PhD Courses in Denmark

Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Sociology

Dates and time: 25-27 November 2026 from 9-16

This course is designed to help participants refine and strengthen their Ph.D. project designs. Through a series of sessions, participants will present and critically reflect on their research plans, receiving constructive feedback from fellow Ph.D. students and the course convenor. Additionally, the course will cover broader topics such as thesis type (monograph or article-based), quality standards, and strategies for writing and publishing academic articles.

Course Structure:
This is a three-day course designed to help participants refine their Ph.D. projects. After a short introduction, we will focus on participants’ projects, following this disposition: 

1. Each participant will write a five-page summary about their project, based on the following structure:

 - Research Question: What is your central research question? What assumptions underlie your research question? How does your project contribute to existing research in your field?
 - Concepts: How do you define the key concepts in your study?
 - Theory: What are the main theories and concepts guiding your research?
 - Sampling: What is your object of inquiry? Which aspects of empirical reality do you focus on, and why?
 - Methodology: What methods and analytical strategies will you use? What are the strengths and limitations of your chosen approach?
 - Transparency: How will you ensure transparency in your research?

2. Each participant will do a short project presentation, followed by a 30-minute discussion of their project.

3. The course will also include brief presentations by the course convenor on key aspects of Ph.D. project design, including research questions, sampling, concepts, theory, methodology, and transparency. Each presentation will be followed by plenary discussions centered on participants' own projects.

Course organisers:
Diana-Roxana Galos, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Copenhagen
Mathias Wullum Nielsen, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Copenhagen

ECTS: 3.5

Max. number of PhD students: 12

Registration: Please register via the link in the box no later than 2 October 2026

Further information: For more information about the PhD course, please contact the PhD Administration (phd@hrsc.ku.dk) or the course organizers.

Reading list:

Logic:
Beach, D., & Kaas, J. G. (2020). The great divides: Incommensurability, the impossibility of mixed-methodology, and what to do about it. International Studies Review, 22(2), 214-235.
Becker, H. S. (2000). Cases, causes, conjunctures, stories and imagery. Case Study Method. Key Isssues, Key Texts, 223-233.

Research question:
Sandberg, J., & Alvesson, M. (2011). Ways of constructing research questions: gapspotting or problematization? Organization, 18(1), 23-44.
Mears, A. (2017). Puzzling in sociology: On doing and undoing theoretical puzzles. Sociological Theory, 35(2), 138-146.

Concepts:
Adcock, R., & Collier, D. (2001). Measurement validity: A shared standard for qualitative and quantitative research. American Political Science Review, 95(3), 529-546.
Desmond, M. (2014). Relational ethnography. Theory and Society, 43(5), 547- 579.

Theory:
Abend, G. (2008). The meaning of ‘theory’. Sociological Theory, 26(2), 173-199.
Swedberg, R. (2016). Before theory comes theorizing or how to make social science more interesting. The British journal of sociology, 67(1), 5-22.
Healy, K. (2017). Fuck nuance. Sociological Theory, 35(2), 118-127.
Sutton, R. I., & Staw, B. M. (1995). What theory is not. Administrative science quarterly, 371-384.

Sampling:
Lieberson, S. (1991). Small N's and big conclusions: an examination of the reasoning in comparative studies based on a small number of cases. Social Forces, 70(2), 307-320.
Collins, C., Neely, M. T., & Khan, S. (2024). “Which cases do I need?” Constructing cases and observations in qualitative research. Annual Review of Sociology, 50.
King, Gary, et al. Designing Social Inquiry. Princeton University Press, 1994. (Chapter 4).

Methods and Limitations:
Jerolmack, C., & Khan, S. (2014). Talk is cheap: Ethnography and the attitudinal fallacy. Sociological Methods & Research, 43(2), 178-209.
Lamont, M., & Swidler, A. (2014). Methodological pluralism and the possibilities and limits of interviewing. Qualitative Sociology, 37(2), 153-171.
Achen, C. H. (2005). Let's put garbage-can regressions and garbage-can probits where they belong. Conflict Management and Peace Science, 22(4), 327-339.

Transparency:
Breznau, N. (2021). Does Sociology Need Open Science? Societies, 11(1), 9.
Pratt, M. G., Kaplan, S., & Whittington, R. (2020). Editorial essay: The tumult over transparency: Decoupling transparency from replication in establishing trustworthy qualitative research. Administrative Science Quarterly, 65(1), 1-19.