Contemporary Social Structure
The objective of the course is to familiarize the students with the main contributions of sociology on the processes of structuring contemporary social inequality. The different theoretical approaches to the structuring axes of inequality (especially class, gender, ethnicity and age) and their empirical application will be worked on. The theoretical approaches and the historical framework are basically limited to the formation of Western patriarchal capitalist societies.
Students must develop the necessary learning skills to collect, process and analyze information in a critical manner, as well as to compare and define the implications of the main contemporary sociological debates on social structures, and to analyze the different ideological readings of inequality from a comparative perspective.
Important Notice on Course Suitability and Activities:
Some Summer School courses are designed for students with prior academic background in a specific discipline and may be unsuitable for participants without that preparation.
In addition, certain courses include discipline-standard practical activities (for example, laboratory work with biological specimens, dissections, use of clinical or forensic material, field sampling, or other hands-on procedures) that may be unfamiliar or unsettling for some participants.
Students are responsible for reading the course descriptor carefully and ensuring (i) that they meet any stated academic expectations or prerequisites, and (ii) that they are comfortable participating in the methods and activities described.
If you are unsure about suitability, please contact the course lecturer(s) before enrolling.
| Week | Contents | Teaching / learning activities |
|---|---|---|
| 1 |
|
Seminar: dealing with sociological questions |
| 2 |
|
Video activity: Analysing a social phenomenon |
| 3 |
|
Group project: final project analysing a social phenomenon from a sociological perspective. |
The evaluation consists of 3 evidences: 2 individual (each one 30%) and 1 group project (40%).
Seminar: Friday first week
Video activity: Friday second week
Group project: Friday third week
Academic integrity notice: any form of plagiarism in work submitted for this course will be treated as a serious academic offence and may result in an automatic fail grade.
- Mills, C. W. (2000). The sociological imagination. Oxford University Press. Chap 1
- Wallerstein, I. (1998). Open de Social Sciences. Report of the Gulbenkian. Chap 1
- Keirns, N. J., Strayer, E., Griffiths, H., Vyain, S., Bry, J. D., Cody-Rydzewski, S., ... & Sadler, T. (2015). Introduction to Sociology 2e: OpenStax.
- Martin, J. L. (2009). Social structures. In Social Structures. Princeton University Press.
- Clemens, E. S., & Cook, J. M. (1999). Politics and institutionalism: Explaining durability and change. Annual review of sociology, 441-466.
- Littek, W. (2001). International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences || Labor, Division of. , (), 8220–8226. doi:10.1016/b0-08-043076-7/01908-2Fitxer
- Narotzky, S. (2018). Rethinking the concept of labour. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 24(S1), 29-43.
- Federici, S. (2004). Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation, Autonomedia. New York. Chapt 2
- Wallach Scott, J. (2010). Gender: Still a Useful Category of Analysis? Diogenes, 57(1), 7–14.
- Winant, H. (2000). The theoretical status of the concept of race. Theories of race and racism: A reader. Chap 13
Joan Pubill Brugués is a historian and lecturer at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. His research focuses on the crisis of modernity, counterrevolution, and anti-parliamentary ideological traditions. He has published in various indexed journals and in collective volumes with publishers such as Peter Lang, Routledge, Marcial Pons, and Comares. He is co-editor of Las sombras de la transparencia. Secreto, corrupción y “estado profundo” en Europa contemporánea (Comares, 2022) and Corruption, Anti-Corruption, Vigilance, and State Building from Early to Late Modern Times (Routledge, 2025).
- Department of the Modern and Contemporary History
- Email: joan.pubill@uab.cat