspectives. It explores relationship preferences, stages of coupling, marriage and parenting in contemporary context. Through this course diversity in family forms will be understood and challenges to the institution of family will be examined. The aim is to understand how families adapt to current social, economic and political environment.

Studies in Anthropology and Tribal Societies

The course introduces students to the subject matter, nature and scope of social anthropology. Major theoretical frameworks and approaches of social anthropology will be discussed while tracing the historical emergence and development of social anthropology from a global perspective. The course familiarizes students to the rich traditions of anthropological studies in India and their contributions in developing a knowledge domain and informed understanding of various aspects of Indian society and culture. The course has significant focus on the concept of ethnicity, ethnic diversity, and study of tribal societies. It discusses, in detail, issues related to definition of tribe, cultural practices, language, identity, constitutional status and provisions, changes and challenges faced by the Indian tribal societies.

Research Methods

The course covers the full cycle of conducting a research study in social sciences including design of a research study, data collection, analysis, and reporting. It aims to equip students with the conceptual understanding of current academic debates regarding different qualitative and quantiative research methods pertaining to social science research, and the practical skills to put those methods into practice in a research study. The course is organised in two parts - qualitative and quantitative research methods.
For the qualitative methods, the course covers the principal methods of collecting and analysing qualitative data: interviews, focus groups and participant observation. It analyses the various debates and challenges in qualitative research design with regards to research rigor and meeting the criteria of repeatability, reliability and validity.  It also addresses the challenges and opportunities of using new media, including visual images, social media and Internet research, in social science research and more specifically, in qualitative design. Three widely-used data analysis methods will be taught to students: thematic analysis, content analysis and discourse analysis. In addition, issues pertaining to literature review, research bias, data privacy and protection and ethics in a research study will also be addressed. Students will learn do basis data analysis using NVivo - a tool for analysing qualitative data.
The focus of quantitative section is on the use of statistical thinking to understand the social world. This section will familiarize students with basic tools of quantitative research methods that are adopted in social and political sciences. Topics include data as theory building, measurement validity and reliability, descriptive statistics (measures of central tendency and dispersion), bivariate analysis (correlation, contingency tables,), statistical inference (sampling, hypothesis testing) and introduction to statistical modeling (regression analysis). Additionally, students will learn to do some basic statistical analysis using Stata®, the software commonly used among social scientists.  
This course is a combination of lectures, in-class lab sessions and individual or group classwork. Student performance will be evaluated by their class participation, weekly homework/classwork, a quiz and the final exam.  

Contemporary Sociological Discourses

This course focuses on the sociological theories and discourses emerged during and after the mid-twentieth century. The course engages with the sociological discourses that continue to shape the contemporary debates and the empirical research in the area. The course carries forward the classical legacy of critical methods of sociological thoughts and brings in comparatively more contemporary developments and advances. The course exposes students to some of these major developments and their outcomes which are critical for understanding the contemporary world. The course highlights important developments, debates and discourses related to modernism, media, world-order, globalization and the ever-changing socio-cultural dynamics at global and national level.

Rural Sociology

This course will engage students in understanding and examining the contours of rural society. The course focuses on describing the sociological dimensions of the rural. The course offers understanding of the rural society from different sociological and interdisciplinary perspectives. The course will involve study of the rural social structure, institutions, economy, culture and change. The students will study the distinctive character and composition of the rural from a global perspective. The theories pertaining to the rural will be critically examined. The course will reflect upon on various empirical studies of rural transformation, change and continuity. The course involves a rural immersion field visit to expose students to the real rural context and interact with different stakeholders of the rural. Rural governance and developmental issues will be studied during these enquiries.

Social Exclusion

This course aims to understand the social location and issues relating to socially excluded, marginalized and vulnerable communities in India. It focuses on the historically deprived sections of Indian society like Tribals, Dalits, women and minorities. It also examines the issues pertaining to communities like LGBT, urban poor and socially and educationally backward classes who are at the margins because of structural reasons and societal attitudes. Structural and phenomenological reasons for their social exclusion will be probed. Critical analysis of theories of identity and social exclusion will be undertaken. Finally, we reflect on the ways and means through which social justice may be achieved

Education and Society

This course provides students with an in-depth understanding of the mutually impinging relationship between society and education. It elucidates a comprehension of education against a theoretical backdrop. It also highlights focal areas shaping education in the form of curriculum and pedagogical practices. It will also explore the governmental and private influences in education.   It will bring the central issues that plague education to the forefront especially in the Indian context.

Ageing and the Life Course

This course is an introduction to the sociological study of aging across the life course. The course will adopt an intersectional lens and rely on interdisciplinary approaches to examine questions of gender, the body, family, identity, social practices, medical and legal discourses surrounding aging. Specific topics include: Theorizing aging across disciplines (history, demography, economics, anthropology and feminist studies); cultural representations of age and aging (body, self-image advertising, consumer culture and ageism); family structure, intergenerational relationships and personhood (social networks, care ethics and later life intimacies); later life in a transnational era (questions of identity, ethnicity, nation/transnationalism and digital sociality); the politics of aging; and social policy.

Sociology of Art

This course is an interdisciplinary course focusing on sociological discourses on artistic creations. It entails analysis of the relationships between social structures, patterns of artistic production and consumption. Number of themes related to the fine as well as popular arts will be examined through sociological perspectives. Through this course we will explore the nature of the art world by understanding and examining the interplay between art and society. Reflections on the reception and reputation of the artists will also be engaged through empirical research. Our goal in this seminar course will be to examine and understand the main traditions, concepts, themes and theories associated with the field of sociology of art. We also embark upon exploring the field’s most pressing current questions and concerns.

Urban Sociology

This course will engage students in understanding the contours of urban sociology. The course focuses on the dimensions and the perspectives in the study of urban society. The course will enable students to study the distinctive characterization of urban society. The theories pertaining to the urban will be critically examined. The various empirical studies of urban transformations will be reflected upon. The changing dimensions of space, power, caste, gender and class in urban society will be examined. Urban developmental issues will be probed.

Economic Sociology

This course is an interdisciplinary course focusing on sociological discourses on economy and material world. The course provides an understanding of the social and cultural bases of economic activity. It highlights the significance of sociological analysis for the study of economic processes in local and global contexts. It will provide an understanding of the historical processes of economic development and their contradictions. The course will focus on sociology of labour markets. Through this course India’s development experience in local and global context will be analysed. Formal and informal economic systems and their impact on social life will be discussed.

Migration and Diaspora

This specialised course is an in-depth study of migration and the associated concepts, theoretical models and their interlinkages from a sociological perspective. The course provides a holistic and critical understanding of the major debates around the social phenomenon of migration, its causes and consequences as well as the typologies and patterns of population mobility. It also explores the development of the concept of diaspora from its very specific origins to the range of theoretical and empirical frameworks it encompasses today. The course updates the students’ conceptual and theoretical understandings about migration as well as diasporic experiences in an ever-changing social system. To contextualise the learnings, the course explores the multifaceted nature of the contemporary global Indian diaspora and their transnationalism in detail.

Sociological Thought - Classics to the Contemporary

This course focuses on the critique of theoretical traditions, both classical and contemporary, that dominate ‘sociological thought’. It will entail reading the original works of thinkers, contextualised by the critical discourses around it - thus helping students develop a deeper understanding of theory in the social sciences. The course will equip students with the intellectual tools to reflect on the varied social crises of the present moment and enable them to appreciate the relevance of sociological thought while engaging with the world around them. The course has been conceived to approach the theoretical frameworks, that have contributed to our understanding of the social, through a critical lens. Case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises will be included in the pedagogy to assist students obtain the skills needed for employment.

Advanced Qualitative Research Methods

The objective of the course is to offer students an in-depth exploration of three types of qualitative research methods - ethnographic, content analysis, and oral history. This is an advanced methods course and therefore students are expected to have some basic understanding of the process of doing research and methods such as in-depth interviews, observations, and focus group discussions. These will be briefly recapped at the beginning of the course but there will not be time to go in-depth into these methods. For the ethnographic component of this course, we will read three ethnographies across gender, health, and disability studies that teach students how to write ethnographies as well as do them. Students will also be introduced to the autoethnographic methods including their benefits and limitations. For the part on content analysis students will learn how to analyse and interpret data shared on social media platforms as well as some of the thorny ethical dilemmas that such research engenders. Oral histories will be taught using a combination of oral history archives and books that use oral histories. Assessments for this course will be structured in a way that students will be working towards an original research project that involves primary data collection using one of these methodologies taught in this class that will be submitted at the end of the course. Each part of the assessment will build toward the final output beginning with a research proposal, a review of the literature, and finally a research paper or another output such as audio production or a film that involves substantial primary qualitative research. The approach will involve case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises to assist students acquire the skills necessary for the profession.

Advanced Urban Studies

Cities are sites of great cultural and ethnic diversity, economic innovation, and inequality, cultural expression, resource consumption, wealth generation, and political conflict and   cooperation. They are also increasingly shaped by global processes, which play a critical role in the shaping of societies. Advanced Urban Studies is a course designed to provide an integrated understanding of the social, political, economic, environmental, and cultural processes that shape urban life, with particular attention paid to how these processes operate in space and time. It focuses on the history, transformation, dissolution, restructuring and reinvention of the city. The purpose of the course is to give an in-depth insight into current research debates within the Urban Studies research field. The course is structured around three core themes that can be linked together as a whole: 1. The interface between actor and structure within Urban Studies 2. The interface between materiality and sociality within Urban Studies 3. Urban Environment Case studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving exercises will be included in the pedagogy to assist students obtain the skills needed for employment.

Sociology of Everyday Life

This course explores the sociology of everyday life both theoretically and in various empirical contexts. This course will encourage students to think sociologically about everyday life, by placing the ‘familiar’ under a microscope. The course will orient students to the key schools of thought in the field including but not limited to Symbolic Interactionism and Dramaturgy (Goffman, Blumer, and Hochschild), Phenomenology (Schutz) and Ethnomethodology (Garfinkel), as well as Standpoint theory (Smith and Collins). This theoretical understanding will enable students to utilize their sociological imaginations in connecting everyday activities and situations as well as seemingly ordinary behaviors and things with larger structural social forces and institutions. The course surveys a range of empirical studies including but not limited to studies of conversation, gender performance, etiquette, everyday violence, social media and new technologies. This course highlights critical theories of the ‘lifeworld’ or ‘habitus’ which seek to explain how everyday life is constrained by or resists more powerful structures and institutions. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Health, Medicine and Society

This course draws on established frameworks of medical sociology, public health and anthropology to unpack the complex relationship between disease, health and social inequalities. The course will encourage students’ critical engagement in understanding the embodiment of inequality and the larger historical, social and economic forces that shape people’s health experiences globally. In particular, the course will begin with a discussion on the links between science and colonialism and subsequently move on to more contemporary debates on the unequal distribution of disease, suffering and infections (e.g. HIV/AIDS and Ebola), social determinants of health and illness and intimate transactions (e.g. organ trafficking, surrogacy and stem cells). In the process, the course will touch upon questions of bioethics in global health practices and offer a critique of humanitarian aid and neoliberalism in the context of global health. The course will conclude with an examination of medicalized resistance to power and health as a human right.

Social Demography

This seminar-style course is designed to be a graduate level introduction to demographic scholarship. The course is organized around the following broad themes. Demographic Theories & Perspectives (e.g. Malthus, Marx, Demographic Transition Theory and anthropo-cultural perspectives of population change); Family Demography: changing nature of unions, family economics, marriage, divorce and cohabitation; Social Determinants of Health: Socioeconomic status (SES) definition and measurement; forms of discrimination; history, context and neighborhood mechanism to health disparities (readings on multilevel methods); social capital and health; Modernity, development and demography: ; Population growth and economic development debates, cross-cultural population policies with a focus on China. Politics of Reproduction: reproductive freedom, the Census and the Muslim question, global politics of population control and contraceptive choice; Migration: theories, global patterns and consequences of international migration. The course will attempt to discuss how methods and concepts in demography interrelate with the social institutions of marriage, family and society. This will be accomplished by engaging in critical population theories and empirical debates from both the Global South and North. In addition to the reading materials, this course will rely on short clips/documentaries, TED talks and other popular media to engage the class in interactive debates. Overall, this course intends to give students a broad perspective on the social science perspective to formal demography and its application to a wide range of social processes. The pedagogy will include case-studies, hands-on learning, and real-world problem-solving activities that helps in equipping the student with the skills required in the workforce.

Sociological Thinking in the Digital Age

Sociological Thinking in the Digital Age is designed to critically examine various developments, implications, and inflections of digital technologies (including the emergence of the Internet) and their increasing use in daily life impacting lifestyles and societies across scales. This course will critically address three fundamental facets that have either guided conventional understandings of Sociology, or are emerging areas in the field, and are as follows: (1) Relevance of classical and contemporary sociological theories to meaningful sociological understanding in the digital age (including concepts of place/space, changing nature of social inequalities and institutions, and questions of movement and mobility) ; (2) Changing nature of sociological data (examining Big Data and/versus Thick Data); and (3) Doing sociological research in the digital age, including concepts of datafication, actor-networks, historical/archival methods, and retrospective versus prospective research designs. The course will address central questions such as: How have sociological theories evolved in relation to “digital”/”digitalization” of societies? How have new social/sociocultural theories developed in response to emergence of new areas such as computational social science? How have the practices of sociologists evolved in the digital age? By the end of the course, students are expected to develop a holistic understanding of sociological perspectives of/in the digital age, utilize new opportunities for meaningful data collection using sophisticated forms of computer-aided techniques, and build and execute mixed-methods approaches in sociological research through critical engagements with big and thick data.