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Graduate Studies, Office of the Dean
York University
230 York Lanes - 4700 Keele Street 1
Toronto, ON, Canada M3J 1P3
Tel: (416) 736-5521
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Change to Program/Graduate Diploma Academic Requirements
Proposal Template
The following information is required for all proposals involving a change to program/graduate diploma academic
requirements, including admission requirements. To facilitate the review/approval process, please use the headings
below (and omit the italicized explanations below each heading).
1. Program/Graduate Diploma: Graduate Program in Sociology
2. Effective Session of Proposed Change(s): Fall/Winter 2015-2016
3. Proposed Change(s) and Rationale
The description of and rationale for the proposed change(s) should provide information with respect to
each of the following points. Please provide:
a) A description of the proposed change(s) and rationale, including alignment with academic
plans.
The Graduate Program in Sociology currently has five approved OCGS fields: Critical Social
Theory; Culture and Identities; Global Sociology; Nature/Society/Culture; Processes, Practices and
Power. In the fall of 2013 the Curriculum Committee was tasked with reviewing and revising these
fields. This mandate was in response to a major recommendation of the 2013 Cyclical Program Review
Report, specifically that the Program review the “the definition of the Quality Council-approved fields
and the manner in which these articulate with comprehensive sub-areas and with faculty members’
research areas.” The suggestion that the fields require revision is echoed in several other sections of the
report and has also been raised at a number of Graduate Program meetings over the past few years.
The proposed revisions better reflect areas of expertise of current faculty members, recent hiring,
trends in the discipline, and the research interests of graduate applicants. These changes do not reflect a
change in substance, focus, or direction of the program or the degree requirements.
b) An outline of the changes to requirements and the associated learning outcomes, including
how the proposed requirements will support the achievement of program/graduate diploma
learning objectives.
Program requirements for both the MA program and PhD program will remain the same. The
revisions will enhance learning outcomes by better clarifying the relationship between the core parts of
the curriculum—courses, fields of study, comprehensives, theses, etc. The addition of the Methods and
Epistemology field, for example, is designed to make explicit the complexity of knowledge, of how
general and discipline-specific beliefs operate together, and of the relationship between epistemological
perspectives and interpretations and methods.
The changes will also bring the Graduate Program into closer alignment with our recent
departmental hiring and with graduate applications at the MA and PhD levels.
c) An overview of the consultation undertaken with relevant academic units and an assessment of
the impact of the modifications on other programs/graduate diplomas. (Where and as appropriate,
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Graduate Studies, Office of the Dean
York University
230 York Lanes - 4700 Keele Street 2
Toronto, ON, Canada M3J 1P3
Tel: (416) 736-5521
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the proposal must include statements from the relevant program/graduate diplomas confirming
consultation/support.)
The Curriculum Committee held a series of meetings with faculty and students to discuss the
degree to which the current fields represented their research interests and their views on revising the
fields. An email survey was used to solicit feedback from program members unable to attend these
meetings. This information was used to revise the description of the fields to more clearly articulate the
Program’s areas of strength; pave the way for a clearer link between the fields and the comprehensives;
and respond to the concerns raised by the Cyclical Review in a meaningful way. A motion to adopt the
revised fields of interest was approved at the April 16 program meeting.
The modifications to the description of the fields have no impact on other programs/graduate
diplomas.
d) A summary of any resource implications and how they are being addressed. (Attention should be
paid to whether the proposed changes will be supported by a reallocation of existing resources or if
new/additional resources are required. If new/additional resources are required, the proposal must
include a statement from the relevant Dean(s)/Principal.)
The resource implications will be minimal and temporary. Beyond the resources needed to
inform students, faculty, and external audiences (e.g., on websites, application forms, and print material
advertising the program), there will be no new resources required.
e) A summary of how students currently enrolled in the program/graduate diploma will be
accommodated.
No accommodation is required. The changes to the fields will be communicated to students
through the website, by email, and in a Program meeting.
4. Calendar Copy
Using the following two-column format, provide a copy of the relevant program/graduate diploma
requirements as they will appear in the graduate Calendar.
Existing Program/Graduate Diploma Information
(change from)
Proposed Program/Graduate Diploma Information
(change to)
Fields of interest: critical social theory; global
sociology; culture and identities; processes,
practices and power; nature/society/culture
Fields of interest: critical social theory; global
sociology; culture and identities; inequalities, power,
and social justice; methods and epistemology
Critical Social Theory. The Graduate Program in
Sociology is widely recognized for providing
rigorous and diverse training in classical and
contemporary theory, as well as for sustaining
innovative research from a variety of theoretical
paradigms. Our program’s distinctiveness stems
from its long-standing commitment to critical and
interpretive approaches. Rooted as they are in the
classics, these approaches also include more recent
developments in Marxism, phenomenology and
hermeneutics, German and French strands of critical
Critical Social Theory. This field combines rigorous
and diverse scholarship in classical and
contemporary theory. It likewise sustains innovative
research from a variety of theoretical paradigms. Our
program’s distinctiveness stems from its longstanding commitment to critical and interpretive
approaches. Rooted as they are in the classics, these
approaches also include more recent developments in
Marxism, social interactionism, phenomenology and
hermeneutics, German and French strands of critical
theory, feminist theory, critical race theory,
postcolonialism, and poststructuralism. These diverse
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Graduate Studies, Office of the Dean
York University
theory, feminist theory, critical race theory,
postcolonialism, and poststructuralism. These
diverse perspectives share a commitment to
interpreting the meaning of social action,
questioning the taken-for-granted character of
everyday life and that of the existing social order.
They, likewise, pay attention to various forms of
power in society.
Global Sociology. This field combines the program’s
longstanding interest in area studies, comparative
sociology, critical development studies, and refugee
and immigration studies with emerging work in
global approaches to citizenship studies, transnational
social and cultural formations, and the cultural
politics of environment. Researchers address the
interactions among the local, national, and global
dimensions of social and cultural life.
The program has a strong institutional history
in the study of four regions: Latin America and the
Caribbean, South and South-East Asia, North
America, and the Middle East. Substantive research
has dealt with topics such as: diasporas,displacement
and exile; social movements; genealogies of
development; identities and space; networks; state
policies and responses to migration; genealogies of
citizenship beyond the nation-state; the constitution
of public spaces through new communications
technologies; global environmental issues; the roles
of women in migrant communities; the political
economy of health; and the character of urban
cultures and economies in world cities.
Culture and Identities. This field unites the
program’s traditional strengths in interactionist,
phenomenological, and social-psychological
approaches to cultural processes and the self with
pioneering work in cultural studies on the
representation, proliferation and politicization of
identities grounded in newer paradigms
(postcolonialism, poststructuralism, queer and
diaspora studies, etc.).
Fields of inquiry range from studies of the
family, households and intimate relationships to
patterns of socialization, and the role of religion in
social life. The construction of identity through
bodies, sexualities, gender, ethnicities, racialization,
migration, citizenship, cities, space and place, as
well as modes of governmentality are, likewise, a
central concern. These various interests are linked
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perspectives share a commitment to interpreting the
meaning of social action and questioning the takenfor-granted character of everyday life and the
existing social order. They also pay attention to
various forms of power in society.
Global Sociology. Research in area studies,
comparative sociology, critical development studies,
and in refugees and immigration is brought together
with emerging work on global and transnational
approaches to citizenship, social and cultural
formations, and the politics of the environment.
Research in this field addresses the interactions
among the local, national, and global dimensions of
social and cultural life.
The focus is on four regions: Latin America
and the Caribbean, South and South-East Asia, North
America, and the Middle East. Substantive research
deals with such diverse topics as: diasporas,
displacement and exile; genealogies of development;
identities and space; networks; state policies and
responses to migration; genealogies of citizenship
beyond the nation-state; the constitution of public
spaces through new communications technologies;
global environmental issues; the roles of women in
migrant communities; the political economy of
health; and the character of urban cultures and
economies in world cities.
Culture and Identities. This field explores the
intersections between identities and cultures in a
range of social relationships and contexts. It
combines the program’s traditional strengths in
interactionist, phenomenological, and socialpsychological approaches with paradigms in
postcolonialism, poststructuralism, queer and
diaspora studies.
The construction of identity through
bodies, sexualities, class, gender, ethnicities,
racialization, migration, citizenship, religion,
space and place, as well as modes of
governmentality, are a central concern.
Attention is paid to the ways in which these
categories and practices intersect with various
relations of power.
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Graduate Studies, Office of the Dean
York University
230 York Lanes - 4700 Keele Street 4
Toronto, ON, Canada M3J 1P3
Tel: (416) 736-5521
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through their commitment to a specifically
sociological focus on cultural processes, the
relations of power, and the sites of socio-political
struggle shaping these processes. Methodological
strategies include the use of historical, crosscultural, survey, interpretive, textual, and
ethnographic research.
Processes, Practices and Power. This field
integrates teaching and research on social processes,
institutional practices, and power and inequality.
Members of the program study the forms, practices,
and textures of institutional life, including how they
are generated and reproduced, where and by whom,
their effects, particularly in terms of social and
moral regulation, and forms and means of resistance
and change from both a contemporary and historical
perspective. These topics are taken up in both
Canadian and international contexts, especially in
relation to the workings of race and racialization,
ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and class. Areas of
concentration within the field include: Work and
Labour; Health Studies; Social Regulation; Law and
Crime; and the Sociology of Education.
Current research deals with the links
between class, education, and social mobility; social
movements acting within civil society;
governmental discourses and mechanisms;
transnational organized crime and corruption;
violence, abuse and conflict resolution; narrative
forms of popular trials; comparative studies on the
restructuring of global capitalism and labour
relations; the gendered, racialized, and class-based
character of health systems; structural sources of
racism, capitalism, and patriarchy; the development
and influence of intellectual, economic, and political
elites; and varieties of social histories.
Nature/Society/Culture. This field regroups
teaching and research in a number of established and
emerging areas of interest: environmental sociology,
the sociology of the body, governmentality
approaches to health, and critical studies of science
and technology. Work in these fields underlines the
indelibly socio-cultural character of naturalized
categories and practices, such as the body, sexuality,
the life course, health and illness, and technoscience. Attention is focused on the ways in which
these categories and practices intersect with various
relations of power in society (gender, sexuality,
class, race and ethnicity), as well as how more
Inequalities, Power, and Social Justice. This field
brings together work in a variety of areas -- health,
education, work, labour, incomes, housing, families,
organizations and meaning. The emphasis is on the
study of social inequalities, power, and struggles for
social justice from a variety of contemporary and
historical perspectives, including: political economy,
historical/political sociology, critical social theory,
poststructuralism, and feminism.
In general, the focus is on the forms, practices,
and textures of institutional and everyday life that
produce inequality, including how it is generated and
reproduced, where and by whom, and with what
effects on social and moral regulation. Studies of
social inequality may have a parallel emphasis on
justice, resistance and change, on the role of
advocacy and activism, on large-scale social
movements, and on community-based research.
Methods and Epistemology. The focus here is on the
dynamic interplay of theory and methods in
conducting inquiries into “the social”--including the
structural constraints and experiences we must
negotiate as sociologists. This field explores how
theories, ideologies, politics, identities, and/or
locations enter what can be known as well as the
tools, techniques, practices, and/or lenses that are
used to explore and critique knowledges. The use of,
quantitative, qualitative, primary and secondary data
are addressed. It likewise includes deconstruction,
and comparative-historical strategies as these
approaches are applied to the wide array of
institutions and practices that are studied by
sociologists today.
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Graduate Studies, Office of the Dean
York University
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Toronto, ON, Canada M3J 1P3
democratic processes of public participation can be
fostered. The aim is to explore the boundaries
between the natural, social, and the cultural realm,
as they have been conventionally constituted in the
human sciences. A principal concern is the causes
and consequences of environmental degradation.
The focus is on environmentalism, violence, and
displacement; the intersection of the urban and
nature; and the impact of techno-scientific
developments upon social life.
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Tel: (416) 736-5521
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