SOCY-402 examines contemporary social theory.  A social theory is an idea or set of ideas about society.  It may come out of the social sciences, it may come from political practices, it may come from personal experience, or it may come out of the arts.  Our goal is to read these ideas, make sense of them (the language of many is difficult), and apply them to contemporary issues.  The theorists and theories are divided up by their approach to organizing social structures.  I try to organize readings from interactional to structural.  This course presents ideas about society from the 20th century; from both men and women; from authors across the world; and from authors who speak out of a wide variety of racial and ethnic identifications.  The authors present perspectives that include Scientific Positivism, Feminism, Marxism, Afro-Centrism, Postmodernism, and more.  This course is demanding.  But these theories have the capacity to transform the way that you engage the world.