Gender division in sociology degree programmes – causes and effects?

Abstract

In spite of engagement and efforts to bring about gender equality in Swedish universities, gender division paradoxically appears in both old and new degree programs and academic disciplines. In recent years there has been a tendency for higher education students to enrol in degree programmes rather than in single subject courses. Due to the decreasing number of students taking subjects like sociology, Halmstad University College has constructed a degree programme, Sociologi och socialt utvecklingsarbete [Sociology and social development], focused on community development and social action; sociology is the main specific subject here. In the autumn of 2007, 95% of the 61 students were female, compared to the 75% of female students in sociology degree courses that Sweden has had in the past seven years. The problem of skewed gender representation in sociology is discussed here, and its consequences for educational practices in sociology as well as for the contents and status of the discipline in the future.

Keywords:

• gender division
• sociology
• choice of education
• gendered habitus

Notes

1. More information can be found at www.hh.se/solur.

2. The arguments in this article do not mean that I do not find class, ethnicity or other categorisations worth discussing. My choice here was to focus on gender division.

3. Sigbrit Franke, at the time university chancellor and head of The Swedish National Agency for Higher Education (HSV) and Stig Forneng, investigator at HSV, article in Dagens Nyheter 2004.06.01 (HSV.se 2007.11.19).

4. The Halmstad project started in autumn 2007 and comprises 17 degree programmes. The students will be studied on several occasions. In the project, continuing until 2012, we map, interpret and analyse connections between social background and the students' choices of education, their expectations of the education and the studies.

5. For a discussion about men, techniques and machines, see Mellström (1999).

6. Career advisers' importance and their recommendations related to structure in society is illuminated in Franke and Nitzler (2008).

7. Letter of Regulation 2007‐12‐19 concerning the financial year 2008 for universities and university colleges.