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november 1: norbert elias
before foucault, let’s talk about a related theorist, elias, whose most famous work documents the “civilizing process”
the opening act, from the history of manners (read pp.53-84)
“shame and repugnance“, from the power of civility [note, the first (and longest) part of this document comes from the history of manners book (and if you are interested, feel free to take a look at the changes in the norms for blowing one’s nose…). you are asked only to read the final pages – pp292-300 in the book, pp18-22 in the pdf)
thomas scheff, “shame and the social bond” (builds on elias and others, to show the importance of shame and emotions for thinking about social structures/relations)
and, as if that weren’t enough, here’s an application of elias to climate change politics and moral panics:
“Extending the Concept of Moral Panic: Elias, Climate Change and Civilization” by Rohloff
(this is not that long, and hopefully of some interest, and gives some sense of how elias might be applied to research. there is also a strong representation of his work in theories of punishment, but since i know many of you are taking the punishment class, i won’t create too much overlap with the example. however, if interested, here’s how one might use elias to talk about prisons: )
november 3: michel foucault
2 excerpts from discipline and punish: docile bodies & the panopticon
and, in case you want to look at cartoon versions of social theory (but also b/c it nicely highlights the links between weberian thought and foucault) here’s a bit from foucault for beginners — this is not required, so skip if you feel like it…
november 8: more foucault
from the history of sexuality, vol. 1
november 10: one more foucault!
governmentality, from the foucault effect
applications to follow…
here are a few: (please note, these are not required, but if you have interest, either in the topics or in seeing the theory put to work, they are here for you… i will draw on these broad cases in class, for whatever that’s worth…)
the environment:
t. luke “On Environmentality: Geo-Power and Eco-Knowledge in the Discourses of Contemporary Environmentalism”
borders and immigration:
w. walters “foucault and frontiers”
whiteness and immigration:
r. decker “the visibility of whiteness and immigration restriction in the US 1880-1930”
november 15: jürgen habermas
we’re going to do something a bit different here for today, because i think habermas is an important theorist, but it’s really, really hard to find a decent excerpt that captures the “flavor” of his ideas. so we’re going to cheat a little, which means reading a (gasp!) secondary source, instead of the original. in this case, we will read an overview by craig calhoun (who you may remember from writing another bit of secondary sourcing on bourdieu previously, although this one is more straightforward). he is summarizing habermas’s book the structural transformation of the public sphere, which uses historical analysis to locate the liberatory aspect of the rationalization (weber!) of communication. the book was written originally in 1962, but wasn’t translated into english until 1989, at which point it contributed to many debates about the “linguistic/communicative turn” in social theory.
read this: here’s the piece by calhoun (30 page pdf, but the actual chapter starts on page 6, and the last few pages are footnotes, so not too bad)
suggested (or just available) things: as you might imagine, with the rise of the internets in the 1990s opened up a lot of space for people to proclaim the internet the “new public sphere” (or not). at the time, a lot of it was speculative, since no one really knew what shapes online communication would take. douglas kellner, a media theorist, was one of the main people engaging with this intersection, see, e.g., this article. mark poster, was more on the po-mo side of things, so was pretty skeptical, as you can see here.
but that’s all back in the days before the web 3.0, so seem quaint and outdated to our experienced eyes. here’s a more recent version of this debate, casting an eye on the role of social media and its democratizing tendencies or not…
IF YOU ONLY READ ONE OF THESE EXTRA READINGS, READ THIS ONE! which is about facebook and fake news, highlighting the very real limits of our current pubic sphere (as well as the conflict between rationalized forms of communication and rationalized forms of control). (the most recent response from zuckerberg) (and here’s another recent take by sociologist tressie mcmillan cottom)
either take a look at these or not, but we’ll use the internet as our case to discuss/work through habermas’s concepts.
november 17: nancy fraser
critique of habermas (oops! a missing page can be found here)
critique of foucault
november 22: post-racial?!???! (spoiler alert: no)
eduardo bonilla-sliva, excerpts from racism without racists (this is the ENTIRE book! don’t read it all (unless you want to, and you might!). instead, read chapter 2 and 3 (and, if you want to keep it going, chapter 4, too, which i will prepare for class, so you might as well read it, right?).
======= stop reading so you don’t accidentally do too much work!======
you don’t need/want to read this, but i am throwing this in anyway, since it’s related and relevant, and it’s here if you want it: desmond (macarthur genius award winner!) and emirbayer, “what is racial domination?”
also, here’s a very recent essay by a historian of the KKK taking on the (flawed!) argument that “nice, decent” people cannot be racist(s): baker, “nice, decent folks”
and, ripped from today’s headlines: tressie mcmillan cottom, “racism with no racists: the president trump conundrum”
nov 29: patricia hill collins
the first part of black feminist thought
transnational black feminist thought (optional)
conclusions to BFT
this is on the long side, but thankfully, on the easier side of reading… i realize that long ago i promised shorter readings, and i know that i haven’t always delivered. i will just say that it’s harder than it looks… anyway, the point is: don’t wait until the last minute to read this.)
=====more if you want====
here’s a recent TED talk (!) from kimberle crenshaw, coiner of the term ‘intersectionalty‘
here’s an article using PHC’s “matrix of domination” to analyze the social position of conservative gay white men.
december 1: omi and winant (and responses..)
here’s some excerpts from omi & winant’s influential work, racial formation in the united states, which will quickly (maybe too quickly! but it is the last week, so…)
here is a recent response/critique/enlargement/engagement with racial formation theory
feagin and elias (not that one!), “rethinking racial formation theory”
here is omi and winant’s response
[[[and i know you aren’t going to read any more, which is okay, but a friend of mine from grad school wrote one of the articles in this special issue on racial formation theory, which might also interest you, golash-boza, “does racial formation lack the conceptual tools to understand racism?”]]]