Roundtable Review: Beyond Anti-Austerity?
Last week’s well-attended roundtable - Beyond Anti-Austerity? The Possibilities and Limits of Movements Resisting Neoliberalism - provided much interesting food for thought on a number of big questions facing contemporary movements of the left. What follows is a brief...
Protest Talks 3: Beyond Anti-Austerity?
The Possibilities and Limits of Movements Resisting Neoliberalism 3.30-5.30pm, 3rd December in the Arthur Lewis Boardroom, 2nd floor.All welcome, but please reserve a place via Eventbrite. The wave of protests instigated by the financial crisis in 2011 has already...
The Umbrella Movement: a leaderless movement supported by citizens’ umbrellas
The Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong is a critical milestone of pro-democracy campaigning in this postcolonial society. Differing from the previous movement mobilisation, the Umbrella Movement is neither planned nor led by any leader. Instead, the movement is a result...
Reading Group Dates for 2014-15
Our monthly reading group will run on Wednesday mornings, 10-11am in 3.040 Arthur Lewis Building on the following dates: 15th Oct - Reading Carroll & Ratner's (1994) Between Leninism and Radical Pluralism in Critical Sociology 20(2) 12th Nov - Reading Eric Olin...
A ‘Revolution’ under Attack – the Alternative in midst the War in Syria
The most recent pictures of thousands of refugees fleeing from heavy attacks of ISIS and making their way from Syria across the border to Turkey, come from the area of Kobani – one of three cantons of the self- proclaimed Autonomy Region Rojava in Northern Syria. This...
Staging protest’s relics: a visit to Disobedient Objects at the V&A
‘How might an object be disobedient?’ The question occurred to me throughout the morning before my visit to the V&A. The exhibition’s title on the one hand seemed to allude to the truth that items and materials are part of our networks of contention, but it seemed...
Discipline and Dissent on the University Campus
On July 21st 2014, the University of Birmingham disciplined three students for their role in a Defend Education Birmingham occupation of the University Senate Chamber in November 2013. Two students were suspended for nine months, while the third was given a formal...
New Book on European Identity and Social Movements
The elections to the European Parliament in May have brought the question of European unity back into the foreground. Right-wing Eurosceptics gained large followings but some advances were also made by progressive parties. I would argue that social movements are the...
Emotional Contagion, Big Data and Research Ethics
The results of a recent psychology experiment on ‘emotional contagion’ last week were heavily reported in the mainstream media and, rather unusually, the discussion was focused on methodology and research ethics. The experiment involved manipulation of the ‘News Feed’...
Last reading group of 2013-14
Our last reading group of this academic year will be 10am Weds 9th July in Café Muse. We'll be readingSimonds, W. (2013). Presidential Address: The Art of Activism. Social Problems, 60(1), 1–26.The piece discusses the relationship between sociology, activism and art...
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