SOC 115: Wealth and Poverty
Department of Sociology
Professor Cynthia Ganote, Ph.D.
E-mail: cmg3@stmarys-ca.edu
Office: Garaventa 315
Office Phone: (925) 631-4185
Office Hours: varies by semester
Course Description
This course offers an in-depth study of wealth, poverty, and the economic system in
which they are grounded in the United States. Toward this end, students will apply various
theoretical frameworks on economic inequality to current social problems in order to evaluate
each framework’s explanatory power. Further, students will critique past and current programs
for lessening the impacts of poverty and use this knowledge to imagine and critique possible
future policies.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students will:
 Use various theoretical frameworks on economic inequality to explain current social
problems and evaluate their explanatory power.
 Examine and critique the capitalist economic system in the U.S., understanding its
mechanisms and implications for people in different social locations. (Social location is a
person’s place in the social structure based on his/her configuration of
class/race/ethnicity/gender/age, etc.)
 Critique past programs for lessening the impacts of poverty and evaluate
current and possible future policies for lessening or ending poverty.
Required Course Materials
Conley, Dalton, Ed. 2003. Wealth and Poverty in America: A Reader. Malden, MA:
Blackwell Publishing.
Lareau, Annette. 2003. Unequal Childhoods: Class, Race, and Family Life. Berkeley,
CA: University of California Press.
Zweig, Michael, Ed. 2004. What’s Class Got To Do With It? American Society in the
Twenty-First Century. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Besides these books, other required readings will be uploaded onto our course’s Moodle site.
Course Format
I will use a variety of formats to enhance your learning, including discussions, mini-lectures, and
group exercises. Generally speaking, the topics addressed in this course will be examined
through active learning approaches.
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Course Requirements
Course grades will be based on two take-home exams (one midterm and one final exam), one
10-12 page paper, several unannounced short assignments, and class participation. Each of these
elements is explained further below:
1. Two take-home examinations will be given in this course (one midterm and one final
exam). These exams will ask you to apply theoretical frameworks to analyze current
social problems and synthesize course material. The final exam will contain some longer
essay questions that ask you to integrate the broader themes in the course using the full
range of texts from the beginning of the course to the end. The take-home final will be
due at the regularly scheduled exam time, and our final exam time will be used to
conduct one final class dialogue on the course material.
2. In a 10-12 page paper, you will link a particular social problem of your choice that stems
from economic inequality (e.g. lack of access to quality healthcare, food scarcity,
homelessness) to a policy or program that is designed to address this specific social
problem. As part of the paper, you will include at least two different theoretical
frameworks that explain the problem, analyzing the root cause(s) of the problem from
each theoretical framework’s perspective. After analyzing the problem’s root causes
from different theoretical perspectives, you will critique a past or current policy or
program that is designed to address this problem, then recommend your own policy or
program designed to address this social problem, integrating parts of existing
interventions with your own ideas. Note: In the second part of the paper, you should
clearly incorporate the ideas of others and your own ideas in order to creatively address
the problem of poverty alleviation or elimination.
I would be glad to accept rough drafts up until a week before the paper is due in order to
offer feedback, although a draft is not required. The papers must be handed in on time,
except again in case of an extreme circumstance, in which case I should be contacted
prior to the due date.
3. Throughout the course, several short assignments will be given, and they will be
unannounced. They will often involve an application of or reaction to the material
covered in class or the readings. These assignments should be near a page in length. The
short assignments will either be due by the end of the class period, or at the beginning of
the next class period. I will specify at the time whether the assignment should be handwritten or typed (depending on whether it is to be turned in immediately or in the next
class period).
4. Class participation and attendance are required for this course. Participation in
discussions, group exercises, and films is essential for your understanding of the material.
In addition, some material on the exams will be drawn from items covered in class that
are not in the assigned readings. Finally, if any changes are made to the syllabus
throughout the course, those will be announced in class and it will be important for you to
find them out. For all of these reasons, if you have to miss class, please alert me to this
fact and get the notes from a classmate. It is your responsibility to keep up with any
changes in the schedule.
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Honor Code
All work in this course is governed by the Saint Mary’s Honor Code. It can be found at the
following url:
http://smcnet.stmarysca.edu/campus_life/handbook/PDF/student_handbook.pdf#page=26.
All of the work in this course must be your own work, unless I have specified otherwise. If you
have questions about how the honor code applies to a specific assignment, please do ask me.
Classroom Etiquette
Respect and Dignity
We will discuss some controversial issues this semester. You may disagree with other students,
your texts, or me. When you do disagree, I ask that you do so in a respectful and open-minded
fashion. This does not mean you have to employ “political correctness” in speech, but it does
mean that all points of view must be expressed with due respect for the differing opinions of
others.
On the same note, I expect for students to listen to the opinions and analyses of their classmates,
since we will create a learning community together. If you are talking while a classmate is
speaking in class, I will address that violation immediately. In addition, I do not expect you to
talk, write notes, or send text messages while I am teaching or at any point during class.
Cell Phones
Please turn off your cell phones when you come into class. If you have a personal or work
emergency for which you need to keep your phone on, please turn it to vibrate or speak to me
before class starts to notify me that you will need to keep your ringer on.
Tardiness
Please make every effort to be on time for class. I find it very disruptive to have students
walking in late after class has started, so if you foresee difficulty in getting to class promptly,
notify me ahead of time.
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SOC 115: Wealth and Poverty
Week
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2
3
4
5
6
7
Dates
Tentative Schedule of Readings*
Topic
Required Readings
Introduction to Course
Tues.
 No readings required before first class
meeting
Thurs.
Theoretical Frameworks on
 Smith, “Of the Division of Labour,”
Economic Inequality
Conley reader
 Marx, “Absolute and Relative Surplus
Value,” Conley reader
Theoretical Frameworks on
Tues.
Economic Inequality
 Davis and Moore, “Some Principles of
Stratification,” Conley reader
 Frank and Cook, “Winner-Take-All
Markets,” Conley reader
Thurs.
 Jencks, “Inequality,” Conley reader
Social Class and Family Life
Tues.
 Lareau, Chapters 1 & 2
Thurs.
 Lareau, Chapters 3 & 4
Social Class and Family Life
Tues.
 Lareau, Chapters 5 & 6
Thurs.
 Lareau, Chapters 7 & 8
Social Class and Family Life
Tues.
 Lareau, Chapters 9 & 10
Thurs.
 Lareau, Chapters 11 & 12
Intersections: Social Class and
Tues.
Race
 Conley, “Being Black, Living in the
Red: Race, Wealth, and Social Policy
in America,” Conley reader
 Fletcher, “How Race Enters Class in
the United States,” Zweig reader
Thurs.
 Lustig, “The Tangled Knot of Race and
Class in the United States,” Zweig
reader
MIDTERM EXAM WEEK
Tues.
 Synthesis of course material up to this
point
Thurs.
 MIDTERM EXAM DUE
 “People Like Us” film in class
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8
EASTER RECESS!!!
9
Lifestyles of the Rich and
Famous: Understanding the
Wealthy
10
Life in the Middle Class
Life in the Working Class
11
Lifestyles of the Poor and
Anonymous: Understanding the
Poor
12
Social Class and
Social Movements
Tues.
 NO CLASS
Thurs.
 NO CLASS
Tues.
 Domhoff, “The American Upper
Class,” Moodle
 Kendall, “Class: Still Alive and
Reproducing in the United States,”
Moodle
Thurs.
 Larew, “Why Are Droves of
Unqualified, Unprepared Kids Getting
Into Our Top Colleges? Because Their
Dads Are Alumni,” Moodle
 Brooks, “Bobos in Paradise: The New
Upper Class,” Conley reader
Tues.
 Patillo-McCoy, “Black Picket Fences:
Privilege and Peril Among the Black
Middle Class,” Conley Reader
Thurs.
 Tokarczyk, “Promises to Keep:
Working Class Students and Higher
Education,” Zweig reader
 Jensen, “Across the Great Divide:
Crossing Classes and Clashing
Cultures,” Zweig reader
Tues.
 Stack, “Swapping,” Conley reader
 Anderson, “The Code of the Streets,”
Conley reader
Thurs.
 hooks, “Class and the Politics of Living
Simply,” Moodle
Tues.
 Cobble, “When Feminism Had Class,”
Zweig reader
 DeFreitas and Duffy, “Young Workers,
Economic Inequality, and Collective
Action,” Zweig reader
Thurs.
 Quan, “Global Strategies for Workers:
How Class Analysis Clarifies Us and
Them and What We Need to Do,”
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Zweig reader
Tues.
 Katz, “In the Shadow of the Poorhouse:
A Social History of Welfare in
America,” Conley reader
 Wilson, “The Hidden Agenda,” Conley
reader
Thurs.
 Ackerman and Alstott, “The
Stakeholder Society,” Conley reader
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What Can We Do? Wealth,
Tues.
Poverty, and Public Policy
 hooks, “Living Without Class
Hierarchy,” Moodle
 Shiva, “How to End Poverty: Making
Poverty History and the History of
Poverty,” Moodle
Course Overview
Thurs.
 No new readings
 Synthesis of course material
15
FINALS WEEK
 FINAL EXAM
*I reserve the right to make changes in the syllabus whenever necessary to meet learning
objectives or to compensate for unforeseen circumstances.
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What Can We Do? Wealth,
Poverty, and Public Policy
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