Privileged Claims; Discounted Knowledges

Course aim

To encourage students to analyse the common-sense assumptions surrounding the notions of reality and knowledges using approaches from the sociology of knowledge and social epistemology.

Course content

Underlying assumptions in the social hierarchy of knowledge; social epistemology; theories of ideology including Marx and Mannheim; what socially counts as knowledge and why; scientific and metaphysical knowledge; the ‘science’ and ‘social’ in the social sciences; the social construction of reality; binaries of knowledge such as objective/subjective, absolutism/relativism, science/religion, reason/faith, of women/men, of the colonisers/colonised; metaphor and its social functions; feminist standpoint epistemologies.

Textbook(s)

Fopp, R 2008, Enhancing understanding; advancing dialogue , 1st Ed, ATF Press, Adelaide

Prerequisite(s)

Not available to students who have successfully completed SOCU 3005 Sociology: Ideas and Information in the Risk Society. For Sociology general studies major students: SOCU 1002 Sociology: Perspectives and Locations or approval of the Course Coordinator. No special prerequisites for BA students.

Corequisite(s)

Nil

Teaching method

Component	Duration
INTERNAL, MAGILL
Lecture	1 hours x 13 weeks
Tutorial (Online tutorials)	2 hours x 13 weeks
EXTERNAL, MAGILL, ONLINE
External (Using hypertext documents as weekly readings, the lecture content and tutorials in weekly modules linked to hypertext documents, and discussion line)	N/A x N/A

Note: These components may or may not be scheduled in every study period. Please refer to the timetable for further details.

Assessment

Minor essay, Research essay, Weekly continuous assessment tasks

Fees

EFTSL*: 0.125
Commonwealth Supported program (Band 1)
To determine the fee for this course as part of a Commonwealth Supported program, go to:
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Fee-paying program for domestic and international students
International students and students undertaking this course as part of a postgraduate fee paying program must refer to the relevant program home page to determine the cost for undertaking this course.

Non-award enrolment
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* Equivalent Full Time Study Load. Please note: all EFTSL values are published and calculated at ten decimal places. Values are displayed to three decimal places for ease of interpretation.