ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an exploration of both current and potential uses of it in the learning and teaching of sociology in higher education in Britain. The huge potential of it for transforming higher education is widely acknowledged and proclaimed, but there are extremely divergent ideas about how the “great it transformation” can be achieved. A number of well-recognized factors inhibits long-term strategic planning and decision-making. The net effect of rapid technological development and chronic under-funding of the British university sector has been to produce a piecemeal, incrementalist approach to it development in universities. The argument advanced in this chapter is that it uses in research, certain aspects of management and administrative computing are crucial for the development of the most effective student learning strategies. Formal disciplinary teaching of it in sociology, when incorporated into a broader strategy for use of it as an element of effective learning, has a strong tendency to focus on the application of specific it skills.
