Link to Archive of Issues Graduate Social Theory: Readings and Suggested Measures of Learning

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Soc. 555-01: Seminar in Social Theory

Mirror Sites:
CSUDH Habermas UWP

California State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Created: June 6, 2001
Latest update: October 31, 2001
 E-Mailjeannecurran@habermas.org

Graduate Social Theory Readings
Week of October 29, 2001: Week 10

Special instructions for October 31, 2001: Field Work
NO CLASS TIME!

  • Online readings for Halloween.
  • Theory in hardcopy text for Halloween.
  • Discussion topic for first thesis project practice.

    I'll be adding to this over the next week. Be sure to check. jeanne

    • Online Readings:

        For Halloween:

      • Local versus Cosmopolitan Narrative New York Times article on Nigerian massacre. Relegated to inside page because of local concern with terrorism and Afghanistan. Read for the shaping of the dominant discourse.
      • Instructions for Thesis Project
      • jeanne's November Novel This is the novel jeanne has undertaken to write in November to match your writing of your thesis project. I think the experience of doing a thesis project, at least one that you do for yourself, in a specifically limited time frame, is an important learning tool for all graduate students.

        Because a number of you have contacted me over the last several days with concerns for your children and for general safety this week, we are going to do a field assignment for the October 31 meeting. Start your November thesis project. I expect you to write a paragraph a day, starting with November 1 through November 30. Follow my lead in the November Novel. Use our October 31 class time to choose a topic; see my choosing of a topic for my novel in Installments 1 through 4 of the planning stage. I'll put up more instructions for the thesis project soon. jeanne

    • Hardcopy Readings:

        For Halloween: Contemporary Social Theory, ed. by Anthony Elliott.

      • Chapter 15. DissemiNation: Time, Narrative and the Margins of the Modern Nation by Homi K. Bhaba. Pp. 211-219.

        Conceptual linking to the Nigerian massacre article: How we prioritize the "unthinkable" is based on the structural context in which we find ourselves - our Nation - and the dominant discourse in our nation of the nation in which the massacre occurred. Race and political discourse affect the priority we assign to mass killings. Imagine the killing of hundreds of people in the US at the present time.

        Bhaba assumes a strong background in theory. I will get up supportive material shortly. jeanne, October 31, 2001.

    • Some Suggested Measures of Learning:

      Comment on one of the following topics, or do something of your own choosing.

        For Halloween:

      1. Explain how the inside page positioning of the story of the Nigeria massacre was determined in part by the dominant discourse of the US. Consider the online readings and the hardcopy readings for the Nigerian massacre.