The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is a comprehensive land-grant university, a Carnegie I Research Institution, and the flagship campus of the University of Tennessee system. A major teaching and research institution, UT Knoxville is located in the Tennessee Technology Corridor and offers an environment conductive to research and professional opportunities in numerous areas.

The graduate program in sociology offers training leading to a Master of Arts degree and to a doctoral degree. Program goals include advancing sociological theory and sociological research, assessing and solving contemporary social problems, and promoting quality teaching of sociology. The opportunity to pursue any combination of these goals is aided by the substantive breadth and diverse research styles of the distinguished faculty.

Training is given in both quantitative and qualitative methods. Quantitative research support services include easy access to computer facilities and a bank of secondary data sources. The Department offers a minor in statistics as well as advanced survey research training. Among the qualitative research support services are established contacts with the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and communities and social groups in Appalachia. Faculty are presently engaged in qualitative research in urban Mexico, and on the careers of professional criminals. Students are assisted with the development of their own specialized training interests within the framework of existing resources.

Early in their training, students with teaching assistantships (see below) have the chance for supervised teaching contact with undergraduate students. Advanced students teach their own sections of undergraduate General Sociology and Social Problems.

Criminology analyzes, first, the social origins of and process through which laws and norms become socially and politically legitimated (examples include the creation of new statutes or the process through which sexual norms change); second, the process and impacts of interpersonal or bureaucratic reactions to deviance (entities studied include the police, correctional apparatus, and regulatory agencies); and third, the process of rule-breaking (examples include the origins of rule-breaking behavior, and the organization and activities of rule-breakers).

Energy, Environment, and Resources Policy analyzes the social bases of environmentalism, including the conditions underlying grassroots environmental movements, community mobilization, and growing concern with sustainable urban ecology and development. Instruction is provided in environmental sociology, social movements and collective behavior, demography, human ecology, qualitative and quantitative design and analysis, and demographic techniques. Faculty maintain research ties with a large number of area organizations and programs.

Political Economy analyzes the political and economic foundations of change in global society; it examines contemporary issues in the context of large-scare and long-term historical shifts to understand continuity and change in global society and local communities. Instruction is provided in the sociology of development, and political, economic, and social institutions and categories such as classes, the state, race and ethnicity, gender, markets, and social, nationalist, and revolutionary movements.

Special Studies allows students who cannot achieve their educational goals within the current specialty-area structure to recruit a committee and develop an individualized course of study. Individualized programs are possible in a number of areas because of the diverse interests of the sociology faculty as well as established working relationships with faculty in allied departments. Recent M.A. and Ph.D. recipients have specialized in the family, social psychology, religion, sociology of education, qualitative methods, sociology of medicine, and social problems.

The Department of Sociology offers graduate study leading to the Master of Arts and the Doctor of Philosophy. Both Master's and the Doctoral programs permit students to pursue a variety of career directions; both allow for the construction of individualized programs of study. Students have ample opportunity for :"hands-on" experience in the application of knowledge because the Department offers teaching and research assistantships as well as other opportunities for professional growth.

The M.A. program is designed to accommodate the various career plans of students. Students may choose to become familiar with many different aspects of sociology or to take more specialized courses that prepare them for Doctoral level work. A student may select a Master's program that includes preparing a thesis or completing additional course work and a written examination.

The Ph.D. program is also designed to permit students to prepare for various types of professional careers. All students must demonstrate competence in sociological theory and research methodology through their course work, examinations, and a dissertation. Students may choose more general programs of study emphasizing two specialty areas in sociology, or they may focus on a specialty area in sociology and a collateral area in a related field of study. Some students may focus on one specialty area and a subspecialty within it.

The Department awards a number of teaching assistantships and two criminology research assistantships year. Appointments include tuition waivers. Research assistantships to work with individual professors on externally-funded research projects are often available. The University offers a number of graduate assistantships for work in a variety of settings, and the Graduate School offers fellowships for full-time study. Student loans are also available.

The sociology faculty at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville represents a variety of specialties, theoretical approaches, and methodological styles that make for a vibrant and balanced graduate program. The Department is large enough to include faculty expertise in several substantive areas of sociology, and yet small enough to foster close working relationships between faculty members and graduate students.

New students are admitted each fall. The deadline for both admission and financial assistance is February 15.

Students may contact the Graduate School by the Internet and request an application via the Request form at http://funnelweb.utcc.utk.edu/ gsinfo, or they may e-mail at gsinfo@utk.edu, or they may telephone the Graduate School at (865 / 974-3251). Requests for departmental applications may be made by mail, e-mail (utsocdep@utkux.utcc.utk.edu), or telephone (865 / 974-6021)

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