SOC5005 - Digital Lives: Self and Society in a Digital Age

Objectives:

Assessment tasks are designed to enable students to demonstrate the Learning and Employability outcomes for the relevant level of study. Level Learning Outcomes are embedded in the assessment task(s) at that level. This enables a more integrated view of overall student performance at each level.

Content:

This module introduces students to Digital Sociology and encourages students to develop a critical understanding of the function and effects of digital technology within society. Through examining the digital through both theory and real-world examples, this module brings the everyday use of these technologies into question.

The module will cover areas that move between the everyday digital lives of individuals to the broader contemporary digital issues effecting society. Equality and social justice are a core strand within the module, in particular, how digital technologies are intimately connected with the global economy and the exploitation of the global south, as well as the longstanding structural inequalities that such technologies perpetuate through algorithmic systems.

Learning and Teaching Information:

Lectures
Hours: 10
Intended Group Size: 25 (Full Cohort)

Workshops
Hours: 10
Intended Group Size: 25 (Full Cohort)

Guided independent study
Hours: 130

Further Detail Relating to Assessment

Assessment 1 (report) – The end of semester 1 assessment is a report on a topic chosen by the student in relation to any of the content covered on the module. For this report, students will be expected to critically analyse a specific contemporary digital technology. Examples of contemporary digital technologies might include Smartphones, Fitbits and digital technologies could also include platforms (I.e. social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, Metaverse). As part of this, the student should consider the history and use of their chosen technology, outline the function and social impact of their technology, and examine the social consequences of their chosen technology. The report should draw on academic research to evidence its claims, but should be written as if for a non-expert audience.

Assessment tasks are designed to measure the extent to which you have satisfied the Level Learning Outcomes for your programme. Some modules, for example where there are professional body (PSRB) requirements, will also test for module-specific skills and knowledge.

Further details of assessment are available in the Assessment Handbook for your programme and in Assessment Briefs provided by Module Tutors.

Assessment:

001 Report; 2,000 words; end of semester 1 100%

Fact File

Module Coordinator - Andrew Brierley
Level - 5
Credit Value - 15
Pre-Requisites - NONE
Semester(s) Offered - 5S1

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