Postgraduate course 2024/2025

Contemporary Sociological Theories

Type: Elective course

Area of studies: Postgraduate Studies

Delivered by: School of Sociology

When: 2 year, 1 semester

Mode of studies: offline

Open to: students of one campus

Instructors: Arnab Roy Chowdhury

Language: English

ECTS credits: 2

Contact hours: 18

Course Syllabus

Abstract

Today, societies around the world are undergoing numerous large socioeconomic and political transformations, such as globalization and neoliberalism, as well as structural changes in state-society relations and market dynamics. This course uses contemporary sociological theories—which aim to explain these transformations and structural changes in a comparative and historical perspective—to understand the issues that society faces. This course approaches sociological theories and issues in a thematic manner and analyzes socio-economic and political macro categories, groups, markers, and identities (such as class, race, gender, ethnicity, and nation). It considers how macro, meso, and micro social realities interact and intersect, as well as how these interact and transform dynamically through periods of stasis and transformation. Using papers published in prominent sociology journals (such as the Annual Review of Sociology, the American Journal of Sociology, and Theory and Society), the course aims to provide students with the tools to apply these theories creatively in conceptualizing, analyzing, and understanding the complex realities of contemporary society.