Framing as a metacommunicative device establishes the narrative of a given story and mobilizes emotional support. Within the framework of monster theory, horror movies are seen as a way of framing common fears about moral decay, concerns about the future, anxiety about outgroup members, and spiritual unknowns. In the classroom, we explore the…

Many contemporary students are unfamiliar with the cultural history of television programming in the United States. References to iconic series that represented significant milestones in minority representations and discussions of racial issues--such as "I Spy," "Julia," "All in the Family," or even "The Cosby…

Sociologists have developed compelling pedagogical strategies to focus the undergraduate gaze on problems of gender and sexuality. Nested within the social construction of gender norms, the sexualization of girls and women negatively impacts individual, interpersonal, and societal levels of social interaction. Nevertheless, this important issue…

Mirroring increased cultural and disciplinary attention to sexuality, many introductory sociology textbooks have begun to include coverage of the topic. Our study first assesses the extent of textual coverage of sexuality in a sample of 38 introductory textbooks published after 2000. Secondly, we focus on 14 textbooks with a sexuality chapter…

This article describes an exercise that explores how race categories and classifications are socially constructed scientifically. In an introductory sociology setting, students compare their perceptions of the size of minority populations with counts from the U.S. Census. In a series of debriefing sessions, students analyze both their perceptions…