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This course is designed to begin development of superior reading skills, through a focus on Extensive Reading. Students will be introduced to a variety of activities during the semester to increase their understanding of how and why they read. Students will read one novel during the course, which they will use for the Book Report assessment component and some in-class activities. Students are free to choose the material they work with during the course, but it must be of a standard appropriate to university. Students will access the resources of the library and on-line facilities provided by the library to choose their material. There will be set reading periods during the second class of each week, where students will take turns to read a section from their chosen book, to practice close reading. During the final week of the course, students will meet with the teacher for a one-on-one discussion of the course.
This book illuminates how culture shapes social world and how society shapes culture. It starts from ways of looking at culture, goes through cultural meaning, culture as a social creation, production of culture, distribution of culture, reception of culture, organizational cultures, cultural communities, and finally ends at the examination of the interactions between culture and power. It explores stories, beliefs, media, ideas, art, religious practices, fashions, and rituals from a sociological perspective, and it provides a wide spectrum of cultural examples from multiple countries and time periods. As the fourth edition, it offers new coverage of nationalism as a cultural object, the construction of gender and sexualities, cross-cultural trust, etc.
