Maryland's internationally prominent sociology department offers a broad program of excellence with special strengths in Demography (ranked 8th), Development, Gender Work and Family (ranked 5th), Historical & Comparative Sociology , Military Sociology , Social Psychology , Stratification, and Theory. Currently ranked 20th in the U.S. News ratings, the department's reputation has continued to rise in recent years.

Research centers such as the Maryland Population Research Center, the Center for Research on Military Organization, and the Center for Innovation offer students and faculty abundant opportunities to collaborate. The Department also houses the India Human Development Survey.

With our combination of size, intellectual range, strong specialty areas, racial/ ethnic diversity, and Washington area location, we believe Maryland provides an ideal setting to pursue the B.A. or the Ph.D. degrees in Sociology.

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What's new?

One combined campus-wide commencement ceremony will be held on Sunday, January 24, 2010 in the Cole Student Activities Building during which all graduates will be recognized, both as a group and individually.

Please click here for further information: http://www.commencement.umd.edu/

In the Spotlight

Harriet Presser will be awarded the Jessie Bernard award at the August 2010 meetings of the American Sociological Association. The Jessie Bernard Award has been given for thirty years in recognition of scholarly work that “has enlarged the horizons of sociology to encompass fully the role of women in society”. Harriet has been a Professor of Sociology at Maryland since 1976 and was named Distinguished University Professor in 1999. She was the founding Director of the Center on Population, Gender, and Social Inequality (now the Maryland Population Research Center).

Harriet adds this honor to numerous other career awards including election as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Association of University Women's 2007 Founders Distinguished Senior Scholar Award.  Last year the Population Association of America established the Harriet B. Presser award to honor scholars who have done distinguished research on gender and demographic issues.

Her current research focuses on a 25-year view of shift work over the life course, offering a new perspective on work and family time. This follows up her well-known book Working in a 24/7 Economy: Challenges for American Families, published by the Russell Sage Foundation.