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Listed in: Anthropology and Sociology, as SOCI-47
Ron Lembo (Section 01)
In this course we will examine texts that are marginal to both the discipline of sociology (past and present) and the social mainstream and which, despite or perhaps because of their marginality, provide fresh insight regarding sociological issues and concerns. These texts-some by sociologists, some not-will be used to explore such things as changing modes of technological power, commodity culture, virtuality and its relation to "the real," techniques for normalizing and regulating the self, the formation of the unconscious and its relation to a directive self, varieties of human and non-human agency, especially the "transgressive" sort, globalization and its effects on cultural life, and so on. The transition from Fordism to flexible accumulation, from modern to postmodern conditions, from colonial to postcolonial worlds, will figure importantly in course discussion. Emphasis will be placed throughout the course on identifying concepts and perspectives enabling us to see "the social" in ways unanticipated by conventional sociological thinking. Limited to 20 students. First semester. Professor Lembo.