Sociology

Globally, we are safer than we were a century ago. Whether in terms of war, industrial accidents or even diseases. Yet, today, we face risks which have the potential to be world problems. What is the nature of the new risks we face today? How should societies today respond? The spread of the coronavirus is an example of the uncertainty with which we will have to live. It will not be the last challenge we will face globally.

changed since the outbreak of Covid-19, including the availability of certain foodstuffs, or rather the lack of them. This session looks at three key areas: how public health threats affect the ways in which we produce and consume food; the vulnerability of our main food suppliers to sudden disruptions; and, finally, where responsibility might lie for ensuring domestic food security.

The individual actions you did this morning getting to school (think about what how you got up, what you did immediately after, what you chose to wear, eat, how you got here, and why you came here in the first place etc). Then discuss the extent to which you think these actions were (a) shaped by learned ‘social norms’ and ‘social values’ (i.e. behaviour we do because most other people in our society or culture do them), or were (b) our genuine free choices that we as individuals were able to make, free from these ‘social norms’ and ‘social values’?

The study of cinema exhibition offers us a fascinating insight into the unique relationship between the moving image and its audiences. This illustrated talk, suitable for students working in a wide range of subjects - including Film and Media, English, History and Sociology - will investigate the way in which our experience of cinema has developed from the very intimate and personal ‘peephole viewing’ of Edison’s kinetoscope to the truly social, immersive experiences we recognise today.  We’ll take in the lavish 1,000+ seater auditorium or ‘dream palace’, the ‘drive-in’ popular with American youths, the bespoke movie theatre and the multiplex. And we’ll consider whether the increasingly popular ‘pop up’ cinema, site-specific screenings and the ‘open cinema’ movement (aimed at extending exhibition to excluded communities) is the future of independent cinema exhibition in the UK. 

How much of your life is defined by what you buy and your identity as a consumer? This session is about how consumption has replaced production as the main way that our society identifies its members. In this session, you will consider how consumption has become so common in how we understand ourselves and lifestyles, our relationships with institutions, our work-life-balance, and our intimate lives.