As a sociology major, you might collaborate with faculty or your peers on research, or apply for funding to support your own research on a project of your choice during the academic year or during the summer. You’ll have the opportunity enroll in our honors program and to present your research.
Undergraduate Honors in Sociology
Interested in a long-term research project? Consider pursuing honors work, where you’ll work closely with an adviser on a topic that interests you.
The senior thesis is intended to give the exceptional student an opportunity to pursue an intensive course of independent study under the direction of a department faculty member. The course culminates in a thesis completed during the senior year. Students writing theses may be eligible for graduation with honors in sociology. Graduation with honors in sociology requires an acceptable senior honors thesis.
For the procedure and timeline for developing a thesis, see the Sociology Student Handbook.
Additional guidelines are in this document:
Writing A Sociology Honors Thesis
Below, check out recent topics and titles by our undergraduate honors students.
- Keitaro Okura: “Racialization of Asian and South Asian International Students at Clark University”
- Ben Walter: “The Ambiguity Paradox of Queer-Ass Folk: Problems, Solutions, and Costs of Queer Identity”
- Justin J. Woods: “Emerging Adults and Primary Care: Their Access and Experiences”
- Julianne M. Siegfriedt: “Working Together and Apart: The Rape Crisis Center of Central Massachusetts and the Worcester Police Department”
- Carolyn K. Spitz: “Defying the Statistics: How Has the University Park Campus School Closed the Achievement Gap?”
Academic Spree Day
Once you’ve conducted your research, practice how to present it to others. Held each spring, Clark’s Academic Spree Day celebrates undergraduate research. Many sociology majors participate in this culminating event and present their research.
- Ruth Fuller ’20: “ ‘Aren’t You Scared of Us?’: Expressions of Healthy Masculinity in Men’s Prisons” (Sponsor: Professor Shelly Tenenbaum)
- Camilo Posada Rodriguez ’19: “ ‘La Cosa ‘Ta Dura’: Stressors, Attribution, and Coping Among College-Educated, Unemployed Panamanians” (Sponsor: Professor Rosalie Torres Stone)
- Shulamith Jacobi ’19: “Tearing Down Walls: Deinstitutionalization of Asylums and Decarceration of Prisons” (Sponsor: Professor Shelly Tenenbaum)
