Course guide of Sociology of the Life Course (21411B8)

To ensure the viability and academic quality of teaching and learning in a foreign language, it is important that the students enrolled have the necessary competences to be able to deal with the course successfully. For this reason, a recommended B2 or higher level of English (CEFR's framework) is established for students intending to enroll in this course. Students with a B1 language level (or lower) should refrain from registering.

PLEASE, TAKE THIS RECOMMENDATION INTO ACCOUNT SERIOUSLY WHEN CONSIDERING REGISTRATION FOR THIS COURSE. Should you have any question, please get in touch with the course's lecturer at marianos@ugr.es

• Concepts and theories about age and ageing from a life-course perspective.
• Age stratification, integration and differentiation in social structures.
• The ageing and society paradigm.
• Life-course trajectories, transitions and institutionalisation.
• Social problems and inequalities across the life course.

• Being able to identify and critically assess the basic components and theories of the life-course paradigm through a sociological lens.

• Getting acquainted with and evaluating the ways in which social context, social history, and social structures affect and are affected by individual life courses.

• Getting familiar with some of the quantitative and qualitative methodologies used to study the life course.

• Envisaging pathways for professionalisation in Sociology linked to life-course developments.

1a. Life course: It is about time!

2a. Age, the life course, and the sociological imagination.

3a. Structuration and institutionalisation of the life course.

4a. The craft of life-course studies.

1b. Integrating varieties of life-course concepts. Distinguishing age, period, and cohort effects.

2b. Identifying life-course events: timing, duration and sequencing.

3b. Generational and intergenerational connections across the life course.

4b. Data collection and measurement. Strategies for analysis.

• Dannefer, D. (2021). Age and the reach of sociological imagination. Power, ideology and the life course. Routledge.
• Heinz, W. R., Huinink, J., & Weymann, A. (Eds.). (2009). The life course reader. Individuals and societies across time. Campus Verlag.
• Wingens, M. (2022). Sociological life course research. Springer.

• Adam, B. (1990). Time and social theory. John Wiley & Sons.

• Levy, R., & Widmer, E. D. (2013). Gendered life courses between standardization and individualization: a European approach applied to Switzerland. Lit.

• LIVES. Swiss Centre of Expertise in Life Course Research

• MD01. Master class/lecture 
• MD02. Discussion and debate sessions 
• MD03. Problem solving and practical case studies 
• MD06. Computer room sessions 
• MD07. Seminars 
• MD08. Simulation exercises 
• MD09. Source and document analysis 
• MD10. Group projects 
• MD11. Individual work 

In order to emphasise continuous assessment, both with regard to the learning of content and the acquisition of competences, a diversified assessment system is established based on the following instruments:

• A) Assessment of cognitive competences:
  • Individual final exam [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) understanding of theoretical content covered throughout the course; 2) use of specialised language; 3) use of diverse theoretical content when analysing a given issue. Weighting: 30% of the final grade (up to 3 points).
• B) Assessment of instrumental competences:
  • B.1. Practical seminars and activities [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) topic contextualisation; 2) literature review; 3) clarity of presentation; 4) technical accuracy in the use of scientific knowledge; 5) methodological mastery. Weighting: 50% of the final grade (up to 5 points). Instrument B1 shall be taken into account only in the case of students who have attended at least 80% of our seminars.
  • B.2. [optional] Students may get up to 1.5 of B.1.'s 5 points by participating in activities within the framework of the Open Education Programme carried out at the Faculty of Political Sciences and Sociology. The lecturer shall provide instructions on how to get involved in Open Education activities as part of the course's continuous assessment system.
• C) Evaluation of attitudinal competences:
  • [optional] Individual planned contributions in either lectures or seminars. Assessment criterion: 1) connection to the course; 2) contribution's originality and thoroughness. Weighting: 20% of the final grade (up to 2 points). This instrument shall be taken into account only in the case of students who have attended at least 80% of our seminars.

Students who do not pass the course in the ordinary session, will be able to pass the course in the extraordinary one by means of the following instruments:

• D) Assessment of cognitive competences:
  • Individual exam on the course's theoretical contents [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) understanding of theoretical content covered throughout the course; 2) use of specialised language; 3) use of diverse theoretical content when analysing a given issue. Weighting: 30% of the final grade.
• E) Assessment of instrumental and attitudinal competences:
  • Individual exam on the course's practical contents [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) understanding of practical content covered throughout the course; 2) use of specialised language; 3) use of diverse practical tools when analysing a given issue. Weighting: 70% of the final grade.

These exams can be prepared through using the sources and materials made available to students on PRADO.

Students who, by virtue of the continuous evaluation system, have achieved, in the framework of the ordinary evaluation system, some of the competences mentioned above, may attend these extraordinary exams under specific conditions that will be established in due time.

Those students who cannot follow the continuous evaluation assessment system for reasons regarding work, health, disability, mobility programs or any other duly justified may apply to the Head of the Department of Sociology, in the way and within the deadlines established in Article 8 of the current "Normativa de evaluación y de calificación de los estudiantes de la Universidad de Granada", may apply for the single final assessment. The lecturer of the course is not competent to grant this type of evaluation. As far as possible, students should follow the continuous evaluation system.

In the case of the single final assessment, the following instruments apply:

• F) Assessment of cognitive competences:
  • Individual exam on the course's theoretical contents [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) understanding of theoretical content covered throughout the course; 2) use of specialised language; 3) use of diverse theoretical content when analysing a given issue. Weighting: 50% of the final grade.
• G) Assessment of instrumental and attitudinal competences:
  • Individual exam on the course's practical contents [mandatory]. Assessment criteria: 1) understanding of practical content covered throughout the course; 2) use of specialised language; 3) use of diverse practical tools when analysing a given issue. Weighting: 50% of the final grade.

These exams can be prepared through using the sources and materials made available to students on PRADO.

1) Following recommendations by CRUE Universidades Españolas and the Secretariat for Inclusion and Diversity of the UGR, the systems of acquisition and evaluation of competences included in this guide will be carried out in accordance with the principle of design for all people, facilitating learning and knowledge demonstration according to the specific needs and functional diversity of the students.

2) In this course, regarding the teaching of instrumental competences, PoliSocioLAB (Laboratories of the Faculty of Political Sciences and Sociology) may be used. PoliSocioLAB includes the Quantitative Studies Laboratory (SPSS, R, Visual QSL, Bellview Cati, Phyton...), the Qualitative Studies and Multimedia Analysis Laboratory (NVIVO, QDA miner liter, Gephy...) and the Radio Laboratory. Depending on the coordination of the teaching with other courses, such use may take place during the regular teaching schedule of the course or outside our regular schedule as complementary non-mandatory sessions.

3) It is reminded that the University of Granada has a Protocol to prevent, avoid and deal with possible situations of harassment of any kind. To this regard, please read this DECLARATION.

4) How does the "Sociology of the Life Course" course connect with sociologists' professional practice? Professor Matthias Wingens has explained that life-course studies are about "relating the dynamics of social structures to the dynamics of life courses and analyzing their interactions". Moreover, he makes this interesting remark: "Life course research is primarily interested in the asynchronies or synchronization problems between the social and the individual time dimension". A good example to this regard are efforts for facilitation of work-family reconciliation. Another example touches transitions into retirement and their impact on workers' lives depending on age, cohort and period effects. Generally speaking, the planning, implementation and evaluation of programs and policies articulating welfare regimes would need at some point input from life-course sociologists since temporalization and chronologization of our lives have increased dramatically.

5) Several videos on career guidance and professional experiences related to the Sociology degree can watched on the Faculty's YouTube channel. Likewise, the guide of professional opportunities of the Bachelor's Degree in Sociology published by the University of Granada describes various job opportunities in this field.