SOCAL36/301/3/2023

Tutorial letter
301/3/2023

SOCAL36

Semesters 1 & 2

Department of Sociology

IMPORTANT INFORMATION TO READ THROUGH ON HOW

TO DO ASSIGNMENTS

BARCODE
 SOCAL36/301

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents page 1. Introduction....................................................... 3

2. Completing essay type assignments ........................................................................ 3

2.1 The purpose of assignments ........................................................................... 3

2.2 Preparing for assignments .............................................................................. 4

2.2.1 Understanding the question .......................................................................... 4

2.2.2 Preparing your assignment drafts ................................................................. 5

2.3 Technical presentation of send-in assignments for Sociology modules .............. 6

2.3.1 Title, the table of contents and numbering .................................................... 6

2.3.2 Acknow ledgement of authors ....................................................................... 7

2.3.3 Quotations .................................................................................................... 7

2.3.4 References in the text ................................................................................... 8

2.3.5 List of sources ............................................................................................... 9

2.4 Assessment of assignments............................................................................. 12

2.4.1 What are markers looking for? .................................................................... 12

2.4.2 What you should avoid doing ...................................................................... 12

3 Answering short questions and multiple choice questions....................................... 13

3.1 Short questions ................................................................................................. 13

3.2 Guidelines for answering multiple-choice questions.......................................... 13

4. Closure ................................................................................................................... 16

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1. Introduction

It gives us great pleasure to welcome you as a Sociology student. The discipline of Sociology
provides significant insights into societal issues that affect people from all walks of life.
Graduates with a sociological background can make an important contribution to any career
field they choose to pursue. We hope that your experience as a sociology student will be
pleasant and stimulating, and we wish you the best for the 2023 academic year.

The tutorial letter SOCAL36/301/2023 contains important information that will assist you to
successfully complete your studies in the Department of Sociology. The tutorial letter provides
you with guidelines that will help you prepare both your multiple-choice questions (MCQ) and
essay-type assessments. We strongly encourage you to carefully read this tutorial letter in
order to understand what is expected from you when you write your assignments and prepare
for your examinations.

Dr C G Thomas

Department of Sociology

Undergraduate Convenor

Tel: 012 429 6560

Email: [email protected]

2. Completing essay-type assignments

In this section we consider:

2.1 Why assignments are set (what their purpose is);

2.2 How to prepare for the assignment you submit;

2.3 The technical requirements for academic writing and, finally,

2.4 How assignments are assessed.

2.1 The purpose of assignments

Our aims in setting the assignments are:

• To teach you how write logically, to summarise and to use sources effectively;

• To teach you to study purposefully and independently to help you to examine

sections of the syllabus systematically (since it is not possible to cover the entire
syllabus through set assignments, you must work through the remainder of the
syllabus on your own);

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 • To provide an opportunity for you to understand, develop and explore sociological
ideas;

• To give you feedback on your work and to help you correct your mistakes;

• To monitor your progress.

2.2 Preparing for assignments

Students often struggle to present well-written and properly integrated assignments. We

therefore would like to offer some general guidelines on how to do assignments.

2.2.1 Understanding the question

It is important to understand the question. Read it carefully and consider what is required.
Read the question several times to make sure that you have understood it. In the table below,
we give you definitions of terms often used in assignments (as well as examination) questions.
This should help you to interpret assignment questions and to work out what has been asked of
you.

Analyse Identify and examine different parts and indicate their

relationships.

Compare and contrast Describe and then compare so that the similarities and/or
differences become apparent.

Contextualise Explain something in terms of the time and place of its

creation, as well as other background factors.

Contrast (see ‘compare Describe and then compare so that the similarities and/or
and contrast’ above) differences become apparent.

Discuss Describe and examine from various viewpoints.

Compare, contrast, sift through and debate.

Critically discuss Discuss with particular attention to shortcomings.

Differentiate Describe and then distinguish between different views,

assumptions, and theories so that their differences are
emphasised.

Describe Give a systematic, clear, and detailed account. The

amount of detail depends on the stipulated word/page limit
or time limit in the examination.

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Evaluate Consider from a positive and a negative point of view.

Depending on the question, your personal views may be
2.2.2
required. Substantiate your final position.
Prepari
Explain Describe clearly in detail the structure, content, or ng your
relationships. If possible, use an appropriate illustration. assign
ment
Illustrate Use an example to explain or make clear your position or drafts
argument.
(Adapte
Substantiate Provide acceptable grounds for your reasoning or d from
conclusions. How to
write
Outline Give a framework (structure) of a topic or situation. Do good
not go into detail. essays
by
Relate Indicate the connection. Henry
Bernstei
n, 1995)
Review List the most important aspects. A critical review should
also include an analysis and evaluation.
THINK -
State Present very briefly and concisely. PLAN -
WRITE -
REVISE
Summaries Give a brief a count of the main features or points. Omit -
details and examples where possible. IMPRO
VE

• Process relevant information

The first step in writing an assignment is to read as much as possible around the topic you have
to discuss. Difficult sections have to be read again and again until you understand what the
author is trying to say. The next step is to collect the raw materials for the assignment in the
form of notes on relevant parts of the sources. Many students think that this is enough, and
hand in their rough notes as their assignment. This is a mistake. What we want from you is that
you process these raw materials, that is, understand and systematise them. Processing is an
active process through which you select and interpret key ideas and issues essential to
addressing the essay topic.

• Take notes

When taking notes, you should decide what the key points are. Rather than summarising
content in a mechanical way you need to absorb key ideas and develop your understanding of
essential arguments. You should concentrate on the parts of the text that are directly relevant or
useful to your topic. You need to learn how to distinguish between reading material that is of
greater and of lesser value to your topic. Identify the connections with other sources you have

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already read - these cross- references are very important in getting to grips with your subject
matter. Add comments and criticisms of your own on the text you are reading.

• Draw up an outline

The questions set in the assignment will likely expect more of you than a straightforward factual
account or the mere summarising of what others have said. These are generally part of the raw
material you use to formulate an answer and not the answer itself. In this regard you may be
expected to explain or compare particular phenomena, to look at explanations of why things
happen (causes) or at descriptions of how things happen (processes, mechanisms). It is
consequently important to decide beforehand what the question requires of you.

Essay-type questions require a logical argument. Essays should be structured as follows:

• Introduction: introduces the topic or main question and outlines how you plan to
answer the question. The word ‘Introduction’ is an appropriate heading for this part of
your essay.

• ‘Body’ [Argument]: developing an argument with the aid of the material assembled
(ideas, models, evidence), and importantly make use of examples to add context. Do not
use the word ‘Body’ as a heading for this part of any essay, rather, carefully read the
assignment guidelines for hints about appropriate names for the headings and sub-
headings of the different logically related sections that make up the ‘body’ of your essay.

• Conclusion: summarises the argument and points out its implications, and it is
significant to reflect on the essay. The word ‘Conclusion’ is an appropriate heading for
this part of your essay.

The outline or structure of an essay is somewhat like a sandwich, with the substance, that is the
really interesting and substantive part of the argument, as the filling.

Structuring your essay by using subheadings for the key aspects of the argument helps keep
you ‘on track’. The effective use of subheadings not only signals the main points you want to
cover but their sequencing also signals whether you have integrated those points in a logical
manner.

2.3 Technical presentation of send-in assignments for Sociology modules

All academic assignments must meet certain basic technical requirements. We present an
outline of technical requirements that must be taken into account when preparing assignments
below.

2.3.1 Title, the table of contents and numbering

Each assignment must have a TITLE which is stated on the title page and a TABLE OF
CONTENTS, which is placed on the next page. Look at the following example of a topic which is
stated on the title page and the table of contents; note that each heading is numbered and that
you must reproduce the headings and their respective numbers at the appropriate places above
the related text in the substantive content of the essay:

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TOPIC: Discuss classes and class relations in social change. Use the transition from capitalist
societies to socialist societies to illustrate your answer.

Table of contents Page

1. Introduction 1

2. The Marxist conception of “class” 1

3. The nature of class relations in capitalism 2

3.1 The two most important classes in capitalism 3

3.2 The historical origins of the bourgeoisie and the proletariat 4

3.3 The nature of the relationship between the bourgeoisie and the

Proletariat 5

4. Classes in the transition from the capitalist society to socialist society 5

5. Conclusion 7

6. List of sources 8

2.3.2 Acknowledgement of authors

When you use the ideas and arguments of authors other than yourself, as we all do all the time,
you must acknowledge and reference the sources of the ideas or argument even when you do
not quote the author’s direct words. If you do not do this, you can be accused of plagiarism.
Plagiarism is the act of taking words, ideas and thoughts of others and using them as if they
were your own. It involves a number of dishonest academic activities such as copying the work
of other students, copying from textbooks or study guides without giving the source, copying in
the examination, etc. The Disciplinary Code for Students is reproduced in the Study @ Unisa
document and applies to cases of plagiarism. Kindly read the university’s: Policy for Copyright
Infringement and Plagiarism as well.

Universities demonstrate instances of plagiarism using software that tests for originality in a
student paper or other scholarly publications. The most widely used of such software
programmes is called Turn-it-in. The test results show similar strings of text in a student’s paper
or in a paper that an academic submits for publication with existing publications and provides a
percentage weighting of the similarity between that student’s or academic’s paper with existing
publications.

Plagiarism is not only a breach of academic and research ethics. If you quote or paraphrase too
closely and too often, it also becomes very difficult for the marker to evaluate whether or not you
understand the work.

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Source references are needed by markers to check your formulations against those of the
sources themselves (e.g., in the case of interpretation differences or to avoid undue suspicions
of plagiarism). They also serve as “begetters of authority”. This means that you indicate to your
academic colleagues through your references that you have read the relevant sources and that
your opinion on these matters can therefore be trusted.

2.3.3 Quotations

When you use a writer’s exact words, they should be placed between quotation marks. Keep
the use of quotations and of paraphrasing to a minimum. Paraphrasing comprises the selective
copying of paragraphs and/or sentences - with a few changes to, and/or deletions from the
original source/text. Collections of quotations and/or paraphrases suggest that you could not
interpret or properly understand the text. When quoting please note the following points:

• Place the quotation in inverted commas “” and acknowledge the source.

• Retain the exact spelling and punctuation of the original.

• If you omit words from a quotation, indicate this by a series of three full stops …

• If you add words to a quotation, place them in square brackets [].

• If you wish to emphasise part of a quotation, italicise, or underline it and add the
phrase “my emphasis” in brackets at the end of the reference.

For example:

Berger (1987: 27-28) emphasises that we must not see the individual as merely a passive
internalises of meanings which exist outside of that individual. As Berger puts it “the individual is
not moulded as a passive or inert thing. Rather he [or she] is formed in the course of a
protracted conversation ... in which he [or she] is a participant” (Van der Merwe et al 1990:211).

2.3.4 References in the text

You need to reference sources when you use information or ideas from them (even if you
paraphrase or put it in your own words) and when you use direct quotations from a text.

You must identify the source of the material by giving in brackets:

• the author’s surname (unless it already appears in the sentence or paragraph),

• the year of publication, colon [:],

• the page or pages referred to (unless the entire publication is to be indicated).

For example:

Where the author’s name appears in the sentence:

While it has been shown by Wetherell (1996:316) that…

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Where the author’s name does not appear in the sentence:

It is often argued that . . . (Wetherell 1996:316).

Where you refer to the entire work, you give no page numbers:

Some, such as Parsons (1966), go further than earlier authors (MacIver & Page 1949; Gillin &
Gillin 1942) ...

Where there are two authors, both surnames are given, joined by an ampersand:

With the salience of social identity, depersonalization occurs in the sense that group
membership defines the individual (Hogg & Abrams 1988:2-3).

Where there are three or more authors or editors, the surname of the first is given followed by
“et al” (which means “and others”):

... (Cook et al 1995:2) . . .

For institutional authorship, you provide the name of the institution in an abbreviated form:

... (SA Institute of Race Relations 2000:3-18) . . .

Where an author is responsible for more than one publication in the same year, they are
distinguished from one another by using a, b, c and so on after the year of publication:

We note that Buchler (1998a:132) . . .

A series of references should be separated by semicolons:

... (Crosbie 1975:69; Steyn & Uys 1998:37-38; Turner 1991:2) . . .

When you refer to several different pages in a source, they are separated by a comma

(Cartwright & Zander 1968:7-8, 10, 13).

If you have not consulted a book yourself, you should refer to it in the following way:

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Gecas (1989:97) summarises the contribution a sociological social psychology can make by
citing C Wright Mills: “To ....

OR

Durkheim has written (quoted in O’ Donnell 1993:4) “In the same way ....

Here Gecas and not Mills, or O’Donnell and not Durkheim, would appear in your source list,
because these are the sources you have actually read.

2.3.5 List of sources

In the list of works at the end of the assignment, each publication consulted and referred to in
the text (as above) must be identified fully. We prefer not to use the term “bibliography” here as
it is strictly speaking a list of all known publications on a specific subject.

All publications MUST BE arranged alphabetically according to the author’s name. If you have
consulted more than one publication by the same author, these are arranged chronologically
according to the date of publication.

Sources in general

List all sources as follows:

the author’s surname, comma (,), and initial(s) (indicate an editor by (ed) following

the initials), followed by a full stop (.) (no full stops between initials)

the date of publication, full stop(.)

the title of the book, full stop(.) (only the first letter of the title should be capitalised,
and the title should be underlined or italicised)

the place (city or town) of publication - not the place of printing - followed by a colon
(:)

the name of the publishers, followed by a full stop (.) (omit words like “Publishers,”
“Limited,” “Company”)

NB: No page numbers are given in the case of books in the list of sources.

For example:

Bardot, R. 1996. The racism problematic: contemporary sociological debates on race and
ethnicity. Lewiston: Edwin Mellen.

• Books with more than one author

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In cases where there is more than one author, the surnames, and initials of all the authors must
be indicated in the list of sources.

For example:

Berger, M, Wallis, B, & Watson, S. 1995. Constructing masculinity. New York: Routledge.

• Later editions of a book

If you consulted a second or later edition of a book, you must provide the date of the edition you
used and indicate which edition it is after the title in your list of sources.

For example:

Neuman, W L. 2000. Social research methods: qualitative and quantitative approaches. 4th
edition. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

• Books with more than one editor

In cases where there is more than one editor, the surnames, and initials of all the editors must
be indicated in the list of sources followed by (eds).

For example:

Shotter, J & Gergen, K. J. (eds) 1989. Texts of identity. London: Sage.

• A journal article

When a journal article is referred to, its title is followed by a full stop. This is followed by the title
of the journal (underlined or italicised) and the volume number, colon, the page numbers on
which the article appears and a full stop.

For example:

Stryker, S. 1989. The two social psychologies: additional thoughts. Social Forces 68(1): 55-64.

• An article in an anthology

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When you refer to an article in an anthology, you should provide the required information as
follows: author’s name, date, the title of the article followed by a comma and the word “in”, the
title of the anthology (underlined or italicised), a comma, the words “edited by” and the editor’s
name, a comma (,), place of publication, colon (:), publisher, a comma (,), page numbers on
which the article appears, full stop (.). Please note that the initial(s) of the editor appears/appear
before the surname in this case.

For example:

Zolberg, AR. 1987. Wanted but not welcome: Alien labour in western development, in
Population in an interacting world, edited by W Alonso. Cambridge: Harvard: 36-74.

• Two publications in the same year

If you wish to refer to two publications by the same author, which were both published in the
same year, distinguish between them by the addition of a and b after the year of publication.

For example:

United Nations Population Fund. 1991a. Population and the environment: The challenges
ahead. New York: United Nations.

United Nations Population Fund. 1991b. India tops UNFPA programmes. Population 17 (7): 1.
110

• References to study guides

You should refer to a study guide in exactly the same way as you would refer to any other
source.

For example:

Gelderblom, D. & Martin, R. 2005. Theorizing modernity: sociological foundations. Only study
guide for SOC3026. Pretoria: University of South Africa.

• Internet articles

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The same guidelines as above apply. List the author(s) alphabetically with the rest of the
sources. The title of the article is followed by the words ‘Available at:’ and the World Wide Web
address is given. This is followed by the phrase ‘accessed on’ and the date on which you
accessed that article in single brackets.

For example:

Hall, D. 2001. The sociology of risk and social demographic change. Available at:

www.ssc.uwo.sociology/popstudies/dp (accessed on 03/03/2015).

2.4 Assessment of assignments

2.4.1 What are markers looking for?

• The integration of ideas. Your arguments should be constructed systematically and

logically. This means that you must be able to forge different ideas and arguments into a
coherent whole.

• The ability to argue a position using the knowledge acquired through reading and
evaluation. Remember, in sociology there are often not absolutely ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answers
to the questions, as in mathematics or physics - there are better, or worse argued points of
view. Expressing your own position entails that you can assess the arguments of others.

• An ability to grasp, assess and communicate the key points of any issue and to
distinguish between the more and less important aspects.

• Understanding the relevant analytical approaches and models, the ability to

differentiate between contrasting approaches and models and an ability to apply them to
empirical cases.

• Clear writing. Remember that your time to cover a particular question in the
examination is limited - and that you should learn quite early in your studies how to write
clearly and succinctly.

• Writing in own words. Besides the obvious point that you may not copy from another
student or any other source, it is plagiarism to merely alter a word or a phrase here and
there and present the result as your own work.

2.4.2 What you should avoid doing:

• fail to answer the question

• organise your answer poorly

• fail to keep to the point

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 • use rhetoric (assertion) rather than argument (reasoning)

• make sloppy use of evidence or over-generalise

• repeat yourself

• copy (i.e., summarise what others say without giving your own point of view)

• write superficially

• provide too much description without any analysis

3 Answering short questions and multiple-choice questions

3.1 Short questions

When doing assignments where short or paragraph length answers are required, please
number each of your answers clearly in terms of the number of each question or instruction you
have been set. As with essays, you must also indicate the source of your information, using the
technical guidelines for referring to sources as set out in section 2 of this tutorial letter.

The key to answering short questions lies in identifying and understanding exactly what is asked
of you. Take great care reading the question and instructions. Identify the key issues they
contain and list or underline them. Next, decide what information is most relevant to these key
issues. Consult the prescribed material you are referred to. Read it several times. Jot down
notes (and also details of the source you obtain them from). If you feel confident that you have
gathered sufficient information to respond adequately to the question, formulate an answer,
using your own choice of wording as far as possible. Keep the mark allocation in mind. For
example, don’t write three pages for a 10-mark item and a five-line paragraph for a 20-mark
item. Read the question/instruction and your draft answer repeatedly, making adjustments to
the latter where necessary, to make sure you have done what is required of you. Now you are
ready to formulate a “final draft” of your response to the question or instruction.

3.2 Guidelines for answering multiple-choice questions

Multiple-choice questions are designed to test important skills and are not an "easy option".

Multiple-choice questions test reading and analytical skills that you need to acquire before you
move on to writing essays. We therefore hope that the multiple-choice assignments you do will
provide you with a good foundation for essay writing.

In attempting an assignment, you need to first read the relevant parts of the study guide very
carefully. Then begin reading the multiple-choice questions. Multiple-choice questions are
usually made up of an instruction or incomplete phrase (called the “stem”) and a number of
possible options, only one of which is correct, also called the “key”. We call the incorrect
statements or items “distracters”. Here is an example of the most basic type of multiple-choice
question:

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Who is considered to be the founder of sociology? (stem)

1. James Joyce (distracter)

2. Karl Marx (distracter)

3. Mary W Wollstonecraft (distracter)

4. Auguste Comte (correct option or key)

5. Max Weber (distracter)

The above is, however, the most basic kind of multiple-choice question. It asks a direct question
to which there is one correct answer. To answer it, you must read the question (or “stem”)
carefully and choose the correct answer by recognising the correct answer and eliminating the
incorrect answers. A more complicated version of this type of question is when there is more
than one correct answer or statement, as in the following example.

Choose the correct option. Which of the following are concepts associated with the work
of Karl Marx? (stem)

a. proletariat

b. suicide

c. gender inequality

d. surplus value

e. biological determinism

1. a and d (correct option or key)

2. a and b (distracter)

3. c and d (distracter)

4. d and e (distracter)

5. a and e (distracter)

Sometimes a multiple-choice question (or item) may require you to choose the incorrect option,
as in the following example. This is one of the reasons why you have to read the stem very
carefully.

Choose the INCORRECT option. (stem)

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 1. The concept “family” refers to a larger unit than the concept “kinship”. (This statement
is incorrect, so option 1 is the correct choice or the key.)

2. When two people marry they become kin to one another. (distracter)

3. The extended family is generally larger than the nuclear family. (distracter)

4. Kinship categories sometimes cut across “natural” ties. (distracter)

5. Marriage always creates a new family, even if no children are born from that union.
(distracter)

Another type of multiple-choice question (or item) is the incomplete statement. Here is an
example:

One of Emile Durkheim's first works was a study of ...

1. social class (distracter)

2. gender roles (distracter)

3. suicide. (Correct option or key)

4. poverty. (distracter)

5. stratification (distracter)

In the above question, you have to read the stem and then choose the option that correctly
completes the statement.

We also sometimes ask you to link statements or concepts with other statements or concepts in
the most appropriate manner.

Here you have to select the option that best combines the two. For example:

Choose the correct option. Link the characteristic described below to the type of society
to which it applies best.

a. Multiparty democracies which have clearly defined political boundaries, and which
were the first nation-states to emerge.

b. Predominantly one-party states characterised by centrally planned industrialised

economies which allow little or no opportunity for competition among enterprises.

c. Societies that have mostly disappeared as a result of the impact of Western industrial
and military power and Western culture.

d. Societies based on small, agricultural communities who live in rural areas with no
towns or cities.
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i. Agrarian societies

ii. Premodern societies

iii. Second World societies

iv. First World societies

1. a=i; b=ii; c=iii; d=iv

2. a=iv; b=iii; c=i; d=ii

3. a=i; b=ii; c=iv; d=iii

4. a=iv; b=iii; c=ii; d=i

5. a=i; b=iii; c=iv; d=ii

In this example you have to combine a concept (such as First World society) with the
description that applies best to it. First world societies are multiparty democracies and were the
first nation-states to emerge and therefore statement ‘a’ must be matched to concept ‘iv’. You
need to do the same exercise for the other statements and then select the option that best
combines statements and concepts.

The main point to remember about all multiple-choice questions is this: READ THE STEM
CAREFULLY. THIS IS ESSENTIAL.

4. Closure

We wish you all the best of luck in your studies and future endeavours!

Remember, do not only work hard but work smart.

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