LibGuides: Sociology : Home

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Reckoning with Racism: Police, Judges, and the RDS Case by Constance Backhouse In 1994, a white police officer arrested a Black teenager, placed him in a choke hold, and charged him with assault and obstructing arrest. In acquitting the teen, Judge Corrine Sparks - Canada's first Black female judge - remarked that police sometimes overreacted when dealing with non-white youth. The acquittal was appealed and ultimately upheld, but most of the white judges who reviewed the decision critiqued Sparks's comments. Reckoning with Racism considers the RDS case, in which the Supreme Court of Canada fumbled over its first complaint of judicial racial bias. This is an enthralling account of the country's most momentous race case.
Call Number: E-Book
Publication Date: 2023
Cultural Appropriation in Fashion and Entertainment by Yuniya Kawamura; Jung-Whan Marc de Jong Is it ever appropriate to "borrow" culturally inspired ideas? Who has ownership over intangible culture? What role does power inequality play? These questions are often at the center of heated public debates around cultural appropriation, with new controversies breaking seemingly every day. Cultural Appropriation in Fashion and Entertainment offers a sociological perspective on the debate, exploring appropriation of cultures embedded in race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and religion in entertainment as well as the clothing, textiles, jewelry, accessories, hairstyles, and tattoos we wear. Case studies are drawn from K-pop, Bollywood dance, J-pop, Bhangra music, Jamaican reggae, hip hop and EDM fashion to explore how, when, and why cultural borrowing or appreciation can become cultural appropriation. There's also discussion of subcultural territories that extend beyond geography, race and ethnicity, such as cosplay and LGBTQI+ communities. By providing a range of global perspectives on the adoption, adaptation, and application of both tangible and intangible cultural objects, Kawamura and de Jong help move the conversation beyond simply criticizing designers and creators to encourage nuanced discussion and raise awareness of diverse cultures in the creative industries.
Call Number: E-book
Publication Date: 2022
Athlete Activism: Contemporary Activism by Rory Magrath This book examines the phenomenon of athlete activism across all levels of sport, from elite and international sport, to collegiate and semi-pro, and asks what this tells us about the relationship between sport and wider society. With contributions from scholars around the world, the book presents a series of fascinating case studies, including the activism of world-famous athletes such as Serena Williams, Megan Rapinoe and Raheem Sterling. Covering a broad range of sports, from the National Football League (NFL) and Australian Rules, to fencing and the Olympic Games, the book sheds important light on some of the most important themes in the study of sport, including gender, power, racism, intersectionality and the rise of digital media. It also considers the financial impact on athletes when they take a stand and the psychological impact of activism and how that might relate to sports performance. It has never been the case that 'sport and politics don't mix', and now, more than ever, the opposite is true. This is essential reading for anybody with an interest in the politics or sociology of sport, the politics of protest, social movements or media studies.
Call Number: E-Book
Publication Date: 2022
LGBTQ Digital Cultures: A Global Perspective by Paromita Pain (Editor) Emphasizing an intersectional and transnational approach, this collection examines how social media and digital technologies have impacted the sphere of LGBTQ activism, advocacy, education, empowerment, identity, protest, and self-expression. This edited collection adopts a critical and cultural studies perspective to examine queer cyberculture and presence. Through the lens of representation and identity politics, it explores topics such as race, disability, and colonialism, alongside sexuality and gender. The collection examines how digital technologies have made queer cultural production more expansive and how such technological affordances and platforms have enabled queer cultural practices to be more transformational. Bringing together contributors and case studies from different countries, the contributions grapple with the tensions that arise when visibility, hiddenness, renditions of the self, and collective contractions of identity must be negotiated in a variety of global contexts and explores this influence on contemporary political identities. This book provides an essential introduction to LGBTQ digital cultures for students, researchers, and scholars of media, communication, and cultural studies. It will also be of interest to activists wanting to learn more about the transformative potential of digital media and technology in LGBTQ advocacy and empowerment around the globe.
Call Number: E-Book
Publication Date: 2022
Contested Concepts in Migration Studies by Ricard Zapata-Barrero (Editor); Dirk Jacobs (Editor); Riva Kastoryano (Editor) This volume demonstrates that migration- and diversity-related concepts are always contested, and provides a reflexive critical awareness and better comprehension of the complex questions driving migration studies. The main purpose of this volume is to enhance conceptual thinking on migration studies. Examining interaction between concepts in the public domain, the academic disciplines, and the policy field, this book helps to avoid simplification or even trivialization of complex issues. Recent political events question established ways of looking at issues of migration and diversity and require a clarification or reinvention of political concepts to match the changing world. Applying five basic dimensions, each expert chapter contribution reflects on the role concepts play and demonstrates that concepts are ideology dependent, policy/politics dependent, context dependent, discipline dependent, and language dependent, and are influenced by how research is done, how policies are formulated, and how political debates extend and distort them. This book will be essential reading for students, scholars, and practitioners in migration studies/politics, migrant integration, citizenship studies, racism studies, and more broadly of key interest to sociology, political science, and political theory.
Call Number: E-Book
Publication Date: 2022
Simply institutional ethnography: Creating a sociology for people by Smith, Dorothy E. Institutional ethnography (IE) originated as a feminist alternative to sociologies defining people as the objects of study. Instead, IE explores the social relations that dominate the life of the particular subject in focus. Simply Institutional Ethnography is written by two pioneers in the field and is grounded in decades of groundbreaking work. Dorothy E. Smith and Alison I. Griffith lay out the basics of how institutional ethnography proceeds as a sociology.
Call Number: E-book
Publication Date: 2022
Sociology: The Basics by Ken Plummer A lively, accessible and comprehensive introduction to the diverse ways of thinking about social life, Sociology: The Basics has been translated into six languages. The volume is packed with thought-provoking summaries, questions, quotations and activities. It offers an absorbing narrative about what we mean by the social, and how we can think about it, weaving in discussions of the personal, the political and social change, along with concepts and vivid contemporary examples, and answering questions such as: What is the scope, history and purpose of sociology? How do we cultivate ways of understanding society and 'the social'? What is the state of the world we live in today? How do we analyse suffering and inequalities? What are key methods and tools for researching and thinking about society? How has digitalism reshaped sociology and its method? How might sociology help us understand the changes brought about by Covid-19? Does sociology have values? What is the role of sociology in making a better world? In this thoroughly revised and updated Third edition the reader is encouraged to think critically about the structures, meanings, histories and cultures found in the rapidly changing world we live in. With tasks to stimulate the sociological mind and suggestions for further reading both within the text and on an accompanying website, this book is essential reading for all those studying sociology and those with an interest in how the modern world works.
Call Number: E-book
Publication Date: 2022