These distinct and complementary subjects enable you to appreciate the complex nature and diversity of today’s modern society. You’ll have the opportunity to explore the internal and external forces that shapes our lives and determine our life chances. As part of your studies you’ll assess the merits of competing theories and explanations. Your understanding will be enhanced by our links with highly renowned academics and via the additional enrichment activities on offer. Teachers within the department come from a variety of backgrounds and specialisms, bringing an often unique quality to their teaching. Having high standards and expectations means that each individual in their care is guided to achieve to the best of their ability.

The world over, people wear much or little jewellery, have many or few children, value or shun the elderly, are peaceful or aggressive, enjoy different kinds of art and music and hold different religious beliefs. While people may be biologically the same, they differ in their tastes, behaviours and beliefs. The capacity for such startling differences is human culture; the study of how people live is the discipline of Sociology. Sociology is the systematic study of how human societies shape the lives of the people who live in them and how people shape the cultures they live in. People have created cultures and subcultures that are complex, fascinating and utterly different. Within these cultures individuals are able to create identities which may emphasise their difference from others. This course will appeal to students who are interested in exploring the complex nature of study and the differing life chances that exist between individuals as a result of their social class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality and religion.

“The task for sociology is to come to the help of the individual. We have to be in service of freedom. It is something we have lost sight of.” ~ Zygmunt Bauman

Those who study Sociology will develop the following skill sets:

• Appreciate the complexity and diversity of social situations
• Develop their research, judging and evaluation skills
• Be able to make reasoned arguments
• Develop their knowledge and understanding of research methods, analysis and statistical techniques
• Develop opinions and new ideas on societal issues
• Acquire the ability to understand, scrutinise and re-assess common perceptions of the social world
• Relate sociological knowledge to social policy The majority of our students go onto University. Sociology graduates are found in a wide range of occupations. Many are attracted to careers that centre on the challenges and demands that members of a society face. This leads to jobs in education, criminal justice, social services, welfare services, government, counselling, charities and the voluntary sector.

AQA Exam Board. Three, 2 hour written papers at the end of the second year.

First Year: Sociology of Education, Families & Households and Research Methods. Second Year: Sociology of Crime & Deviance, Beliefs & Society and Theory & Methods.

Course cost fee which covers the cost of course booklets Sociology for AQA volume 1 & 2 by Ken Browne (text book) – optional.

5 or more GCSES, graded 4 or above including English & Maths

Sociology does not confine itself to one particular area of social life. Indeed, sociologists have studied a vast and diverse range of topics including education, consumerism, popular music, sexuality, the body, ethnic conflict, poverty, sport, science, health, drug use, the law, war, religion, migration, death, housework, mobile telephones, humour and murder. It is hard to think of any significant area of social life that has never been the subject of a sociological study. Because the subjects it examines are so numerous and so varied, sociology cannot be defined simply in terms of the subjects it studies. It is more useful to define sociology in terms of its approach or approaches to explaining social life rather than its subject matter.