Course Requirements for the Certificate:
Graduate Students participating in Committee activities have the opportunity to earn a Graduate Certificate in Social Theory. This Certificate offers students systematic multidisciplinary training in social theory. It augments, and is pursued concurrently with, the regular M.A and Ph.D. degree programs of participating departments. To receive the certificate, a student must take three courses:
- ST 500: Introduction to Social Theory, providing students with a broad survey of social theoretical issues spanning the humanities and social sciences;
- ST 600*: Multidisciplinary Perspectives in Social Theory, a topical, team-taught seminar conjoined with a public lecture series; and
- ST 690*, a topical seminar jointly taught by faculty members from the humanities and social sciences.
*ST-affiliated seminars (list updated each semester) outside of the student's home department may be taken as substitutions for ST 600 and ST 690; please contact the certificate director Shui-yin Sharon Yam at s.yam@uky.edu if you would like to suggest a substitution for one of these courses.
In total, the certificate requires nine hours of course work, can be pursued in tandem with regular degree programs, and is open to all graduate students at the University of Kentucky. Undergraduates can take the courses (with permission of the instructor) but only graduate students may receive an official certificate for their transcript.
To enroll in the certificate program, please apply via the Graduate School admission portal. If you are currently enrolled in a Master's or PhD program, you do not have to pay an admission fee. Please upload only your unofficial transcript.
Your progress to the Social Theory certificate will be administered through the audit process. The UK audit system will verify graduate certificates and automatically add them to your transcript. Audits may be accessed via myUK. If you have questions (or require a substitution), please contact the Social Theory graduate certificate director Shui-yin Sharon Yam at s.yam@uky.edu.
Topics of ST 600 have been:
- Environmental Justice and Disasters (2024)
- Debilities and After/Alterlives (2023)
- Reproductive Justice (2022)
- Queer Theory (2021)
- Animal (2020)
- Populism (2019)
- Affect (2018)
- Archives (2017)
- Justice (2016)
- Transnational Lives (2015)
- Market Failures, Famine and Crises (2014)
- Mapping (2013)
- Security (2012)
- Self/Story (2011)
- Law, Sex, Family (2010)
- Consuming Cultures (2009)
- War (2008)
- Migrations, Displacements, and Mobilities (2007)
- Emotion (2006)
- Intimacy (2005)
- Religion & Identity (2004)
- Localizing Globalization (2003)
- Civic Practice/Civil Societies (2002)
- Metropolis (2001)
- Children at the Millennium (2000)
- Masculinity and the Male Body (1999)
- Nation Theory (1998)
- Whiteness (1997)
- Revisioning Ecological-Social Justice (1996)
- Representing Reason (1995)
- Disciplining Boundaries (1994)
- Contemporary Democratic Theory and Democracy (1993)
- The Social and Political Body (1992)
- Objectivity and its Other (1991)
- Reassessing Modernity and Postmodernity (1990)
- Multidisciplinary Perspectives in Social Theory (1989)
The Committee on Social Theory is also a supportive environment where students readily meet faculty from numerous fields who are enthusiastic about and willing to serve on multidisciplinary thesis and dissertation committees.
Admission:
The certificate is limited to graduate students currently enrolled at the University of Kentucky. Students interested in the Committee should apply for regular admission to one of the participating departments, indicating their interest in earning a Certificate. The Committee encourages prospective students to contact the director when applying for admission and to indicate their interest in the program when initially contacting the Director of Graduate Studies of the relevant department. Each year the Committee offers one student a half research assistantship and actively sustains student fellowship support for social theory teaching and research in concert with allied departments.
For more information, or to request a certificate upon completion of the program, write to:
Dr. Shui-yin Sharon Yam
Director, The Committee on Social Theory
University of Kentucky
Lexington, KY 40506-0027
Email: s.yam@uky.edu