in the Classroom

When I teach, I aim to share the analytic logic of social science and sociology, not to convey raw information or provide content. When my students are lawyers or teachers, and the intellectual leaders of their community, I want them to understand and explain their world, and that is not something that can be accomplished simply by remembering who a famous sociologist was was, or memorizing the intellectual antecedents to conflict theory.

I especially enjoy introducing students to the logic of the everyday. Because I am convinced that social science explains almost every aspect of our social, political, and cultural worlds, my goal is to give students access to this insight. I am always excited when one of my students switches to major in sociology after taking one of my courses.

I thus have two primary goals as an educator. The first is to train students to use social science to understand their surroundings and experiences, and recognize how and why their perceptions of inequality may differ from others. The second is to help students develop skills that make them better thinkers, employees, and informed citizens.