Sociology and Anthropology Department

The Department of Sociology and Anthropology trains its students to use sociological and anthropological perspectives in the analysis and interpretation of contemporary issues such as the tension between globalization and national integration, the inequalities in access to power and resources among different groups, and the consequences of these structural forces on cultures and individual lives. In this training aim, the Department believes that a sound assessment of these issues requires:

1. a deep understanding of social systems and processes, and

2. an ability to apply this understanding to concrete social problems, both of which sharpen the students' critical faculties.

The Department expects its undergraduate and graduate students to use this critical sense in examining social phenomena with scientific rigor, in understanding contending ideologies of social change, in offering alternative narratives on rapid social change, and in making workable recommendations for designing plans and policies that enhance people's welfare.

Mission and Vision

The Department of Sociology and Anthropology, an academic unit of the School of Social Sciences, Loyola Schools, commits itself to the University's goal to contribute to national development by forming women and men who will devote their lives to the service of their fellow individuals and, through academic excellence, mature spirituality and the promotion of justice, serve those who are in need of help, most especially the poor and powerless.

Through its training research and action programs, the Department instills in its students a critical understanding of mutual dependence between structure and human agency in a globalized society, as well as the ability to apply this understanding to transformation of cultural practices, especially those found in Third World societies like the Philippines.

These academic skills, coupled with the value formation acquired through the University's core curriculum, are believed to be prerequisites for interpreting and acting on contemporary social forces such as the dialectic between globalization and national integration, the gross inequalities in access to power and resources among different groups, the relentless degradation of the physical environmental, the growing rationalization of modern life, and the deconstructive ethos of a highly technological post-modern age.

The consequences of these forces on genders, age groups, social classes and ethnic communities, specifically on how these groups and individuals confront and accommodate to these contexts, also occupy an important place in the Department's training, research and action agenda.

To sustain this academic commitment, the Department deems it imperative to maintain a responsive program of studies run by a set of faculty members whose unassailable professional competence, or sapientia, and superior teaching skills, or eloquentia, are matched by a great concern for human welfare, communitas, and a nurturing attitude or cura personalis towards their students and staff.