Choose one of the following two documentaries to watch & write about.
Draw from three sources in the course to explain what is happening in your selected documentary. At least one of those sources must be a reading from the second half of the course. After that, your two remaining sources can be lectures or readings, from the first or second half of the course. The sources you select will likely differ depending on the documentary you select (e.g., for Weiner, you might select Zerubavel’s “The Rules of Denial” to start; for The Prison in Twelve Landscapes, you might select Pager’s “The Mark of a Criminal Record” to start – these are just suggestions).
Your sources should lend some insight into what is happening in the film. You will want to draw upon course concepts to help explain the larger underlying patterns (what we might call the ‘dynamics’, ‘structures’ or ‘processes’). Be sure to make clear how the different course materials fit together (or don’t fit together) in your analysis.
Because space is limited, you should focus more on making these connections with the course materials rather than summarizing the documentary, or writing elaborate intro and conclusion sections (so, more of a report or long-form response than a traditional essay structure). That said, a strong paper should flow in a way that is easy for the reader to follow, and a couple sentences at the beginning and at the end can help with the overall framing. Note: you may focus in on particular sections of the documentary rather than addressing all of it.
Use of sources from outside the course is not required, and these should be used minimally or not at all for Part I of the exam. Part II: Concept Scavenger Hunt (15%, or 3 x 5%) Part II requires you to find examples that illustrate concepts we’ve learned about in the second half of the course, providing a short explanation in each case (see next page for the specific tasks).
Your example in each case must be either a news story, an image, a gif, a meme, or a short video (i.e., some kind of online content). Be sure to copy and paste the items in the document you are submitting. If it is a news story, provide both the url and a screen capture/image of the top of the article (similar to what you see in the lecture slides).Avoid using articles from academic journals as your example.
1. The term cultural capital has recurred across a few weeks. Find an example where cultural capital is demonstrated by drawing from the online content options specified above. Explain the connection. Be sure as part of your response to include an explanation of this concept by drawing on either the reading by Annette Lareau, or the lecture for Week 9, or the lecture for Week 10.
2. Richard Sennett introduces the concept of invidious comparison in his reading from Week 7. Find an example from online content where this process is demonstrated. Be sure to explain what is going on in the example in relation to Sennett’s concept and in relation to what he says are the consequences or effects of invidious comparisons.
3. Present an example from online content where the conversational rituals or communication styles of men and women (based on gender role expectations in Western countries) come into conflict or are contrasted with each other. Be sure to draw from Deborah Tannen’s reading from Week 8 in your analysis.
4. Eviatar Zerubavel, in his reading from Week 8, discusses how “separating the “relevant” from the “irrelevant” is a sociomental act performed by members of particular social communities who are socialized to focus only on certain parts or aspects of situations while systematically ignoring others” (p. 25). Find an example using online content where a group of two or more people are engaged in this kind of ‘sociomental’ act that the author describes. Be sure to explain the quote and how it connects to what is going on in your example.
5. Find a news article or opinion piece where the writer denies or fails to grasp the structural or systemic nature of a social problem such as racism or sexism. What alternative explanation do they offer and how is this flawed? Draw from any material in Week 10 or Week 11 (the lectures or readings) to develop your explanation.
6. Find a news article or video news segment about a for-profit long-term care home or chain of nursing homes that has seen a high number of COVID-19 deaths during the pandemic. How do the problems with the home(s) identified in the article relate to those described in the reading by Pat Armstrong et al. in Week 12? Be sure to consider the larger context the authors describe around neoliberal government policies.
Reflective Learning Exercise (5%) Tell us about something you learned from the course. Perhaps your thinking on a social issue changed, or perhaps you gained a new perspective on society, or perhaps you’ve gained some insight into our everyday experiences of living through a pandemic. Provide at least 250 words. You don’t need to reference a particular reading or lecture per sethough you are encouraged to reflect on the course material in a general sense. This will be marked in a similar fashion to the discussion forum responses, but out of 5 in this case.
