Communities and Social Dynamics - 2nd semester
Objectives
1. Define courses main concepts
2. Recognize the renewal of communities conceptualization and theorization as social networks and spaces of sociability and socialization;
3. Reflect on the theoretical sociological frameworks of community;
4. Communicate rigorously results of sociological studies that take communities as sociological research objects;
5. Question on current communities, both locally circumscribed or un-territorialized, from the approached theoretical frameworks.
General characterization
Code
711081054
Credits
6
Responsible teacher
Maria Margarida Marques, Paula Reis
Hours
Weekly - 4
Total - Available soon
Teaching language
Portuguese
Prerequisites
Bibliography
BELL, Colin and NEWBY, Howard, Community Studies. An Introduction to the Sociology of the Local Community. Bóston, George Allen & Unwin, 1971.
BRINT, Steven. Gemeinschaft Revisited: A Critique and Reconstruction of the Community Concept. Sociological Theory 19(1), pp.1-23.2001
CASTELLS, Manuel. A era da informação (Vol.1): A sociedade em rede. Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2000.
COHEN, Anthony P., The Symbolic Construction of Community, London, Routledge, 2007.
DELANTY, Gerard, Community, London, Routledge, 2003.
PUTNAM, Robert D., Bowling Alone. The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York, Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 2000.
NISBET, Rober. The sociological tradition. New York : Basic Books, 1993.
TÖNNIES, Ferdinand, Community and Society, New York, Dover Publications, 1957.
WELLMAN, Barry, Networks in the Global Village. Life in Contemporary Communities. Oxford, Westview Press, 1999.
Teaching method
Theoretical and practical sessions. Each theoretical lecture exposes concepts and fundamental theoretical frameworks. Practical lessons work on understanding, discussing and oral and written capacities. They are organized around relevant educational material to the topic in question, whether films/ documentary clips or discussion of texts previously read by students. Some practical lessons serve to follow the students essays, which should be realized outside the class.
In class teaching
Evaluation method
Continuous assessment of participation in practical lessons, with requested work (10%);
Reading form of a relevant text to the written essay, in group (15%)
Presentation, in a practical lesson, of the literature search and the questioning to the essay around a relevant topic for research, in group (20%)
Written essay, in group, whose elaboration will be accompanied along the practical lessons (25%)
Wrriten presential Test (30%)
Subject matter
1. Community and Utopia: the European tradition.
2. Community Society dichotomy: Tönnies, Durkheim and Weber.
3. Rural communities and peasant societies.
4. Community and nationality.
5. Community and modernity: from the loss of community nostalgia to the individuation of civic culture
6. Urban communities: locality, identity and belonging. From Chicago School to Human Ecology, from Green Community to Sustainability.
7. Community and diversity: migrations, networks and enclaves as source of diversity and social and cultural complexity.
8. Communities and social capital: Bowling Alone or the decline of the idea of community in America. Thesis and antithesis.
9. Personal communities and social networks. The strength of weak ties or the networked community.
10. Virtual communities: belong, communicating.