Showing posts with label Sociology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sociology. Show all posts

Sunday, April 3, 2016

Why Study the Rich?



WHY STUDY THE RICH?

Public Programme
April 23, 2016: 12.30-5.30pm, Free
Rabbits Roads Institute
Old Manor Park Library
835 Romford Road
Manor Park
London
E12 5JY
Map
An afternoon of talks and discussion
Refreshments served. Older children and young adults welcome.

‘Why study the Rich?’ is an event that brings together cross-disciplinary approaches to studying wealth in society. Come and listen to talks by activists, writers and artists whose scrutiny, investigation and differing perspectives attempt to challenge cultural narratives and societal structures that are intrinsically linked to the maintenance of power.
Open discussion with the audience is encouraged throughout the afternoon, as together we discuss how studies of ‘the rich’ might reveal a deeper understanding of the conditions of contemporary life and contribute to the debate about inequality in society.

Confirmed Speakers:
Roger Burrows, Professor of Cities at Newcastle University
Aditya Chakrabortty, senior economics commentator for The Guardian
Jeremy Gilbert, writer, researcher and activist & Professor of Cultural and Political Theory at UEL
Katharina Hecht, PhD student at LSE, on Economic Inequality
Jo Littler, Reader in Cultural Industries at City University London
Laure Provost, Artist, screening film ‘How to make money religiously

‘Why study the Rich?’ culminates a project called The Rich as a Minority Group by artists Ruth Beale and Amy Feneck in collaboration with GCSE Sociology students from Little Ilford School in Newham.


***END***
‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs
Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski 
All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com
Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Ruth Rikowski at Serendipitous Moments: http://ruthrikowskiim.blogspot.co.uk/

Friday, October 16, 2015

How Class Works - 2016 Conference



HOW CLASS WORKS 2016 CONFERENCE
A Conference at SUNY Stony Brook
June 9-11, 2016
CALL FOR PRESENTATIONS

The Center for Study of Working Class Life is pleased to announce the How Class Works – 2016 Conference, to be held at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, June 9-11, 2016
Proposals for papers, presentations, and sessions are welcome until December 9, 2015, according to the guidelines below.  For more information, visit our Web site at <www.stonybrook.edu/workingclass>.

Purpose and orientation: This conference explores ways in which an explicit recognition of class helps to understand the social world in which we live, and the variety of ways in which analysis of societies can deepen our understanding of class as a social relationship across the globe.  Theoretical and historical presentations should take as their point of reference the lived experience of class in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, within nations and internationally.  Presentations are welcome from people outside academic life when they sum up and reflect upon social experience in ways that contribute to conference themes and discussion.  Formal papers are welcome but are not required.  All presentations should be accessible to an interdisciplinary audience.

Conference themes: The conference welcomes proposals for sessions and presentations that advance our understanding of any of the following themes:
* The mosaic of class, race, and gender: To explore how class shapes racial, gender, and ethnic experience, and how different racial, gender, and ethnic experiences within various classes shape the meaning of class.
*  Class, power, and social structure: To explore how the social lives of working, middle, and capitalist classes are structured by various forms of power; to explore ways in which class dynamics shape power structures in workplaces and across broader societies.
*  Class in an age of income inequality:  To explore the implications and consequences of the growing income gap between top earners and the rest for the lived experience in class in different corners of the world.
*  Class, Community, and the Environment: To explore ways in which class informs communities and environmental conditions where people work as well as where they live; also to consider questions of "home," community formation and sustenance, and environmental justice. 
*  Class in a global economy: To explore how class identity and class dynamics are influenced by globalization, including the transnational movements of industry, capital, and capitalist elites; the experience of cross-border labor migration and organizing; and international labor and environmental standards.
*  Middle class? Working class? What's the difference and why does it matter? To explore the claim that the U.S. and other developed nations have become middle class societies, contrasting with the notion that the working class is the majority; to unpack the relationships between the middle class and capitalist, working and other subordinate classes both in the developed and the developing world.
*  Class, public policy, and electoral politics: To explore how class affects public deliberations and policy in a variety of nations around the world, with special attention to health care, the criminal justice system, labor law, poverty, tax and other economic policy, housing, and education; to explore the place of electoral politics in the arrangement of class forces on policy matters.
*  Class and culture: To explore ways in which cultures and subcultures transmit, sustain, and transform class dynamics around the world.
*  Pedagogy of class: To explore techniques and materials useful for teaching about class, at K-12 levels, in college and university courses, and in labor studies and adult education courses.

How to submit proposals for How Class Works – 2016 Conference:  We encourage proposals for panel sessions (three or four papers) and roundtables that bring diverse perspectives and experiences into dialogue: scholars with activists; those working on similar themes in different disciplines; as well as those working on similar issues in different parts of the world. Proposals for individual presentations are also welcome. Proposals for presentations must include the following information [for session proposals this information must be included for all proposed presentations, as well as indication of presenters' willingness to participate]: a) short descriptive title; b) which of the conference themes will be addressed; c) a maximum 250 word summary of the main subject matter, points, and methodology; d) relevant personal information indicating institutional affiliation (if an y) and what training or experience the presenter brings to the proposal; e) presenter's name, address, telephone, fax, and e-mail address. A person may present in at most two conference sessions. To allow time for discussion, sessions will be limited to three twenty-minute or four fifteen-minute principal presentations. Sessions will not include official discussants.  

Submit proposals as an e-mail attachment to michael.zweig@stonybrook.edu or as hard copy by mail to: The How Class Works – 2016 Conference, Center for Study of Working Class Life, Department of Economics, SUNY, Stony Brook, NY 11794-4384.

Timetable:  Proposals must be received by December 9, 2015. After review by the program committee, notifications will be mailed by the end of January 2016. The conference will be at SUNY Stony Brook June 9-11, 2016.  Conference registration and housing reservations will be possible after March 7, 2016.
Details and updates will be posted at: http://www.stonybrook.edu/workingclass


Conference coordinator:
Michael Zweig
Director, Center for Study of Working Class Life
Department of Economics
State University of New York
Stony Brook, NY 11794-4384
631.632.7536    
michael.zweig@stonybrook.edu                   ##


***END***
‘Human Herbs’ – a song by Cold Hands & Quarter Moon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Au-vyMtfDAs
Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
Glenn Rikowski @ Academia: http://independent.academia.edu/GlennRikowski 
Ruth Rikowski @ Academia: http://lsbu.academia.edu/RuthRikowski

Ruth Rikowski at Serendipitous Moments: http://ruthrikowskiim.blogspot.co.uk/


Tuesday, March 4, 2014

Societies of Control

SOCIETIES OF CONTROL
New Formations Special Issue  'Societies of Control'
Call for Contributions
Deadline for paper proposals March 31st 2014

Potential contributors: please submit title, full abstract (300 words) and a short c.v. to nfsubmissions@me.com by this date.
Contributors will be notified of acceptance by April 14th 2014
Submission of papers will be required by  September 30th 2014.
Journal Info: http://www.lwbooks.co.uk/journals/newformations/contents.html

This issue of New Formations will address a complex set of interrelated issues in the theorisation of contemporary societies and power relations. The emergence of distributed systems, network relations and decentralised institutions has been widely observed as a key feature of social, cultural and political change for several decades, across a wide range of domains of practice and discourse. The issue will provide an opportunity to reflect upon this convergence and the diverse positions from which it has been theorised.
A key reference point in these discussions, Deleuze's 'Post-Script on the Societies of Control' remains a enigmatic text on several levels. Easily dismissed as the irrelevant musings of a metaphysician on a fundamentally sociological set of questions, the essay's theses have nonetheless proven irresistibly suggestive to many commentators. The claim that contemporary mechanisms of government, regulation and administration must be understood as operating according to different logics than the classic 'normative' mode of 'disciplinary' power seems increasingly relevant in the era of networked communications and official encouragement of cultural, social and sexual 'diversity', and yet Deleuze's delineation of those mechanisms remains frustratingly abstract and cryptically suggestive.
However, Maurizio Lazzarato has persuasively linked Deleuze's suggestive account with the general thesis that contemporary capitalism is best understood in terms of the shift from 'Fordism' to 'post-Fordism' in the 1980s. Whilst Fordism relies on a typically 'disciplinary' set of institutions and practices (the factory, the centralised nation state, the collectivist and conformist education system, 'mass' media), post-Fordism relies on quite different mechanisms and organisational forms (disaggregated networks of corporations, trans-national regulatory bodies, 'narrowcasting' and social media) which the notion of 'control society' tries to capture at the same level of abstraction as Foucault's concept of 'discipline'.
In fact, although Foucault's studies of 'disciplinary' society have influenced understanding of both historical and contemporary societies across a swathe of disciplines and in many spheres of political thought and cultural work, his later lectures seem also to propose that the logic of 'security' which emerges in the 20th century is different from the logic of 'discipline' and in this regarid is close to Deleuze's understanding of 'control'. Reading Foucault's later lecture sources with care, Lazzarato argues persuasively that it is a common but categorical mistake to believe that Foucault's studies of disciplinary power are attempts to delineate the basic mechanisms of contemporary forms of power, rather than historical studies of institutional forms and practices which, while they may well persist, are today definitively 'residual' in character.
Simultaneous with and subsequent to Deleuze’s and Foucault’s work on these issues the emergence of interest in post-Fordism in the wake of the Regulation School’s theorisation of Fordism and its decline has generated interested in a similar set of issues since the 1980s, particularly on the Anglophone Left. The claim that the shift from ‘Fordism’ to ‘Post-Fordism’ or ‘the New Capitalism’ constitutes the definitive historical process of recent times has been influential on various strands of social and political theory and analysis since the early 1980s. What might be the points of resonance or dissonance between these theses and those proposed by Foucault and Deleuze and their followers?
Another element of much commentary on these issues has been the proposition that ‘the network’ now constitutes the prevalent organisational form for both corporations and political and social movements. The fact that ‘networked’ and ‘horizontal’ organisational forms were pioneered by the radical movements of the 60s and 70s - most notably the women’s movement - is well known. What is the significance of this historical fact, of the agency of the women’s movement and the desires it expresses in shifting the dynamics of advanced capitalist culture? How does the emergence of post- Fordism and the societies of security / control transform gender relations and the politics of sexuality, and how far have those shifts themselves been driven by the multiple refusals of gendered and sexual normativity which have characterised the cultural radicalism of recent decades?
This issue will explore the analytic possibilities generated by this set of issues, questions and theses with reference both to a range of possible objects of study in contemporary politics and culture and to a number of different conceptual and theoretical positions. Should we bother to develop and flesh out Deleuze's and Foucault’s suggestions at all? If so, how might we do so and what would be the analytic gains? Are there alternative conceptions of phenomena addressed by their work which would allow for better diagnosis and more sophisticated analysis?
What phenomena of contemporary culture and politics might be best analysed in terms of the idea of 'control society'? How could such analyses inform our broader understanding of such issues as the 'war on terror', new modes of sexual regulation, new forms of censorship (especially online) and 'surveillance' by corporate or state agencies and debates over intellectual property? What forms of democratic, libertarian or anti-capitalist politics and culture might be possible or necessary in an era of ‘control'?

Confirmed Contributors:
Andrew Goffey
Luciana Parisi
Tiziana Terranova
Angela Mitropoulos
Athina Karatzogianni
Will Davies
Alex Williams
Tony Sampson
Yuk Hui
Erich Hörl

**END**

'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk
Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski


Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Food and Society 2014

FOOD AND SOCIETY 2014
BSA Food Study Group Conference:
Food & Society 2014
Monday 30 June 2014, 09:00-19:30
British Library Conference Centre, London

Keynote speaker: Professor Lotte Holm, Institute of Food and Resource Economics, University of Copenhagen

Call for Abstracts
Poor diet, levels of food waste and intensification of agriculture are key themes in contemporary food research and policy making, yet they can appear disconnected from everyday social practices and the lived experiences of food and food systems. The fourth BSA Food Study Group conference will bring together researchers, practitioners and policy makers to explore this apparent disconnect and showcase the most cutting edge research and practice from within and beyond the sociology of food.
‘Why do people fail to comply with ‘healthy eating’ advice?’ is a central question for public health policy makers. However it is one which generally fails to acknowledge that for consumers, food is also about pleasure and plays an ideological role in constituting family life. What, therefore, can social science tell us about food and eating in everyday life? To what extent are individuals responsible for their unhealthy or unethical eating practices and is it reasonable for them to be ‘blamed’? What is the significance of the social contexts in which lives are lived? How do emotions and ideas about food, pleasure and commensality influence food practices, over and above official dietary advice? What criteria do different groups of consumers use in selecting foods; are issues of provenance, safety and ethics the preserve of the few? What part can and should be played by food policy makers, manufacturers and retailers in addressing food related health and environmental inequalities? And what can industry, policy and academia learn from each other about the so-called ‘gap’ between knowledge and individual ‘behaviour’ and practices? The conference will bring delegates together around these – and other - issues to discuss what is important in food research now.

Call for Abstracts, Symposia, Posters and Images
The conference will provide a forum for the presentation of rigorous research on food and eating from sociology and other disciplines, looking at experiences in both the Global South and North. The presentation of research from related disciplines and topics is welcomed. Particular focus will be placed on the conference themes:
- The enjoyment of food, consumption preparation and eating
- Food ethics including food insecurity and waste
- Production and consumption, including global dimensions
- Procurement and institutional food
- Food health, obesity, morality
- Children’s food and breastfeeding
- Food and related policy (responses and interventions)
- Food and Public Health

We invite abstracts for oral papers lasting 20 minutes, with 10 minutes to follow for questions, and for posters. As in previous years a prize will be awarded for the poster which delegates agree best communicates its aims, methods, findings and conclusions.
We also invite abstracts for symposia with a maximum of three connected papers of relevance to the conference theme.
Acknowledging the methodological diversity of delegates’ research, we also invite the submission of original fieldwork photographs which reflect a research project. These should be submitted with captions of no more than 30 words.

Abstract Submission Deadline: Friday 14 March 2014

Please direct any academic enquiries to the Food Study Group co-convenors:
Hannah Lambie-Mumford: h.lambie-mumford@sheffield.ac.uk  
Rebecca O’Connell: r.oconnell@ioe.ac.uk  
Andrea Tonner: a.tonner@strath.ac.uk  
For administrative issues please contact the BSA Events Team: events@britsoc.org.uk

**END**

'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://wordpress.com

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Labor Process / Valorization

LABOR PROCESS / VALORIZATION
40 years after Labor and Monopoly Capital, by Harry Braverman
Deadline for submission of articles: January 31, 2014
(Articles in Portuguese and English)
Guest Editor
Elcemir Paço Cunha
Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF)
“The distinctive capacity of human labor power is, therefore, not its ability to produce a surplus, but rather its intelligent and purposive character, which gives it infinite adaptability and which produces the social and cultural conditions for enlarging its own productivity, so that its surplus product may be continuously enlarged. From the point of view of the capitalist, this many-sided potentiality of humans in society is the basis upon which is built the enlargement of his capital” (BRAVERMAN, 1998, p. 38).
The purpose of this call is fostering discussions on the labor process in the capitalist mode of production, having in mind the 40th anniversary of the publication of Labor and Monopoly Capital: the degradation of work in the twentieth century, by Harry Braverman. As is generally known, this book resumed the discussions of Sociology of Work worldwide by evoking the links between the labor process and the monopoly phase of capital. From this copious influence, remained the so-called Labor Process Theory, which engenders discussions and events abroad (http://www.ilpc.org.uk/). The discussions from Braverman’s book, under the critical guidance of Micheal Burawoy, also, prompted considerations that, right or wrong, staked out the conditions for setting what came to be the Critical Management Studies (KNIGHTS and WILLMOTT, 1990).
Additionally, all movement in the different chains that put on hold the category work discussing its validity for a social criticism or its centrality to social life (Jürgen Habermas, Claus Offe, and Andre Gorz, and resonances in the recognition theory as it appears in Axel Honneth, in addition to authors having even postmodernist attitudes, such as Zygmunt Bauman), also served to greatly deviate research on the work problem (compare, notwithstanding, to different movements which do not claim such centrality under the terms of criticism, as György Lukács, Ernest Mandel, István Mészáros, etc.). Not by chance, the so-called Organizational Studies, which partly reflect on the issues of social and economic sciences, manifest the tendency to pass off the problems of the labor process as valorization process of capital by preferring other themes also important that, however, keep away from the key determinations of this sociability observed, whose guiding core is still (against the most varied prognoses) the logic of value.
Therefore, celebrating this work by Braverman means opening the possibility for discussions which bring up the issues directly associated to work and labor process in the capitalist production, addressing, by way of example, these possible points:
· Issues concerning the centrality of work;
· New expressions of work degradation;
· Work, work division, and command technique (administration) at work;
· Work, State, and social policies;
· Work and new expressions of the “social question”;
· Work and feminism;
· Others.
We would like to invite authors to prepare theoretical and empirical papers.
Cadernos EBAPE.BR is an online journal on Administration published in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, by EBAPE/FGV (Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration of Getulio Vargas Foundation) and it is an open access journal - http://bibliotecadigital.fgv.br/ojs/index.php/cadernosebape/index. All approved papers will be published in the original language. The Cadernos EBAPE.BR is classified by the CAPES Qualis system as B1.
The authors should follow the guidelines for submitting articles to Cadernos EBAPE.BR in:
The articles should be submitted through the link: http://bibliotecadigital.fgv.br/ojs/index.php/cadernosebape/login  
You must register as an author, if you have not done it previously.
The deadline for article submission is January 31, 2014.
Note: please indicate in the field "AUTHOR’S COMMENTS” (bottom of the page – 1st stage of the procedure) that your article is for the special issue: “Labor process/appreciation 40 years after Labor and Monopoly Capital, by Harry Braverman”.
Specific questions about the special issue should be directly addressed to the guest editor: Elcemir Paço Cunha (elcemirpacocunha@gmail.com).
Guest Editor
Elcemir Paço Cunha
Associate Professor of the Post-Graduation Programs in Social Service and Law at the Universidade Federal de Juiz de For a

**END**

'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Saturday, January 18, 2014

Materiality At Work

MATERIALITY AT WORK

BSA Work, Employment and Economic Life Study Group
‘It’s not immaterial’ – Materiality at work
The BSA WEEL group is holding a half day seminar/workshop on materiality at work on Friday 24th January 1pm – 5pm.
How does the material environment of work matter? How are working lives and the organisation of the workplace impacted by the spaces, size, weight, smells, sounds and other material characteristics of particular jobs? In what ways do workers physically interact with the material world in order to perform work? How do instruments or tools mediate this interaction? Are interactions with organic materials different from interactions with non-organic materials? To what extent can we understand interactions with technology as material, rather than immaterial?
Generally, what can an understanding of work as material contribute to the sociology of work and employment?
The event will be held in the BSA meeting room, Imperial Wharf, London. Costs to participants £20 BSA Members, £25 Non-members, free unwaged/student.
We are especially keen for attendees who wish to do so to contribute five minute micro-presentations in which they explore the role of materiality in their research. These are *not* expected to be fully developed papers but instead should raise ideas that have come out of research and suggest issues that may be of interest to others.
If you are interested in contributing to the seminar in this way please submit a two sentence (max 50 word) proposal for a five minute overview of how your research relates to the materiality of work to Ben at b.m.fincham@sussex.ac.uk


**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo  
'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com

Monday, January 6, 2014

Living on the Edge - Rethinking Poverty, Class and Schooling

LIVING ON THE EDGE – RETHINKING POVERTY, CLASS AND SCHOOLING

BOOK LAUNCH
Living on the Edge – Rethinking poverty, class and schooling
By Professor Terry Wrigley
9 January 2014
1 – 2 pm
University of East London
Stratford, Cass Building, ED4.02

Based on his new book (co-authored with John Smyth), Terry Wrigley will outline a long tradition of deficit thinking whereby children growing up in poverty, their families, and those who teach them, are held to blame for low achievement. The history of flawed explanations and faulty evidence includes genetic intelligence, poor parenting and low aspirations.
The material and cultural impact of poverty on children has been intensified and complicated in England through current Austerity politics as well as rigid curriculum standardisation and surveillance. The book also proposes a symbolic interactionist approach, drawing on Bourdieu and Goffman, to understand and respond to the complexity of relationships and (mis)understandings between teachers and students, or schools and communities.
Terry Wrigley, Visiting Professor, Leeds Metropolitan University,
Editor, Improving Schools journal

Details on the book:
Living on the Edge – Rethinking poverty, class and schooling
9781433116858
John Smyth and Terry Wrigley
Peter Lang
2013
239 pages

**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo  
'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
All that is Solid for Glenn Rikowski: http://rikowski.wordpress.com
The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk
Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski
Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

Friday, August 16, 2013

International Sociology of Education Conference


INTERNATIONAL SOCIOLOGY OF EDUCATION CONFERENCE

The Royal Foundation of St Katharine, 2 Butcher Row, London, E14 8DS, UK
19th and 20th November, 2013

Programme

TUESDAY 19TH NOVEMBER 2013

ARRIVAL AND REGISTRATION        09.30 - 11.00 [Coffee available]

Welcome and introduction

1. Education and Power
Naomi Hodgson, Antonia Kupfer & Peter Mayo
Institute of Education, London, Universities of Southampton and Malta
11.15-12.55
       
Lunch:       13.00 - 14.00

2. Elite schools in a new field of power?  Schooling and international student mobility in the UK
Rachel Brooks & Johanna Waters, Universities of Surrey and Oxford
14.00-15.15

3. Elite schools in Ireland: the complexities of distinction in an economically selective, state-funded market
Aline Courtois, Hibernian College, Dublin, Ireland
15.15 – 16.30
       
Tea:          16.30-16.45                       

4. KEYNOTE LECTURE
Jane Kenway, Monash University, Australia
17.00-18.30                               
       
Dinner:      19.00


WEDNESDAY 20TH NOVEMBER 2013

5. Private-elite schools – a fuzzy boundary?  The ordering of the private education marketplace in England
Claire Maxwell, Institute of Education, London
09.00 -10.15
               
6. Diaspora Dilemmas:  an educational ethnography of second-generation Afro-Caribbeans in London & New York
Derron Wallace, University of Cambridge
10.15 - 11.30

Coffee:      11.30 – 12.00

7. Comfort Radicalism and NEET: A conservative praxis
James Avis, University of Huddersfield
12.00 - 13.15

Lunch:       13.15 - 14.15

8. Theorizing policy in the sociology of education
Megan Lourie & Elizabeth Rata, University of Auckland, New Zealand
14.15 - 15.30

9. Youth education and employment:  the role of identity in post-18 choice making processes
Kate Hoskins, University of Roehampton
15.45 – 17.00

Tea and depart:  17.00  

END OF CONFERENCE


Contact: Mrs Helen Oliver (h.j.oliver@shefffield.ac.uk)

**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  
'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski
The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk
Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Saturday, March 16, 2013

Sociology and the Global Economic Crisis


SOCIOLOGY AND THE GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS

CALL FOR PAPERS

Sociology
A journal of the British Sociological Association
Sociology and the Global Economic Crisis

Special Issue Call for Papers
Deadline for submissions: 31 August 2013

Editorial Team:
Ana C. Dinerstein (University of Bath), Gregory Schwartz (University of Bath) and Graham Taylor (University of the West of England)

Brief: As the Editors of the 2014 Annual Special Issue of Sociology (http://soc.sagepub.com), a journal of the British Sociological Association (http://www.britsoc.co.uk), would like to invite you to submit a paper, and extended book review essay, or a theoretical intervention that does one of two broadly defined things: 
·         Explore how sociology can contribute to a better understanding of (the lived experience of) the global economic crisis; and/or
·         Reflect on how social processes and movements confronting the crisis can inspire a new sociological imagination.

Our aim is to bring together contributions that:
·         Bridge disciplines
·         Unsettle conventions
·         Cosmopolitanise epistemologies
·         Renew sociology

We welcome contributions on relevant topics in any field of social science engaging with sociological research, from early career and established academics, and from those outside academia.

Rationale: The Editorial Board of Sociology considered a high number of proposals in response to the tender for the Special Issue of the journal in 2014. Our proposal, titled ‘Sociology and the Global Economic Crisis’ was selected as the successful submission. The Special Issue will address the urgent need todeconstruct and interrogate the formulation and reality of the global economic crisis. Additionally, it will systematically and critically investigate the specifically social processes underpinning its development and intensification.

Our aim in this proposal has been to tackle the challenge confronting the social sciences by the current economic crisis, in that there has largely been a failure to translate a quotidian reality of crisis into adequate forms of knowledge. While there has been discussion of ‘the crisis’, or 'austerity', of growing poverty, precarity, unemployment, and proletarianisation, there have been severe limitations in the disciplines of social science to engage with their object of knowledge in a way that seriously rethinks the epistemological and methodological assumptions of such knowledge. In short, the emergence of the current crisis has tended to highlight serious limits to the sociological imagination. Rethinking the ‘crisis’ could facilitate the renewal of sociology as an intellectual force in the public sphere, and imbue sociology with a critical or radical force that has been missing in recent decades.

With the explicit aims of the special issue to bridge disciplines, unsettle conventions and cosmopolitanise epistemologies, we see the contribution of critical Marxist theorists as paramount. Why? Above all, by asking authors to reflect on how social relations of production are confronted and rethought by various (new) movements and (new) forms of politics, and how modes of protest are not only confronting the political-cultural and class changes, but how social mobilisation itself nurtures epistemological innovation. 

Queries: The full paper should be submitted by the 31 August 2013. The articles will be peer reviewed following the journal's usual procedures. The special issue is to be published in October 2014. To discuss initial ideas, seek editorial advice, or discuss a specific paper, please contact the Special Issue Editors by email on sociology.specialissue.2014@gmail.com



**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  
'Cheerful Sin' – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

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