tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363Fri, 17 Apr 2026 09:18:29 +0000CSNSoc 101CulturePowerSoc 205PoliticsSocietyEconomicsSoc 102Sociological ImaginationSpring 2009Public PolicyAngelSocial ProblemsFreedomSociologyTeachingSummer 2009WebCTFall 2011Health CareAcademic StudyFall 2010Spring 2011FPPStigmawritingChoiceSize AcceptanceSpring 2012Summer 2010TheoryFall 2009FilmOrganizational StudiesPovertyDisabilitiesSpanishSpring 2010"The Sociological Imagination ... our most needed quality of mind." -- C. Wright Millshttp://doingsociology.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Pattie)Blogger140125en-usnocopyright 2002, 2003, 2004 Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomassociology,organizations,public,issues,groups,public,radio,constructionist,deconstruct,war,sex,sociological,imagination,animals,pets,control,power,power,elite,critique,cultural,commentary,culture,consumption,consumerism,technopoly,mediMaking Sociology Excessively Attractive. Episodes of First Person Plural, a sociology radio show that aired on CFUV, FM Radio in Victoria, British Columbia from 2002 to 2004.First Person PluralCarl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomaspattie_thomas@yahoo.comCarl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomastag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-2186521362668812746Mon, 25 Sep 2017 04:10:00 +00002017-09-24T21:10:52.838-07:00#WeKneelWithYou #1stAmendment #WeThePeople #ResistThePoliceState #BlackLivesMatter #TakeTheKnee I am beginning with the above hashtags because I want to be clear about my point of view. I am supportive of the protests today and the right to protest. White Folks Showing Support I also feel that it is important as a white woman, a teacher and a sociologist to not remain silent at this moment http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2017/09/kaepernick-race-and-ritualism-one-point.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-4097294346890511620Thu, 07 Jan 2016 20:00:00 +00002017-01-07T11:47:47.143-08:00 I wrote this blog entry 5 years ago, and then wrote a series the next year called "Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World." With the election of Donald Trump and the divisions the society where I live seems to have, I think it is worth a revisit to these ideas. I don't think the articles are too dated, sadly. At the bottom of the page, I will provide links to the 2013 series. I write this http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2012/01/what-does-sociology-have-to-offer-in.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-8832064645449895455Tue, 01 Jul 2014 19:55:00 +00002014-07-01T12:55:57.709-07:00 For the past several decades, a series of SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) has made a series of decisions that have simultaneously increased corporate power while reducing person freedoms and civil rights. Yesterday's decision (Burwell v. Hobby Lobby) was not the most egregious of these decisions, but certainly within the context of the court's record, the decision was cause for http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2014/07/why-sociology-will-be-needed-to-correct.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-427772188400638804Sun, 24 Nov 2013 21:37:00 +00002013-11-24T13:38:18.822-08:00CultureEconomicsFreedomPublic PolicySociological ImaginationLast Friday marked the 50th anniversary of the assassination of John F. Kennedy. I was too young to really remember much about it. I was in first grade. I remember getting a day off from school and watching a parade and not understanding why it was making my mom cry. I don't recall much else about it. It was 1968 before I got how crazy the world had become in the 1960s. The assassinations of http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-many-other-things-do-we-not-know.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-8073019727161017054Tue, 03 Sep 2013 03:36:00 +00002013-11-24T13:38:18.824-08:00CultureEconomicsFreedomPublic PolicySociological Imagination Two weeks ago, on August 19, I started the first full-time job I've had in 19 years. So the post I am about to make here is a little ironic. But there is a difference between what could/should be and what is. Today, Labor Day, I want to talk about what needs to change. First, I'm going to cheat and offer you a crash course in US economic history in the form of two episodes of Crashcourse, http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-differences-among-labor-work-and-job.html1pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-7988659713609522437Sun, 31 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-31T06:00:05.733-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological ImaginationThis is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology offers context to almost any human endeavor. I jokingly tell people that I got my degree in sociology because I am interested in everything. Joking or not, this is true. Anything that involves two or more humans is fair game for sociological analysis. This is the key to the sociological imagination concept that is http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-7-everything-is-sociological.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-1017904771337155328Sat, 30 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-30T06:00:06.109-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology helps hard sciences understand human beings and our ecological settings more fully. One word to look up to make this case: epigenetics. If we know now that the expression of our genetics are, in part, determined by our ancestors' social histories, we need Sociology to help us understand not only our own world,http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-6-epigenetics.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-5997247665299203681Fri, 29 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-29T06:00:09.708-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology helps us design better social organizations. Any MBA worth her salt will tell you that how a business is organized matters. Complex organizations with multi-layers of bureaucratic systems lead to inefficiencies and poor communication. Flatter organizations are less controllable but offer better flow of communicationhttp://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-5-knowing-organizations-saves.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-908881130437395942Thu, 28 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-28T09:28:09.107-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology offers a way for people from diverse countries, cultures and languages to find common ground. In my home county alone, the population has shifted to more diversity between 2000 and 2010 census. This shift is being seen almost everywhere in the United States. But we are interacting globally at a much higher rates http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-4-commonality-in-diversity.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-3865214435115303842Wed, 27 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-27T07:15:58.770-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology offers an understanding of our collective nature that improves our personal lives. There is some controversy in sociology as a discipline as to the extent to which we control our own destinies. But even in the most functionalist, deterministic applications of social theory, which asserts we have little control, a http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-3-improving-our-personal-lives.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-3158492529914999051Tue, 26 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-26T06:00:10.070-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology offers some of the best ways to measure our successes. If we do take the time to ask what does the data tell us and what solutions make sense given that data, we still need sociology to help us see if some solution is working or not. Social data is always difficult to obtain because we are fish studying fish in a http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-2-measuring-success.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-4494047991405619896Mon, 25 Mar 2013 13:00:00 +00002013-03-25T06:00:06.002-07:00CultureEconomicsPoliticsPowerPublic PolicySocial ProblemsSocietySociological Imagination This is part of a series of Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World. Sociology offers a fuller picture of our condition as human beings. No amount of closing our eyes and ears and singing "na-na-na-na" evoking the name of Ayn Rand three times a day, will change the fact that we share our world with each other. What we do and what other people do creates a collective reality that needs to be http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/number-1-fuller-picture.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-1200503487926925585Mon, 25 Mar 2013 01:50:00 +00002013-03-24T18:50:13.025-07:00EconomicsFreedomOrganizational StudiesPoliticsPowerSocial ProblemsSocietySociological ImaginationSociology I've been thinking a lot lately about why I love Sociology so much and why the rest of the world does not. An article in the Huffington Post by Scott Atran called The Folly of Defunding Social Sciences raised some important points. The last sentence caught my eye: There is more to being a citizen than voting! The Founding Fathers envisioned a Republic with an enlightened citizenry educatedhttp://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2013/03/top-7-things-sociology-offers-world.html1pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-687929591564502886Thu, 28 Jun 2012 15:55:00 +00002013-04-01T18:16:07.185-07:00Health CarePoliticsPowerPublic PolicyI am more relieved this morning that I realized I would be when I read the announcement that the US Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of health care insurance reform passed in 2009 (commonly called "Obamacare"). I had mentally prepared for a negative decision, which I believe would have been wrong and would have set a precedent that would have had effects far greater than the measure http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2012/06/btw-we-still-dont-have-universal.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-6908545354509392658Tue, 21 Feb 2012 23:46:00 +00002012-06-14T12:13:07.794-07:00CSNSpring 2012TeachingI created a new page on this website for announcements pertinent to the courses I am teaching at CSN, called CSN ANNOUNCEMENTS (in the tab above). In the future all announcements will be there instead of on the main blog page.http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2012/02/i-created-new-page-on-this-website-for.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-4030479694678758173Wed, 01 Feb 2012 20:22:00 +00002012-02-01T12:22:19.094-08:00CSNSoc 101Spring 2012ATTENTION: STUDENTS IN SOC 101, SEC 2017, 6P TO 8:30P We are moving to a new room for the semester. Room 1443. It is in the Horn Theatre building. Follow the signs once you are in the building and you should be able to find it no problem. This is a permanent change for the semester. Please come early enough on Thursday to find the room.http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2012/02/soc-101-sec-2017-6p-to-830p-room-change.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-4023682488012648232Thu, 08 Dec 2011 21:22:00 +00002011-12-08T13:22:59.654-08:00My apologies for missing class but I'm ill and not shaking it. I will post notes on what was missed online over the weekend and send out notice. We will have class on both Tuesday and Thursday of next week. You might take this time to meet with your groups and finalize your projects -- you will have 15 min in class on Tuesday for you groups as well. Cya next week Dr. Pattiehttp://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/12/soc-101-class-cancelled-tonight-dec-8.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-8302766844329302314Thu, 24 Nov 2011 23:52:00 +00002011-12-02T09:50:56.530-08:00ChoiceCultureFilmFreedomPowerSoc 205Social ProblemsSociologyTeachingwritingI teach a course called "Race and Ethnic Groups in Contemporary Society" and have been asked on several occasions, "what can we do to end racism?" Here is my answer, though simplified: 1. Own up to our racist history--we need to start talking openly and honestly about how America became one of the richest countries in the world through colonization, exploitation and oppressive domination. 2. http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/11/something-for-which-i-am-thankful.html0Las Vegas, NV, USA36.114646 -115.17281635.909413 -115.48867299999999 36.319879 -114.856959pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-1409329465233285736Tue, 22 Nov 2011 21:06:00 +00002011-11-22T13:07:40.866-08:00CSNFall 2011Soc 101SOC 101 -- 2017, ROOM 1060, 6:00P TO 7:20P is cancelled. Happy Thanksgiving See you next Tuesday. http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/11/soc-101-class-cancelled-this-evening.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-7094534446465644769Wed, 16 Nov 2011 23:14:00 +00002011-11-24T16:37:02.112-08:00CSNFall 2011Soc 101Soc 102Soc 205Spring 2012I will be teaching the following 16 WEEK classes in the Spring: CLASS    SECTION  CALL #   ROOM #        DAY & TIME SOC 102    2001      27762    CY1068    Th 9:30AM-12:20PM SOC 101    2021      http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/11/spring-2012-csn-schedule.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-7470697068722112807Mon, 24 Oct 2011 02:18:00 +00002011-11-24T16:34:32.603-08:00CSNFall 2011Soc 101I'm sorry to do this again, but something has come up that will prevent me from being at class on Tuesday. I will announce on Angel changes to schedule due to this unexpected absence. Thank you for your patience. Cheers, Dr. Pattiehttp://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/10/all-of-dr-patties-classes-cancelled.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-4053548649656342743Mon, 10 Oct 2011 19:26:00 +00002011-11-24T16:37:36.897-08:00Disabilitieswriting We have a new joint blog on Psychology Today, examining coupling issues in the context of chronic illness. Today is our first entry. It is also our 19th wedding anniversary Who Gets to Be Sick Today? http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/10/new-joint-blog-on-psychology-today.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-6242062142266413285Wed, 28 Sep 2011 23:41:00 +00002011-11-24T16:35:36.050-08:00CSNFall 2011Soc 101 SOC 102 AND ANTH/SOC 205 will meet on Sept 29 as usual. SOC 101 -- 2017, ROOM 1060, 6:00P TO 7:20P is cancelled. I'm feeling a little better though still under the weather some. I think I can do half day tomorrow, so morning classes will meet as usual, but my evening class is cancelled. Some deadlines will be pushed out to accommodate the missed class. It will probably be tomorrow or Friday http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/09/soc-101-cancelled-thursday-sep-29-6p.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-6040859415424808330Mon, 26 Sep 2011 14:33:00 +00002011-11-24T16:35:54.633-08:00CSNFall 2011Soc 101Soc 102Soc 205SOC 102 -- 2001, ROOM 1218, 9:30A TO 10:50A ANTH/SOC 205 -- 2001, ROOM 1218, 11:00A TO 12:20P SOC 101 -- 2017, ROOM 1060, 6:00P TO 7:20P Classes will be cancelled for Tuesday, Sept 27due to illness. I have a nasty case of bronchitis and do not want to spread contagion. I believe I will be better by Thursday, but look for an announcement here if I am not. Assume we are having class on Thursday http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/09/dr-thomas-classes-are-cancelled-tuesday.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5001264662758629363.post-2320252551129496031Wed, 14 Sep 2011 15:59:00 +00002011-09-14T09:02:21.863-07:00CSNFall 2011Soc 102Social ProblemsSocietyReminder to my 102 students -- here's your chance to meet some of the organizations with whom you might considering doing your community service work. Free food too!http://doingsociology.blogspot.com/2011/09/csn-serves-volunteer-fair.html0pattie_thomas@yahoo.com (Carl Wilkerson & Pattie Thomas)