Volume 24, Number 1, September 2014
Teaching notes
Using this issue
Joan Garrod
This document briefly describes the resources provided as SociologyReviewExtras for this
issue, and then provides suggestions on how some of the articles in this issue could be used
to further your knowledge and understanding of sociology.
The online resources for this issue include a worksheet related to the article on hate crime. In addition,
there is a quiz, particularly for students new to sociology, testing how much you already know about
different features of your society – this is more interesting if you do it in small groups. The answers to
the quiz are provided in a separate document. The PowerPoint presentation takes a look at the size
and distribution of the world’s major religious groups. Finally, there are some weblinks to useful
articles covering various topics within the sociology specifications.
Suggestions for using the articles in this issue are given below.
Ethnicity and ageing: what is life like for older
people in Britain? (p. 2)
For students
This article has some useful material for both Families and Households and Culture and Identity. It will
enable you to show good comparative knowledge by contrasting the traditional patterns of the care of
elderly people in some minority ethnic communities with what is becoming the norm in many other
parts of British society, namely the elderly increasingly living alone with perhaps some community
help, or being in residential care. Remember, though, that in all communities there is a range of
different ways of dealing with the same issues.
Also of interest is the idea that these traditional patterns may change as the younger generation of
BME populations lives a more typical Western lifestyle. There is also material relating to how ‘age’ is a
social construct rather than a simple biographical one, as the author shows how different cultures
interpret ‘old’ and ‘elderly’.
What is ‘hate crime’? (p. 12)
For students
Of obvious importance to students taking the Crime and Deviance option, this article shows how
particular behaviours can become criminalised. Hate crime is a good example of the ‘dark figure’ of
crime, in that it is not possible to know its true extent. You should pay particular attention to the
sociological theories of hate crime, and consider what sociological methods would be best suited to
exploring its nature and extent.
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An internet search on ‘hate crime’ will give you more information from a variety of sources (think
carefully about the nature of these, and which ones are likely to be useful to a sociology student),
together with some examples that have made the media headlines. The online resources for this issue
also include a worksheet for you to complete which will provide you with useful material for revision.
Offender profiling: do police officers think it’s any
good? (p. 20)
For students
This article provides an interesting insight into what serving police officers think about offender
profiling. It would enable you to show good knowledge of a particular method sometimes used to help
the police in their search for the perpetrator(s) of a crime, and is therefore linked to crime statistics and
the clear-up rate. The author shows the different views of experienced serving officers regarding its
usefulness, and some opinions are expressed regarding how it can actually hinder the task of solving
a crime.
The article also provides an example of the kind of mismatch that is often seen between the media
view of something and its practice in real situations. Remember the phrase ‘Cracker doesn’t exist’.
The methodology used will give you another useful example of a small-scale study using semistructured interviews. How easy do you think it is to gain access to experienced serving police officers
to investigate topics such as this? The material in this article might be helpful when answering a
question on the ‘theory and methods’ part of a Crime and Deviance exam question – but make
absolutely sure that you could use it in a way that is relevant to the question asked.
Life history research: punk rockers and
autoethnography (p. 24)
For students and teachers
This article is particularly useful in two ways – first for its discussion of the relatively new method of
‘autoethnography’, and second for its exploration of how membership of a particular subculture can
influence people’s future life. Also of interest is the notion of ‘parent culture’, and how the political
attitudes of parents can influence young people’s attraction to a particular subculture that ‘chimes’ with
some of these views, or how some young people find their adult political attitudes and opinions after
their involvement in a subculture.
Can you think of other subcultures that could be explored in this way? Have a discussion with some
classmates and try to draw up a list. Were your parents or grandparents involved in a particular youth
subculture that may have influenced their later views?
Do politics and religion mix? (p. 30)
For students and teachers
This article provides a really useful way of getting you to look at and interpret one of the mainstays of
much sociological research – namely numerical data (though Ben Clements has done much of the
hard work for you!). There are a few ways that might help you to end up with some useful material for
revision. It would be particularly helpful to do this in pairs or groups of three.
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Go through the article in ‘chunks’, using the subheadings as a guide, and write no more than
two sentences summing up the analysis provided. (Your first subheading, using the material at the
beginning of the article, could be ‘Introduction’. After that, use the ones in the text.)
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Look carefully at each of the five tables. Write down the heading of each table separately.
Using the dates, identify one or two major changes over time (trends) shown by that table. Identify
possible explanations for these and write them down. This task might be quite challenging where
tables 4 and 5 are concerned, but stick with it – it is a very useful exercise to develop sociological
skills!
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The author provides some examples of occasions where political and religious leaders have
been in disagreement. Spend a little time searching the internet (online newspaper archives are often
helpful in this respect) for some details of such disagreements, noting which particular religious faith or
organisation is involved – or possibly a group without religious views, such as agnostics, humanists or
atheists. Here are a few ideas for issues to get you started (you may think of others, or new ones may
have emerged by the time you read this):

same-sex marriage

inter-racial adoptions

faith schools

arranged marriages
Joan Garrod is a managing editor of SOCIOLOGY REVIEW.
This resource is part of SOCIOLOGY REVIEW , a magazine written for A-level students by subject experts.
To subscribe to the full magazine go to www.hoddereducation.co.uk/sociologyreview
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