Need ideas for Sociology presentation

Conflict theory? There's the vaccination issue.

Inequality of sociological classes.

hmmmm.....coming up with a blank now.

(hated sociology in high school)

What are your interests? That's always good place to start.

Also, what level sociology are you in?

sociopaths and their effect on society.

that should encompass all subjects.

Do a presentation on a total institution (prisons, religion, etc) using symbolic interactionism. Relate how even when an institution seeks to control a person entirely there are still back stage performances and social interaction. Note how the total institution changes the concept of self and the social norms that the prisoners must relate to.

You might use a famous novel about a Russian work camp. It is only about 100 pages and covers a single day of a prisoners life. It was written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn and is titled "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich.

How fear(sociological issue) relates to conflict theory... theres a presentation..

I'm a taking college level 101 course at my community college, we have a lot of freedom to choose the topic but at the same time I kind of wish we had a little more direction it can basically be anything related to human behavior.

The push to get people to be productive and contributing members of society when society is sick sick sick and should be avoided as much as possible.

Since I actually have a degree in Sociology, I better put out an appropriate idea for you: consider symbolic interactionism using Blumer's three premises and apply it to how people greet one another and how our behavior can be modified (through expectation and response) by the presence of a greeting or the absence of a greeting and go from there.

(Blumer's premises:

Humans act toward things on the basis of the meanings they ascribe to those things.

The meaning of such things is derived from, or arises out of, the social interaction that one has with others and the society.

These meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretative process used by the person in dealing with the things he encounters.)

Do it on the television show LOST, as far as symbolism...

Study up on Erving Goffmans dramaturgical analysis. He used terms from theater to describe how people act in public and in private (acting, role playing, onstage performance, back stage performance, etc). It is a symbolic interactionist methodology.

It's really easy to come up with something interesting using this analysis type. You could apply it to total institutions, deviance, work environments, anything. Just pick any social interaction between people and analyze it.

Compare horse herd behaviour to new employee interactions in the workplace.

Theres some good ideas here but i'm looking for a social issue I can back up with academic journals or books as sources

How about 'reality is a social construction'. Not the physical world, but the social world.

You cannot give me a piece of society, it doesn't exist except as a social construction.

Maybe too much of a headfuck for college though.

In the case of symbolic interactionism, the problem is not one of determining whether an objective reality exists (philosophy), but rather our definition of the situation (sociology).

This should help you, OP. Like think of examples of this. One I can think of is how people dress to interview for a job.
If you wear a suit and tie compared to wearing trendy clothes, you will be assessed completely differently by the interviewer because of the three premises above.

Like, the interviewer has an understanding of what a suit means to him/her. This meaning has become this to the interviewer because of what the interviewer experienced with suits in his/her life, etc. This understanding of the suit is customized by the interviewer or in his/her mind. What you may think of a suit is completely different than what I might think of a suit....

Now apply these premises to anything is society.

Like the election. What made people choose Obama? Was it them thinking he could relate to them and assure them they would be given what they hoped for from a President? Why? What models did they impose on him? Was it blacks voting for another black? Poor voting for someone who they think was poor and could understand their issues? Or just plain, grew up in family voting democrat so vote democrat?

Then foods...I'm Italian, I like Italian food. I'm not too crazy about bizare foods, they scare me. Why? I don't know. Maybe I'm chicken to try them because I have a predisposed assessment of other foods?

Keep trying - anything can fit the premises above!

multiculturalism, is respect for the host culture being addressed.

Yea I get what your saying I could probably use a model like that. Right now i'm thinking of how I might use it to relate to censorship

Sociopaths in the workplace

and how to deal with them and their head games

Someone else suggested communication. That's a good idea too. Just think of the wealth of examples there. We live in a society where you can create an identity online! We can adjust that identity to anything we want thru social media. How people are viewed on the internet in fb etc is what shapes our society today. People can damage others lives through a ficticious identity , aka bullying. How we view each other on GLP. All these ACs and OPs are sharing personalities and shaping the GLP society. They are different in many ways, what they are really like in reality could astound us.

Do it on whether it is possible to solve all the world's problems by chaning calendars. There might be an expert on the subject that you could talk to somewhere around here.