Lori Brown, associate professor of sociology, is taking a new approach to teaching Principles of Sociology this semester with some help from Harry Potter. By teaching about his fantasy world, students are learning more about their own society.

"[Author J.K. Rowling has] created another world that has some of the same problems we do," Brown explained. "It's not so hard to talk about issues of race when it's talked about in muggles and mudbloods."

This approach is resonating well with Brown's students.

"As you take each theory apart and analyze the important concepts and meanings, you can see a strong link to Harry Potter," said Cori Walker, a teacher candidate who is taking the class as an elective. "Reading Harry Potter allows the reader to pinpoint examples of key sociological issues and compare how they interpret these issues to how our society tackles them."

It's a great way to see how similar our society is to the magical society of Harry Potter, Walker said.

The class, SOC 230, still covers all the subject matter of an introductory sociology class, but puts much of the material in the context of Harry Potter's world.

"The class is based on Harry Potter but it is a sociology class so you still get very important information," said Brittany Allred, a sophomore biology major. "You can use that information to understand how society works [and] why things are the way they are."

In class students listen to lectures and participate in discussions. Outside of class students are responsible for more than just reading their sociology textbook for the next class. The 72 class members must read two books from the Harry Potter series and watch certain Harry Potter films during the semester. In an online message board students are constantly discussing the material outside of the classroom. At any one time, there are multiple sociological discussions happening, growing as each student comments.

"By using the message boards, you actually discuss more than you would in class. You can get more feedback from your classmates than you would in class," said Allred. "It helps you understand the terms and ideas a lot more than if we didn't have the message board."

In this way, the technology of the active class web site has enhanced the students' learning.

"It's always exciting for teachers to see their students talking about [class material]," Brown said. "I'm just amazed at the power of this. With the technology I really think this is the direction to go."

This course, which was developed over the summer by Brown, is being taught this semester for the first time. Brown plans to teach it again in the spring.

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This Meredith College course was featured in the November 19 edition of The News & Observer. To read the newspaper article, visit www.newsobserver.com/102/story/368570.html.