The Baby and the Bathwater

Abstract

Sociologists eager to engage in social change work may see both promise and risk in two interrelated movements: initiatives to renew the role of civic and community engagement in higher education and initiatives within the discipline of sociology to advance publicly engaged work. I focus on one specific intersection of those movements by exploring how community-based research (CBR) relates to student attitudes toward the social change potential of sociology. Analysis of student responses in an undergraduate seminar on publicly engaged sociology and CBR suggests that carefully structured, reciprocally partnered CBR not only encourages student interest in community engagement, it can also encourage critical thinking about the discipline in ways that promote its potential for addressing social issues. I consider the implications of these results for structuring courses and curricula that advance civic engagement and the public good as a broad movement across higher education and sustain student interest in the progressive role sociology can play as a discipline in contributing to that movement.