New article out! Can't Stop the Hype: Scrutinizing AI's Realities
This course explores the rising power of algorithms and their ties to society and culture. We will ask: How do algorithms shape identity, communication, choice, and cultural taste? Do they reinforce existing inequalities or create new social structures? How do they alter our sense of time, space, and democracy itself? By examining these questions, we will see why algorithms are, above all, cultural artifacts.
This course introduces students to qualitative research methods in the social sciences. Through hands-on experience with observation and in-depth interviewing, students will learn how to formulate research questions, design a study, collect and analyze data, and present findings in academic writing. Along the way, we will discuss the ethical challenges of qualitative research, practice reading scholarly articles, and develop key skills in scientific writing.
Artificial intelligence systems are becoming central to how organizations make decisions, evaluate employees, manage processes, and shape culture. This course applies a sociological lens to examine how algorithmic systems redefine power, responsibility, efficiency, professionalism, and fairness. We will explore how they encode norms and values, create new challenges for organizational development, and reshape the role of consultants and change leaders in an era of automation.
This course explores the complex ties between science, technology, and society. We examine how scientific facts are produced, how “objectivity” is constructed, and how technologies embody cultural values and assumptions. We ask what technological power looks like, how it can be resisted, and how innovations like AI or genetic sequencing reshape social life. Alongside these questions, we engage with key approaches in science and technology studies (STS) and apply them to pressing issues such as climate change, autonomous vehicles, nuclear weapons, genetic research, and space exploration.
Knowledge is never neutral—it shapes how we understand the world, act within it, and see ourselves. This course explores the ties between knowledge, power, and society: how statistics and categories define identities and life chances, how expertise creates (and sometimes loses) authority, and how classification can fuel inequality, conflict, and even war. We will ask what it means to live in a “post-truth” era, and how states, markets, and tech companies use knowledge as a tool of control. Through contemporary research and critical analysis, students will learn to see how practices like measurement, quantification, and classification transform both individuals and democracies.