SocImages continued to #breaktheinternet harder than any Kardashian could hope in 2014. Here are a few of the biggest stories that should make it into your afternoon reading:
Ta-da! Again, through no scientific process—unless you count some triangulation of popularity per Google Analytics, being published in 2014, and home office favorite-choosing as “science”—here are our choices for the best of Cyborgology, 2014:
Oh, it’s time! Since we last checked in, TSP has been abuzz, taking on topics from the sociology of protest photos to the construction of consent, how to best build a diverse coalition, and the glorious launch of our latest podcast, “Give Methods a Chance”! Here’s the news you need to know (and some stuff that’s just plain interesting):
“The Social Construction of Consent,” by Jill D. Weinberg. You can’t get to “yes” without first asking a question.
“Between Protestors and Police: How a Photojournalist Got ‘The Shot’,” by Josh Page. Oakland photographer Noah Berger talks exclusively to TSP about catching a shot that went viral. Related: “‘I Can Breathe’ and the Occasional Fear of Photographing Protest,” by Steven W. Thrasher on the Contexts blog. more...
The Council on Contemporary Families is TSP’s newest partner, but they’re already knocking it out of the park with great information and straightforward facts on American families today. Here are three of their biggest hits from 2014:
1) “Homesick Kids and Helicopter Parents,” by Susan Matt. Lately there’s been a lot of talk about the “boomerang generation,” so coddled by their hovering parents as kids that they are practically destined to come back home, a soft, unprepared generation not yet ready for adulthood. Weber State University historian Susan Matt checks the facts.
2) “In School, Good Looks Help and Good Looks Hurt (But They Mostly Help),” by Rachel A. Gordon and Robert Crosnoe. Picking up on the authors Wiley-Blackwell monograph, this article takes a second look at good looks, finding another form of inequality.
3) “Really? Work Lowers People’s Stress Levels,” by Sarah Damaske. The author of For the Family?, Damaske steps back to explain a consistent finding: people who work have better mental and physical health than their non-working peers, and the news is even better for women (how often does a sociologist get to say that?).
To continue honoring the best and most widely disseminated posts on TSP in 2014, we’re moving first into our partner sites. Here are the thought-provoking blockbusters from the editors of Contexts Magazine, the public outreach journal of the American Sociological Society, hosted here online at TSP:
1) “‘I Can Breathe’: The Occasional Fear of Covering Protests,” by Steven Thrasher. A Contexts board member, Thrasher is a professional journalist and photographer with a sociological lens like no other.
2) “Contexts Quicklit: 11 Recent Sociological Findings on Race and the Criminal Justice System,” by Lucia Lykke. University of Maryland grad student Lykke gives a rundown of some of the important numbers for placing today’s widespread protests in, well, context.
3) “Sociology’s Irrelevance in the News,” by Syed Ali. Co-editor Ali largely agrees with Orlando Patterson that sociology, as a discipline, has excused itself from much of the news and offers way to get back in the mix.
Many TSP readers are more interested in research findings than the methodologies used to obtain them. But methods are often an important part of the story, such as new experimental studies that provide powerful tools for measuring discrimination. Backstage at TheSocietyPages, we’re constantly arguing about whether a study’s methods are strong enough to support its findings. And methods are so important that we won’t run a piece unless we agree the underlying research is methodologically sound — regardless of who produced it or where it was published.
So we’ve always wanted a front-stage spot on the site to geek out about methods and explore how we know what we (think we) know. That’s why we’re so delighted to welcome Give Methods a Chance to TSP. GMAC is hosted by Kyle Green and Sarah Lageson, two all-star TSP board members, podcasters, and exceptionally creative multi-method researchers and teachers. Their first couple podcast interviews will give you a sense of the site’s vision and mission: thoughtful discussions with Deborah Carr on how and why we do longitudinal studies, and Francesca Polletta on systematically coding and analyzing people’s stories. Like a good research design, their interviewing approach helps render complex ideas clear and comprehensible.
These podcasts are wonderful for researchers and readers eager to learn how first-rate scholars do their work, but they’ll be an especially useful resource for methods students and teachers. When instructors bring methodology alive for students, as Kyle and Sarah are doing, it has a lasting impact on students. As a department chair, I saw how alumni who pursued careers in business, justice, or social services routinely cited methods as the “sleeper” courses that paved the way for their success. And we hear similar stories from students who became social scientists (like Eric Hedberg, who just sent Facebook props for teaching him paired t-tests 15 years ago — along with his new article on the subject).
We also think Give Methods a Chance will show how sound methodology has far more to do with elegant design principles than technical complexity. As Paola Antonelli of the Museum of Modern Art puts it, good design “combines technology, cognitive science, human need, and beauty to produce something that the world didn’t know it was missing.” As you’ll see from Give Methods a Chance, the best social science does precisely the same thing.
In the first weeks of the New Year, we will begin running down some of the most popular and provocative posts from around The Society Pages and its partner sites. But before we all head off to the four corners for winter break, we want to get the plaudits started with our own in-house team.
We are inestimably lucky to have the dedicated, inquisitive, and intellectually rigorous grad board we’ve assembled here at the University of Minnesota. These students volunteer their time, coming to meetings, workshopping ideas, live-editing their pieces together, reaching out to top scholars for interviews and roundtable contributions, and bringing their energies to the site every day. Here are the unscientific but happily presented Best-Of’s in just some of the areas to which these students contribute:
“Pushing the Secret Service Director Off the Glass Cliff?” by Matt Gunther
“Reflecting on Ferguson,” by Evan Stewart
“Brian Southwell on Social Networks and Public Understandings of Health and Science,” with Sarah Lageson.
“The Fluidity of Racial Categories on the US Census,” by Ryan Larson.
“Re-evaluating the ‘Culture of Poverty’, with Mark Gould, Kaaryn Gustafson, and Mario Luis Small,” by Stephen Suh and Kia Heise.
“Atheist Church: A Predictable Paradox,” by Jacqui Frost.
Without fail, the world keeps moving, and, as we like to say here at TSP, “We will do sociology to it.” Here’s how we’ve been putting those sociological imaginations to work since the last Roundup!
“Racism Retriggered,” by Jennifer D. Carlson. How disproportionate contact with the criminal justice system translates to fewer concealed pistol licenses being issued to African Americans.
“Race and the Regulation of Voting,” by Doug Hartmann. When co-editor Chris Uggen’s research informs the NYTimes, Doug’s on the case.
“Ferguson, the Morning After,” by Doug Hartmann. When facts feel futile.
“Ferguson and Football,” by Doug Hartmann. The St. Louis Rams’ “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” entry to their Sunday Football game brings up sport and political protest, as well as the formal and informal policing of black men’s bodies.
“Volunteer Work: Getting the Gift to Keep on Giving,” by Jacqui Frost. You really shouldn’t swing a turkey, but if you did…
“Veterans’ Day and the Challenges of Civilian Life,” by Evan Stewart. Research on soldiers’ reintegration after service, from social benefits to institutional challenges. more...
It happened Sunday afternoon. I tried to avoid writing about it, not wanting to be distracted from the bigger picture or detract from what I thought—and still think—the most important stories and issues are. But it hasn’t gone away. With this morning’s headlines and so many references to the image I spent several years of my life researching and writing about, I think I have to say something.
I’m talking, of course, about how five members of the St. Louis Rams football team entered the stadium before their game this weekend with their arms and hands raised, enacting the “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” pose that has become such a powerful symbol and statement for protesters in Ferguson, Missouri and all over the country.
Let me say, right off the bat, how much I respect and admire the Rams players—Tavon Austin, Kenny Britt, Stedman Bailey, Jared Cook, and Chris Givens—for what they did. Like their coach Jim Fischer, I defend their right to free speech. Perhaps even more than he can or would say, I celebrate their vision and courage, with respect both to their awareness and understanding of the broader social issues involved as well as to how they figured out a way to use their status as athletes to contribute to that conversation. Their use of the hands-up pose was a stroke of symbolic genius that allowed these men, who make their living with their bodies, to speak volumes without actually saying a word. I see them in the proud tradition of Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who in 1968 used the platform afforded them as Olympic champions to call attention to ongoing problems of race and racism in the United States. (Their clenched-fist, victory stand demonstration in Mexico City, the iconic image that has appeared in many media outlets over the past couple of days, is the inspiration and focus of my book Race, Culture, and the Revolt of the Black Athlete.)
But lots of people don’t see it this way. Predictably, there has been a backlash against the Rams players, led or at least crystallized by the St. Louis Police Officer’s Association who called the gesture “tasteless, offensive, and inflammatory,” calling for an apology from the players and disciplinary action from the NFL. Some of these criticisms are driven by disagreements with the players’ views and perceived politics. I’m actually okay with that (though I’m probably more on the players’ side than the critics). In fact, a real, meaningful conversation about the incident and subsequent events and larger social and racial issues in and around Ferguson that provoked this demonstration in the first place would be a very good result. Yet that doesn’t seem to be what is happening. Instead, judging by their official statement, the police group seems to continue to see black people and bodies as a threat in need of constant management, policing, and control, all of which maps onto the dynamics between the NFL and its predominantly black workforce.
At a broader level, too much of the reaction to the Rams is driven by the sense that this display was objectionable because it was somehow out of place, because it occurred in the athletic arena. This really rubs me the wrong way, and not only because I firmly believe that athletes, like anyone else, have a right to their opinion and the opportunity to express that opinion freely and publicly. I get frustrated with this response because so often the sporting world is used and/or functions to promote, celebrate, rationalize, and legitimate all kinds of social causes, religious beliefs, and political issues—nationalism, military service, breast cancer awareness, the power of prayer and faith, etc. I don’t see why some social issues are allowed pride of place in the sports arena, while others are not, how some athletic figures are allowed to speak up and even spout off, while others are consistently chastised and silenced. There are clearly double standards often at work here, especially with respect to what is seen as protest or complaint against the mainstream majority.
One of the things that is driving me crazy about my various Facebook networks and Twitter feeds is that so many of the folks who have been critical of the Rams players are the same folks who have been calling for activists, African American and otherwise, to protest peacefully, to express their frustrations about Ferguson without resorting to violence and disorder. Isn’t this exactly what these athletes were doing? As John Carlos himself told the Associated Press: “I don’t think anyone got injured or shot by [the Rams players] expressing emotions.”
This morning’s news on this football affair has been driven by the question of whether there was an apology by the Rams or not, with the police folks claiming that “regret” had been “expressed,” while the athletes have refused to back away from their actions and statements. “Did they apologize or not,” were the breathless lines spoken by television reporters as they worked their way through the conflicting hashtags and tweaks. Although I’ve spent much of my professional life thinking about sports, race, politics, and social change, this is exactly the kind of side-show I was afraid of—where talk about athletes and symbolic gestures and official demands becomes the focus of the conversation. The result is that public attention, our attention, is deflected away from the real issues—the deeper social problems of police use of force, of racial disparities in the criminal justice system, of pervasive and persistent racial inequities in contemporary America, and the ongoing scourge of racism itself—that should be the focus of the still-unfolding stories and lessons and (hopefully) reforms coming out of Ferguson. But of course these deeper social realities are precisely what protestors and demonstrators and activists are trying to remind us of and keep our attention focused upon. Even if we don’t agree with their perspectives, conclusions, or suggested solutions, we would do well to honor their effort.
What a night. What a disturbing, terrifying, disconcerting night. A questionable grand jury process. Explanations and pushback. Protests. Police, lots of police. Media everywhere. Some looting and violence. Gas and smoke. Images of burning buildings and cars—fiery images that seem to be on a continuous loop this morning, this difficult morning after. How to make sense of it all? What to say? What to do?
I looked to and start with the President, President Obama, our President. The President’s words last night, in the immediate aftermath of the release of the grand jury decision, were measured, subdued, and multifaceted—begging for peace, pleading for calm and, more importantly, trying to get folks from all different sides with such divergent reactions to better understand each other. I saw our leader trying to explain why, on the one hand, we must respect the rule of law, our law enforcement agents, and the workings of the criminal justice system–as well as why, on the other hand, we need to understand, really understand, why there is so much anger and frustration and resentment from so many. It was very typical Obama—trying, cautiously and stoically, to be that voice of compassion and understanding, that bridge across racial and ideological and political lines, subtlety appealing to our common humanity, our bigger ideals, our better angels.
As a sociologist and a citizen, I found myself deeply sympathetic and aligned. In fact, it is probably the kinds of things I would have said if I had I been in the President’s shoes or on his speech writing team. Although I would have probably developed and further specified the deep and historical sources of anger and frustration—not only with respect to racial disparities and injustices within the criminal justice system at all levels, but also the legacies of segregated housing and lending polices, the realities of poverty, poor education, and unemployment, the persistence of so many stereotypes and racially charged images and rhetoric—I still would have asked for some kind of balance and some larger peace and understanding. In fact, much as Todd Beer in his SocSource/TSP post from earlier in the fall on “Teaching Ferguson,” I still believe that these deeply racialized and even racist historical forces, institutional policies, and contemporary realities—and the very different ways in which they are perceived and understood (or ignored or disavowed)—are crucial to both understanding and explaining both Ferguson the town and Ferguson the cultural firestorm. And this broader historical context and social conditions are all too often missing from media coverage, political discourse, and public understanding with their focus on the specific case in its immediacy and its concreteness. This in mind, I probably also would have also talked about the profound, deeply sociological challenge of confronting obvious, patterned, and systemic inequities of race in both the criminal justice system and the society at large without losing sight of the fact that the specifics of any given incident, event, or case are unique, may not stand in microcosm for the whole, and are probably not the appropriate focus for systemic, institutional change.
But the problem is that all of this, at least as I was watching last night and trying to think it back through this morning, is a little too measured, a little too dispassionate. Part of this is that the whole abstract language of a multi-point, multifaceted analysis and perspective is a little bit too communitarian. That is, it is too heavy on the language of common understanding of our mutual situation when what we are really talking about is the extremely divergent reactions and response of very different and indeed radically polarized communities. There are specific sides and radically different perspectives here, and the stakes require responding to them on their own grounds. Ultimately, however, I think this response–both the President’s and my own—is unsatisfying at the moment, because it is too much about analysis and understanding, and not enough about action, response—what to do and who will lead. Too often the call for calm, clear thinking analysis and understanding—no matter how accurate, no matter how potentially useful—never gets to the next step. Good sociology, in short, does not always make meaningful leadership, much less transformative response and meaningful change.
Ezra Klein’s Vox column this morning (“Why Obama won’t give the Ferguson speech his supporters want”) helped give me a better sense of why Obama gave the speech he did. He is capable of more. Indeed, he did more–much more–on the campaign trail leading up to his historic ascendence to the presidency. But now, as President, he is in a different position. Obama’s challenge is not so much that he needs to try to speak to and represent the nation as a whole. Obama’s challenge right now, according to Klein, is that in our polarized political climate—and no figure is more polarizing than the President, according to the political scientists—anything Obama says on any given issue or cause, any specific position he takes or policy he argues for, tends to be damaging to the cause or any allies he may have. Obama and his advisors have—rightly, it would seem—realized that he is hemmed in and it is better for him to take a middle ground rather than inflame passions yet again. (Immigration, of course, is the exception to this, the arena where Obama and his team have decided to take the hit and fight the good fight, but that is a single and quite exceptional case at this point, as much about political position and institutional power as about rhetoric, understanding, and dialogue).
Ultimately, however, I find myself thinking not about Obama’s political challenges but about the limits and indeed pathologies of a dispassionate if accurate sociological response in a moment of such historical crisis and upheaval. Focusing on the roots and conditions as well as on the need for shared, overarching understanding just doesn’t seem like quite enough. Necessary, but not enough.
