Sociology...

lou91

Hi, I'm considering putting the Sociology TSM down on my CAO. I've been reading the course descriptions and stuff, and while it seems interesting, I can't help getting the impression that it's a bit, well, waffle-y. Some of the descriptions are so broad, its hard to get a clear description of what it actually entails. From what I gather, the closest Leaving Cert. equivalent would be the Regional stuff on the Geography course. Would that be right? I'm really hoping to get Psychology, but seeing as how it's about a billion points, I need some backups. Sociology seems to be the only thing that has any echoes of Psych.
I don't have a particular interest in Politics. Would that be a problem?
So, yeah, trying to get a feel for the subject in laymans terms rather than that lovely prospectus gloss. Thanks!

manicmonoliths

Well first of all I hate sociology, so I may not be the best person to ask for an unbiased opinion, but of those who have studied I think everyone would be either in the love or the hate camp.

You have to do sociology with another subject in Trinity. Either with one other in TSM or through BESS. I did the Introduction to Sociology module last year and personally I hated it. I found it very waffley and quite pointless.

It was divided into 2 modules, the first was about sort of real world sociology stuff, so we talked about gender, globalisation and ageing, that kind of thing. It was interesting up to a certain point, but I couldn't see the point of studying it academically. The 2nd module was more about the theory side of sociology, like relativism vs absolutism, this was horribly tedious and there was lots of readings that were pretty tough to decipher.

We had to do one essay at Christmas, a multiple choice exam in March and then a final exam in the summer.

I'm not 100% sure on this but if you do Sociology in TSM, you have to do 2 other subjects in 1st year along with intro to sociology, I think they are intro to political science and intro to economic policy. And then you'd obviously do the subjects from your other TSM course.

I only did Sociology for one year so I'm not the best person to talk to
I'd say talk to someone in 4th year sociology or someone who doesn't hate the subject with a passion!

Oh on a side note, I know a guy who does TSM Sociology and Psychology, he loves psychology but hates sociology. He tried to switch to single honours psychology but the college wouldn't let him. So now he's stuck doing Sociology for the next 3 years.

andrew

RandomUserName! wrote: »

Hi, I'm considering putting the Sociology TSM down on my CAO. I've been reading the course descriptions and stuff, and while it seems interesting, I can't help getting the impression that it's a bit, well, waffle-y. Some of the descriptions are so broad, its hard to get a clear description of what it actually entails. From what I gather, the closest Leaving Cert. equivalent would be the Regional stuff on the Geography course. Would that be right? I'm really hoping to get Psychology, but seeing as how it's about a billion points, I need some backups. Sociology seems to be the only thing that has any echoes of Psych.
I don't have a particular interest in Politics. Would that be a problem?
So, yeah, trying to get a feel for the subject in laymans terms rather than that lovely prospectus gloss. Thanks!

I've been doing Sociology as part of BESS for the last few weeks. Since I havn't been doing it in a lot of depth or for that long, all I can give is a first impression. Yes, it's pretty waffley. It's the study of how people interact with society, and how the society we live in influences us. Apparently, nearly everything we do can be related back to the society in which we live. This means that Sociology is REALLY broad, and seems to cover lots of things which are kinda hard to get a sharp focus on. Well, so far thats the impression I've gotten. It's hard to explain until you've done it a bit.

At the first lecture the lecturer was going on about this. If you understand it, you know as much as i do.