Awarded a PhD: Biotechnology and Cord Blood Banking

Many congratulations to Ros Williams for being awarded her doctorate.

Ros completed her thesis under the guidence of Nik Brown and funded by the White Rose Doctoral Training Centre (DTC) and based in the Science and Technology Unit (SATSU) within the Sociology Department.

Ros's research was part of the 'Rethinking the social production, locus and impact of bioscience' network focusing on the social, political and economic dimensions of the biotechnology industries with an emphasis on umbilical cord blood banking.

Funding for a Phd in Sociology

The Department of Sociology is able to offer funding for a PhD including fees and a stipend from Oct 2016. If you wish to find out more and apply the application date is 14th Febuary.

Click here for more information: Funded PhD

Fiction and Social Theory

Dave Beer has edited an E-special issue of the journal Theory, Culture & Society on 'Fiction & Social Theory'. The issue brings together 11 articles from the TCS archive. He's also written a detailed editorial introduction to the issue. The articles are all open access for a limited time. Below is a brief abstract for the issue:

This E-Special issue brings together a range of articles from theTheory, Culture, & Society archive that directly explore the relations between fiction and social theory. Each article develops a different perspective on these relations, yet they all share a common interest in probing at the different ways in which fiction might enrich and provoke our conceptual imaginations. These articles ask how theory might be used to understand or illuminate fiction, whilst also considering how theory might be extended, challenged or informed by fictional resources. In general terms, the articles take three types of overlapping approach. First, there are those that use fiction to extend the imagination of social theory. Second are the articles that use fiction as a documentary resource and platform for theorizing. And, finally, there are those articles that use theory to reanimate and re-examine fictional forms. In exploring these three intersecting branches the pieces illustrate the different ways in which fiction and social theory might interweave in our thinking. The articles gathered here provide frameworks, ideas and resources through which the reader might continue to think imaginatively and creatively about the social world.

The issue is available here http://tcs.sagepub.com/site/especials/fiction-social-theory.xhtml

New Editorial Board Member of Work, Employment and Society

Dr Xiaodong Lin has been elected to join the Editorial Board of the British Sociological Assocation (BSA) journal Work, Employment and Society. 

This international peer-reviewed journal of the BSA, analyses all forms of work and their relation to wider social processes and structures, and to quality of life. It embraces the study of the labour process; industrial relations; changes in labour markets; and the gender and domestic divisions of labour. It supports contemporary, historical and comparative studies and both qualitative and quantitative methodologies.

10th Anniversary of Civil Partnerships

Sue Wilkinson has recorded an interview with WDR, Germany’s biggest public broadcaster, for a programme commemorating the 10^th anniversary of the introduction of civil partnerships for same-sex couples in the UK, under the Civil Partnership Act 2004.

In the interview, she talked about the ‘segregated system’ of marriage and civil partnership, and reflected on the legal case she and her wife, Celia Kitzinger, brought to the High Court in 2006, with the support of Liberty and Out!Rage (see http://www.equalmarriagerights.org).  Although the Court deemed Sue and Celia’s (legal Canadian) marriage a civil partnership in the UK, it was finally recognised as a marriage in England & Wales in March 2014, following the  passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013.

Sue and Celia have also published a series of academic articles in this area, including the relationship between marriage and civil partnership (Kitzinger and Wilkinson, 2004) and the rhetorics surrounding marriage equality (Kitzinger and Wilkinson, 2004).

Sue’s interview will provide the framework for the programme, which will be broadcast on WDR on 21 December 2015 – the 10^th anniversary of the day the first civil partnerships took place in England & Wales.

Death and Culture Conference 1st-3rd Sept 2016

Ruth Penfold-Mounce (Sociology) along with Jack Denham (Sociology), Julie Rugg (Social Policy) and Ben Poore (TFTV) are running a three day international conference at York on 'Death and Culture'

Call for Papers:
How can we, as academics, understand cultural responses to mortality?

Is every response to death – over time and over place - uniquely personal or essentially the same?

This conference focusses on the impact of mortality on culture, and the ways in which the very fact of death has shaped human behaviour, evidenced through thought, action, production and expression. The conference seeks to re-engage with the study of mortality as an academic enterprise, supported by evidence and framed by theoretical engagement. No discipline is excluded and we are encouraging researchers including postgraduates to contribute who might not consider themselves death scholars, with work that overlaps with death and the dead.

We welcome contributions on topics such as but not limited to:

·         Death, film and television

·         Fame and death

·         Historical death

·         The dead in place and space

·         Law, death and the dead

·         Art and death

        Commonplace death

Confirmed keynotes include Prof Jacque Lynn Foltyn (National University, California), Prof Sarah Tarlow (University of Leicester) and Dr Michelle Aaron (University of Birmingham)

For more details visit: york.ac.uk/death-and-culture

Please note more information will be added soon regarding conference details.

A review of the Marginal Death Symposium December 2015

The Marginal Death Research: Doing Edgework symposium on Wed 2nd December was a dynamic and exciting day with stimulting papers and discussion.

Follow the link for a review of the day: Marginal Death

Encountering Corpses in Manchester

Ruth Penfold-Mounce is speaking at the new public event -  Encountering Corpses II - on Saturday 19th March 2016.

Held in the Manchester Crematorium Old Chapel the day will include tours of the Crematorium facility, a visit to the Greater Manchester Police social centre for lunch and a display on policy pathology in the area.

Ruth will be part of a panel on (Sub)Cultural Encounters - Mountaineer corpses, celebrity bodies and preserved tattoed skins

Follow the link for more details and to book your ticket:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/encountering-corpses-ii-tickets-19842731143

Conversation Analysis Short Courses: How long are they and how much do they cost?

The new series of short Continuing Professional Development courses in Conversation Analysis launching in 2016 are proving hugely popular. See below for outlines of the courses and the costs:

Conversation Analysis: An Introduction (1 day: £75)

Wed 20 January 2016; Sue Wilkinson and Celia Kitzinger

Find out more about conversation analysis (CA) and the kinds of issues it can be used to address.  No prior experience needed.

An Introduction to Conversation Analysis and its use in Medical Settings (1 day £75)

Fri 26 February 2016; Merran Toerien and Robin Wooffitt

For health services researchers, and others with an interest in communication in health care, who wish to find out more about conversation analysis (CA) as applied to medical interaction. No prior experience needed.

Developing Conversation Analytic Skills 1: Turn-taking (3 days £360)

Tues 26 – Thu 28 April 2016; Clare Jackson, Sue Wilkinson and Celia Kitzinger

Core foundational training in conversation analysis (CA).  Intensive course, limited to a maximum of 12 participants, offering a systematic grounding in the domain of turn-taking.  Intended for those with some prior familiarity with CA. 

Developing Conversation Analytic Skills 2: Sequence Organisation (3 days £360)

Tues 3 – Thurs 5 May 2016; Sue Wilkinson and Merran Toerien

Core foundational training in conversation analysis (CA).  Intensive course, limited to a maximum of 12 participants, offering a systematic grounding in the domain of sequence organisation.  Intended for those with some prior familiarity with CA.

For further info/registration please contact: sarah.shrive-morrison@york.ac.uk

New Professor in the Sociology and Criminology

The Sociology Department is thrilled to announce the appointment of Professor Maggie O'Neill who is moving from Durham University in April 2016 as a Chair in Sociology (Criminology).

Professor Maggie O'Neill

Maggie has research interests in:

• cultural and critical criminology
• innovative methodologies
• race, crime and justice
• asylum, migration and diaspora
• sex work
• social justice and cultural citizenship
• critical and feminist theory

Follow her on twitter: @maggieoneill9

Communicating about Smell and Taste Disorders

Kelly Benneworth-Grey has been involved in the third annual Fifth Sense Conference 2015. She contributed to this event which brings together clinicians and researchers sharing experiences and knowledge of our understanding of smell and taste disorders.

Kelly Benneworth-Gray communicating smells and memory through art

Kelly along with Kate McLean ran workshops exploring the different ways of communicating and sharing olfactory impairment. Kelly's session focused on the language of olfaction and the issues associated with describing olfactory disorders.

For a review of the conference follow the link: Fifth Sense Conference 2015

New Chair in Science and Technology Studies

The Sociology Department is delighted to announce the appointment of our new Chair in Science and Technology Studies.

Professor Joanna Latimer

Firstly, Professor Joanna Latimer will be joining us from Cardiff in May 2016. Joanna is principally interested in:

• medicine and care at the interface with ageing
• older people and biology
• paediatric genetics
• aspects of (bio)medicine and care
• the place aof the non-human (technology, animals and other materials) in the co-construction of the social

Follow her on twitter: @joannaelatimer

Event on Celebrity Culture and Young People

Paul Wakeling (Dept of Education) who has worked and published with the Sociology Departments old colleague Mike Savage on the issue of social class is a member of the Centre for Research on Education and Social Justice. The Centre is running an exciting seminar on young people and celebrity.


Held on wednesday 13th January 2016 at 2.30 in D/L/116 Kim Allen from Sociology and Social Policy Department at the University of Leeds will deliver a talk on: Celebrity culture and young people's imagined futures: Narratives of aspiration in austere neoliberal Britain.

Kim will explore the stories that young people tell about their aspirations and imagined futures within a context of austerity as growing poverty levels, unemployment and welfare retrenchment are disproportionately affecting young people’s lives. Specifically, it will examine how discourses of individualism, self-responsibility, hard work and enterprise feature in young people’s everyday talk about ‘success’ and ‘failure’. The paper will highlight the pervasiveness of neoliberal discourses of meritocracy within young people’s accounts, locating this as a ‘structure of feeling’ (Littler 2014) that circulates across political discourse and celebrity culture. However, it will complicate claims that the centrality of these discourses within young people’s account reflects a simple adoption of neoliberal ideology in which they are ‘blind to their circumstances’ (France and Haddon 2014). Attending to the powerfully emotional nature of discourses of self-reliance and ‘striving’ in the young people’s narratives, it will consider how these are entangled with individual and family biographies and entwined with practices of ‘resistance’ as young people seek to reconcile discourses of meritocracy with their lived experiences. Finally Kim will also interrogate the possibilities for young people to refuse to tell themselves according to these discourses, and consider silence, doubt and ‘not knowing’ as strategies of resistance. In doing so, the paper seeks to unpick the contradictions, complexities, ambivalences and ambiguities within neoliberalism as it works within and through the messiness of everyday practices.

Kim has been involved in the exciting CelebYouth project funded by the ESRC into young people and celebrity.

Laurie Hanquinet and Cultural Capital

Laurie Hanquinet recently sat on a panel discussing new forms of cultural capital.

Follow the link to watch her.

Reviewing the Red Barn Murder: Corpses and Fame

Ruth Penfold-Mounce has just had a book review published in the journal Mortality. She got asked to review a new Palgrave Pivot book based on the Red Barn Murder a historical case of dark tourism and criminal celebrity which she has published on in her own work into criminal corpses.

Follow the link for the review

New Short Courses in Conversation Analysis

The Department of Sociology is delighted to be launching a series of short Continuing Professional Development courses in Conversation Analysis in spring 2016.  Four courses are on offer:

Conversation Analysis: An Introduction (1 day £75)

Wed 20 January 2016; Sue Wilkinson and Celia Kitzinger

Find out more about conversation analysis (CA) and the kinds of issues it can be used to address.  No prior experience needed.

An Introduction to Conversation Analysis and its use in Medical Settings (1 day £75)

Fri 26 February 2016; Merran Toerien and Robin Wooffitt

For health services researchers, and others with an interest in communication in health care, who wish to find out more about conversation analysis (CA) as applied to medical interaction. No prior experience needed.

Developing Conversation Analytic Skills 1: Turn-taking (3 days £360)

Tues 26 – Thu 28 April 2016; Clare Jackson, Sue Wilkinson and Celia Kitzinger

Core foundational training in conversation analysis (CA).  Intensive course, limited to a maximum of 12 participants, offering a systematic grounding in the domain of turn-taking.  Intended for those with some prior familiarity with CA. 

Developing Conversation Analytic Skills 2: Sequence Organisation (3 days £360)

Tues 3 – Thurs 5 May 2016; Sue Wilkinson and Merran Toerien

Core foundational training in conversation analysis (CA).  Intensive course, limited to a maximum of 12 participants, offering a systematic grounding in the domain of sequence organisation.  Intended for those with some prior familiarity with CA.

For further info/registration, contact: sarah.shrive-morrison@york.ac.uk

ESRC PhD funding available

The Department of Sociology holds funding for PhD's to begin 2016/17. 

Check out the link to the department website for more information.

Sad News about Graham Lewis

The Sociology Department has received sad news. Graham Lewis, a long standing member of our department with particular links in SATSU has died.


Andrew Webster, who knew and worked with Graham for many years has written an obituary. Graham will be sadly missed.

Please follow the link.

Funded Wellcome Trust Research Fellowship Available

The Sociology Department is seeking outstanding post-doctoral candidates to apply for a 3 year Research Fellowship from the Wellcome Trust. Candidates are expected to have been awarded their PhD before they apply and must not hold a long term established post. The research must be in any area of human and animal health.

In order to be considered, please submit the following documents to Ed Kirby (ed.kirby@york.ac.uk) by 4pm on Friday 11th December:

• A short CV (1 page)
• An outline of the proposed research (max 500 words) and the name of your proposed mentor and why you have chosen them (max 100 words). The outline should include a summary of the project, the research questions, how the research advances the field and the proposed methodology.

It is recommended that you contact your proposed mentor in advance of applying. If you have any questions regarding the process please contact Ed Kirby.

New Job at York St John University

Matt Spokes, a Teaching Fellow in the Department has been appointed to a permanent Lectureship in Criminology and Sociology at York St John University.

Matt successfully completed his PhD on The Contemporary Avant-Garde: Classification, Organization, Spatiality and Practices of Resistance earlier this year. He has made a massive contribution to the teaching the second year Crime, Culture and Social Change module and Social Research Methods as well as running and teaching on the first year Sociology of Crime and Deviance module. He has been a vital part of the Crime Team here at York and we are sorry to see him go but are glad that he is remaining local and has achieved a lectureship.

Congratulations Matt!

Phd Student Lecture Series

Last year a successful Sociology and Centre for Women's Studies (CWS) Phd Student Lecture Series was launched and is continuing in 2015/2016.

On Monday first year PhD student Rosie Smith presented on her doctoral research into Spectacular Justice. This concept challenges Foucault's private panoptic theory of justice. Meanwhile Jamie Choo from CWS presented on her work into 'Why are we still talking about beauty?'

Steph Lawler and Social Mobility Conference

Steph Lawler in association with Geoff Payne (Newcastle University) are holding a free one day conference on 29th April 2016.

Follow the event brite link for more information and to register.  

Mike Savage and Social Class

Professor Mike Savage from London School of Economics and a former Sociology Department member of staff will give a talk about his new research on class on Monday 30 November 1.30-3.30pm in W/222.

Mikes talk entitled 'Social Class and the new cultural distinctions today' will draw on his latest book Social Class in the 21st Century and is being run by the European Centre for Cultural Exploration (ECCE) . 

Sociology Unpolished Papers

A series of “unpolished papers” begins Wednesday 11^th November. These sessions, organised by Gareth Millington, allow staff, visiting staff and postgrad students the opportunity to present research ideas, unfinished or unpolished papers to a friendly and encouraging audience. Open minds and constructive criticism have been essential in making this termly series a success. Since the series started in 2013, at least three unpolished papers  have gone on to be published in leading journals.

Gareth Millington, Unpolished Papers Series Convenor

Our first paper this term (11/11) is ‘Showing Pain, Violence and Death: Reflections on the use of graphic content in academic presentations’ by Holly Steel and Anaïs Duong-Pedica. 

On 18/11 visiting scholar Ryan Du Toit will give a paper titled ‘Reproductive justice? A critical examination of pre-termination of pregnancy consultations in the public health sector in South Africa and in Great Britain’ . 

Finally on 25/11 Matt Spokes and Paul Chappell will present a paper titled ‘Dealing with dirty data: five years in beers’. All talks are in w/243 and start at 3pm.

Reviewing Foucault's Wrong-Doing Truth-Telling

Rosie Smith one of our newist doctoral students has just published her first piece on The Sociological Imagination. Rosie's thesis focuses on spectacular justice and challenges Foucault's assertions surrounding private punishment suggesting that we are returning to spectacular mediated justice.

Follow the link  to read her book review of Foucault's translated book 'Wrong-doing Truth Telling'

Celebrity Death: A Good Career Move?

Ruth Penfold-Mounce has published a piece in The Conversation over the Halloween Weekend. Drawing on her interest in celebrity and death she suggests that a celebrity career is not necessarily over when they die. For some celebrities being dead is the best career move they have made! Not just for Halloween reflects on Michael Jackson and how Robin Williams has successfully controlled and prevented an 'afterlife' for himself for decades to come the article addresses the sheer scale of celebrities careers in death.

Presenting Conversation Analysis in LA

Merran delivering her presentation

Merran Toerien was delighted to get a chance to visit the University of California at Los Angeles last week - not only because they have sunshine, palm trees and blue sky in LA (just as the clocks were going back in York!) but because it was a fabulous opportunity to work with scholars who have pioneered the application of conversation analysis to the study of medical interaction.  

Merran was invited to give presentations to CLIC (Center for Language, Interaction and Culture - see:http://clic.ss.ucla.edu/) and the CA Working Group (CAWG).  She also met for one-to-one discussions with 8 dynamic graduate students, participated in the CAWG weekly data session, and worked intensively with Professors John Heritage and Tanya Stivers on a collaborative study of treatment recommendations.  

She is immensely grateful for this opportunity and would like to thank Professors Elinor Ochs and Tanya Stivers for the invitation, Clara Bergen for all her hard work in organising the week's activities (ably assisted also by Alex Tate), and the large number of people at UCLA who made the week both intellectually rewarding and lots of fun.   

Gender and South Korea

A seminar is being run by the Sociology Departments Gender, Sexuality and Inequalities Research Cluster in association with the Centre for Women's Studies and the Asian Research Network. 

Professor Chang Kyung-Sup from Seoul National University, South Korea will be presenting on:

‘Another Gender Perspective on South Korean’s Industrial Miracle: The Material Contradictions of Proletarian Patriarchy’.

Time: Tuesday 17^th November 5:00-6:30

Venue: Berrick Saul Treehouse