SECTION I. TOWARD AN UNDERSTANDING OF CURRENT SOCIAL PROBLEMS
Chapter 1. A Conceptual Tool Kit
Chapter 2. Thinking About Social Problems
1. The Sociological Imagination, C. Wright Mills
Why history is necessary to understand experience; how social problems (issues) differ from individual troubles
2. Toward a New Vision: Race, Class, and Gender as Categories of Analysis and Connection, Patricia Hill Collins
How everyone’s life experience exists within overlapping structures of race, gender and class
3. The Limits of Science in Understanding Who We Are, Barbara Katz Rothman
How science constructs problems and solutions
4. Why I Love Trash, Joshua Gamson
How the media shapes our common sense understandings of difference and deviance
5. The Reproduction of Inequality: Interactionist Analysis,Michael Schwalbe, Sandra Godwin, Daphne Holden, Douglas Schrock, Shealy Thompson, Michele Wolkomir
How our uncritical choices and behavior remake inequality every day
SECTION II. SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND INEQUALITY
Chapter 3. Power, Capitalism and Globalization
6. One World, Ready or Not: The Manic Logic of Global Capitalism, William Greider
How the forces of global capitalism contribute to worldwide inequality
7. Enchanting a Disenchanted World: Revolutionizing the Means of Consumption, George Ritzer
How U.S. consumerism is affecting other cultures around the world
8. Corporate Welfare, Donald L. Barlett and James B Steele
How the U.S. government spends more money on aid to wealthy corporations than on aid to the nation’s poor
9. The Social Psychology of Modern Slavery, Kevin Bales
How contemporary forms of slavery are created and maintained within the global economy
10. Disposable Domestics: Immigrant Women in the Global Economy, Grace Chang
How immigration laws lead to the economic exploitation women
Chapter 4. Poverty
11. A World of Poverty, John Isbister
Why wealthy corporation share responsibility for the conditions of impoverished countries
12. Ghetto-Related Behavior and the Structure of Opportunity, William Julius Wilson
How poverty and racism limit the choices available to individuals in poor neighborhoods
13. The Enemy Within, Ruth Sidel
Why women on welfare have become the scapegoat for a variety of social problems
14. Without a Safety Net, Barbara Ehrenreich and Frances Fox Piven
What happens to former welfare recipients when the jobs are gone
15. Making Ends Meet on a Welfare Check, Katheryn Edin and Laura Lein
An examination of the many difficulties facing families on welfare
Chapter 5. Race and Ethnicity
16. American Diversity and the 2000 Census, Nathan Glazer
How race has been constructed through 200 years of governmental census taking
17. Exploring Asian Americans: The Myth of the “Model Minority” and the Reality of Their Lives, Jieli Li
How racial stereotypes obscure ethnic differences and real social problems
18. The Black-White Test Score Gap, Christopher Jencks and Meredith Phillips
How biased edicational tests hinder the success of non-whites
19. The Place of Women Inside Organized Racism, Kathleen Blee
How traditional gender roles support organized racist groups
20. Beyond Black and White: Ethnoviolence Between Oppressed Groups, Barbara Perry
How intercultural violence works to maintain social boundaries, group privileges, and racial hierarchies
Chapter 6. Gender and Sexuality
21. Supremacy Crimes, Gloria Steinem
Serious consequences of media blindness to the gender of the killers at Columbine High School
22. Why Gender Matters: Women, Militarism, and Violence, Amy Caiazza
Why attention to women is necessary to curb support for terrorism and to secure peace
23. Domestic Violence Among the Navajo: A Legacy of Colonization, Diane McEachern, Marlene Van Winkel, and Sue Steiner
Why US military domination and intentional obliteration of Navajo culture led to woman battery
24. Embattled Terrain, Judith Lorber
An evaulation of the evidence supporting different explanations of sexuality
25. Family Man: Fatherhood, Housework, and Gender Equity, Scott Coltrane
Why it is difficult for heterosexual couples to change the way they enact care-giving roles
SECTION III. SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS
Chapter 7. Work
26. White-Collar Sweatshop, Jill Andresky Fraser
Corporate America’s attempts to define the nature of work
27. The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work, Arlie Hochschild
How women and men deal with the conflicts between work and family demands
28. Nickle and Dimed: On (not) Getting By in America, Barbara Ehrenreich
What happens when the author tries to support herself in the low-wage labor market
29. Gang Business: Making Ends Meet, Martin Sanchez Jankowski
How urban gangs share the same entrepreneurial spirit that drives successful corporate leaders
30. The Effects of Affirmative Action on Other Stakeholders, Barbara Reskin
The ways that affirmative action issues are constructed by policy stakeholders
Chapter 8. Family
31. The Myth of Family Decline, Edward L. Kain
Why many common sense ideas about family are wrong.
32. Families on the Fault Line: America’s Working Class Speaks about the Family, the Economy, Race, and Ethnicity, Lillian Rubin
How economic change particularly burdens working class families
33. Lesbians Blurring the Boundaries and Transforming the Meaning of Parenthood and Kinship, Gillian A. Dunne
How lesbian mothers redefine the boundaries, meaning, and content of parenthood
34. Activist Mothering, Community Caretaking, and Civic Work, Nancy A. Naples
How a broader notion of “mothering” can lead women to political action
35. Dubious Conception: The Politics of Teenage Pregnancy Kristen Luker
Why both liberals and conservatives are wrong about teen pregnancy
Chapter 9. Education
36. Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools, Jonathon Kozol
How poverty produces devastating results on the education of America’s children
37. How Corporations are Buying Their Way into America’s Classrooms, Steven Manning
Ways that the growing influence of large corporations is shaping the educational experience for students
38. Missing in Interaction, Myra Sadker and David Sadker
How teachers in America’s schools perpetuate gender inequality
39. Confronting White Students: The Whiteness of University Spaces, Joe R. Feagin, Hernan Vera and Nikitah Imani
The consequences of institutionalized racism at universities across the country
40. Religion and Public Education in a Multicultural America, James Fraser
Why religious tolerance must be included in the increasingly diverse classrooms of America’s schools
Chapter 10. The Criminal Justice System
41. Crime and Policy, Steven R. Donziger
Why criminal justice policy is driven by myths not the realities of crime
42. Steeltown Lockdown, Barry Yeoman
How corrections policy is controlled by a prison-industrial complex
43. Who Own’s Death?, Robert Lifton and Greg Mitchell
An evaulation of the social and political context of the death penalty in the USA
44. DWB Is Not a Crime: The Numbers Show that Police Unfairly and Unconstitutionally Pull Over More Cars Driven By Blacks, John Lamberth
How racial profiling in traffic stops can be demonstrated
45. “Whodunit? An Examination of the Production of Wrongful Convictions, William S. Lofquist
How normal, day-to-day, routine decision making in a flawed system produced a wrongful conviction
46. “I Don’t have to be Afraid of You,” Amanda Konradi
Why and how sexual assault survivors manage their emotions during their court appearances
Chapter 11. Illness and Health Care
47. Your Money or Your Life: Access to Medical Care as a Social Problem, Robert Hanneman
How the medical care we receive is affected by our ability to pay
48. Millions for Viagra, Pennies for Diseases of the Poor, Ken Silverstein
The ways that corporate profits determine pharmacological research
49. An Old City Seeks a New Model, Joshua Wolf Shenk
How one major U.S. city changes the ways it deals with drug abuse
50. The Patient as Object, Daniel F. Chambliss
How health care personnel view and treat patients as less than fully human
51. The Social Organization of Responsibility in the Hospital and the Home, Carol A. Heimer and Lisa Staffen.
How patients and their families make difficult medical decisions
Chapter 12. Environment
52. Wealth, Resources, and Power, Michael Klare
The global implications of resource management and environmental policies
53. Open Season on Open Space, Bob Burtman
How the profit interests of America’s lawmakers are placed above environmental concerns
54. Mapping the Nuclear Landscape, Valarie Kuletz
The ways that America’s nuclear policies reflect racial inequality
55. Natural Capitalism, Paul Hawkin
How defining environmental resources as a form of capital can help to ensure clean water, air, and land
Chapter 13. Global Politics, Terrorism, and War
56. Why the World’s Superpower Can’t Go it Alone, Joseph S. Nye
Why the United States must see itself as part of a global community in order to achieve true security
57. Liberty vs. Patriotism, Chip Pitts and Jennifer Holmes
Why lawmakers’ focus on homeland security conflicts with fundamental principles of American society
58. Conquest: Sex, Rape and Exploitation in War Time, Joshua Goldstein
How gender-based inequality and violence become a key strategy of war
59. The Pa inful Art of Reconciliation, David Lamb
How interaction between former enemies from vastly different cultures leads to psychological healing
