Sociology and Interdisciplinary Social Sciences

Open Access
Hailing from diverse scholarly fields, all contributors are affiliated with The Color of New Media, a scholarly collective based at the University of California, Berkeley. The Color of New Media explores the intersections of new media studies, critical race theory, gender and women's studies, and postcolonial studies. The essays in#identity consider topics such as the social justice movements organized through #BlackLivesMatter, #Ferguson, and #SayHerName; the controversies around #WhyIStayed and #CancelColbert; Twitter use in India and Africa; the integration of hashtags such as #nohomo and #onfleek that have become part of everyday online vernacular; and other ways in which Twitter has been used by, for, and against women, people of color, LGBTQ, and Global South communities. Collectively, the essays in this volume offer a critically interdisciplinary view of how and why social media has been at the heart of US and global political discourse for over a decade. [From JSTOR description]

This book tells the story of how a human community comes to be and how aspirations for the good life confront the dilemmas and detours of real life. Suzanne Keller combines penetrating analysis of classic ideas about community with a remarkable and unprecedented thirty-year case study of one of the first "planned unit developments" in America and the first in New Jersey.

Rooted in a critical understanding of inequality as foundational to digital sociology, this book connects digital media technologies to traditional areas of study in sociology, such as labor, culture, education, race, class, and gender. It covers a wide variety of topics, including web analytics, wearable technologies, social media analysis, and digital labor.

Drawing from the work of top researchers in various fields, The Handbook of Research on Black Males explores the nuanced and multifaceted phenomena known as the black male. Simultaneously hyper-visible and invisible, black males around the globe are being investigated now more than ever before; however, many of the well-meaning responses regarding media attention paid to black males are not well informed by research. Additionally, not all black males are the same, and each of them have varying strengths and challenges, making one-size-fits-all perspectives unproductive. This text, which acts as a comprehensive tool that can serve as a resource to articulate and argue for policy change, suggest educational improvements, and advocate judicial reform, fills a large void. The contributors, from multidisciplinary backgrounds, focus on history, research trends, health, education, criminal and social justice, hip-hop, and programs and initiatives. This volume has the potential to influence the field of research on black males as well as improve lives for a population that is often the most celebrated in the media and simultaneously the least socially valued.  

The impact of the U.S. immigration and legal systems on children and youth   In the United States, millions of children are undocumented migrants or have family members who came to the country without authorization. The unique challenges with which these children and youth must cope demand special attention. Illegal Encounters considers illegality, deportability, and deportation in the lives of young people--those who migrate as well as those who are affected by the migration of others.   A primary focus of the volume is to understand how children and youth encounter, move through, or are outside of a range of legal processes, including border enforcement, immigration detention, federal custody, courts, and state processes of categorization. Even if young people do not directly interact with state immigration systems--because they are U.S. citizens or have avoided detention--they are nonetheless deeply affected by the reach of the government in its many forms.   Contributors privilege the voices and everyday experiences of immigrant children and youth themselves. By combining different perspectives from advocates, service providers, attorneys, researchers, and young immigrants, the volume presents rich accounts that can contribute to informed debates and policy reforms.   Illegal Encounters sheds light on the unique ways in which policies, laws, and legal categories shape so much of daily life for young immigrants. The book makes visible the burdens, hopes, and potential of a population of young people and their families who have been largely hidden from public view and are currently under siege, following their movement through complicated immigration systems and institutions in the United States.  

Now with SAGE Publishing, Mapping the Social Landscape: Readings in Sociology is one of the most established and widely-used anthologies for Introductory Sociology. Susan J. Ferguson selects, edits, and introduces 58 readings representing a plurality of voices and views within sociology. The selections include classic statements from great thinkers like C. Wright Mills, Karl Marx, Howard Becker, and Max Weber, as well as the works of contemporary scholars who address current social issues. Many of the readings integrate questions of diversity, helping students see the interrelationships among race-ethnicity, social class, and gender, and understand how these relationships have shaped the experiences of all people in society.  

An innovative, integrated framework provides core sociological concept.

Race, Class, & Gender: An Anthology demonstrates how the complex intersection between people's race, class, and gender (and also sexuality) shapes their experiences, and who they become as individuals.

This engaging reader consists of 57 edited articles.

This second edition of the award-winning The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Communication emphasizes constructive conflict management from a communication perspective, identifying the message as the focus of conflict research and practice.

The organization of this social theory reader combined with Garner's short introductions to selections enables students to understand the historical flow of social theory and see how disagreements and confrontations shape theory. Writing in clear, down-to-earth language, Garner's introductions highlight links among theorists to illustrate how theoretical traditions are not rigidly separated from one another but are always in conversation, addressing and challenging each other.

The landscape of social theory has changed significantly over the three decades since the publication of Anthony Giddens and Jonathan Turner's seminal Social Theory Today. Sociologists in the twenty-first century desperately need a new agenda centered around central questions of social theory. In Social Theory Now, Claudio E. Benzecry, Monika Krause, and Isaac Ariail Reed set a new course for sociologists, bringing together contributions from the most distinctive sociological traditions in an ambitious survey of where social theory is today and where it might be going. The book provides a strategic window onto social theory based on current research, examining trends in classical traditions and the cutting edge of more recent approaches. From distinctive theoretical positions, contributors address questions about how social order is accomplished; the role of materiality, practice, and meaning; as well as the conditions for the knowledge of the social world. The theoretical traditions presented include cultural sociology, microsociologies, world-system theory and post-colonial theory, gender and feminism, actor network and network theory, systems theory, field theory, rational choice, poststructuralism, pragmatism, and the sociology of conventions. Each chapter introduces a tradition and presents an agenda for further theoretical development. Social Theory Now is an essential tool for sociologists. It will be central to the discussion and teaching of contemporary social theory for years to come.

The seventh edition of this book continues to draw on both contemporary sources and the classical literature of sociology to explore the nature of social life, with an emphasis on issues of gender, race/ethnicity, and inequality.

Open Access
Written by experts from various methodological fields, Transforming Research Methods in the Social Sciences is a comprehensive collation of original essays and cutting-edge research that demonstrates the variety of novel techniques and research methods available to researchers responding to these context-bound issues. It is particularly relevant for study and research in the fields of applied psychology, sociology, ethnography, biography and anthropology. In addition to their unique combination of conceptual and application issues, the chapters also include discussions on ethical considerations relevant to the method in similar global South contexts. Transforming Research Methods in the Social Sciences has much to offer to researchers, professionals and others involved in social science research both locally and internationally. [From JSTOR description]

Understanding Society: An Introductory Reader, Fourth Edition, contains a collection of classic and contemporary sociological readings selected for their timeliness, diversity, and interest.

[Online] This book explains how the idea of race became so important in the USA, generating conceptual confusion that can now be clarified. Developing an international approach, it reviews references to "race," "racism," and "ethnicity" in sociology, anthropology, philosophy, and comparative politics and identifies promising lines of research that may make it possible to supersede misleading notions of race in the social sciences.

Comprised of historical texts spanning two centuries, The Women's Suffrage Movement is a comprehensive and singular volume that covers the major issues and figures involved in the movement, with a distinctive focus on diversity, incorporating race, class, and gender, and illuminating minority voices. In an effort to spotlight the many influential voices that were excluded from the movement, the writings of well-known suffragists such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony are featured alongside accounts of Native American women who inspired suffragists like Matilda Joslyn Gage to join the movement, as well as African American suffragists such as Sarah Mapps Douglas and Harriet Purvis, who were often left out of the conversation because of their race. The editor and introducer, Sally Roesch Wagner, is a pre-eminent scholar of the diverse backbone of the women's suffrage movement, the founding director of the Matilda Joslyn Gage Foundation, and serves on the New York State Women's Suffrage Commission.

[Online] This successor to the well-known Using Sociology covers standard topics found in any sociology textbook. Doing Sociology walks lay readers through the steps of doing real-life sociological practices as conducted by experts in the field. Readable, relevant, and accessible, it is an invaluable resource as a standalone course reader or as a supplement to a traditional textbook.

This book examines the increasing marginalization of and response by people living in urban areas throughout the Western Hemisphere, and both the local and global implications of continued colonial racial hierarchies and the often-dire consequences they have for people perceived as different. However, in the aftermath of recent U.S. elections, whiteness also seems to embody strictures on religion, ethnicity, country of origin, and almost any other personal characteristic deemed suspect at the moment. For that reason, gender, race, and even class, collectively, may not be sufficient units of analysis to study the marginalizing mechanisms of the urban center. The authors interrogate the social and institutional structures that facilitate the disenfranchisement or downward trajectory of groups, and their potential or subsequent lack of access to mainstream rewards. The book also seeks to highlight examples where marginalized groups have found ways to assert their equality. No recent texts have attempted to connect the mechanisms of marginality across geographical and political boundaries within the Western Hemisphere.

"Superbly conceptualises and contextualises social justice in and for our global age. The stellar cast of sociologists connect concepts to practices and outline the challenges we face, as well as providing necessary responses." Gurminder K Bhambra, Professor of Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies, University of Sussex"A collection of brilliant essays by international scholar-activists, examining concepts and practices from diverse contexts."Mary Romero, Professor of Justice Studies and Social Inquiry, Arizona State University"An excellent set of chapters bringing to the fore new perspectives on the social injustices and inequalities facing a world in crisis."Kammila Naidoo, Professor of Sociology, University of JohannesburgBy using contextual global sociology, Sociology and Social Justice explores: Historic and contemporary sites and contexts around the world Sociological insights on topics ranging from social movements, to cyber space. International struggles, processes, and outcomes Written by distinguished international scholars, this is an essential text for those looking at issues of: Human Rights, Public Sociology, Democratization, Gender, and Globalization.