The 2017-2018 colloquia committee focused on the following three types of events: those in which we share our own research; those in which we invite outside speakers whose work is related to the research interests of the department; and brown-bag professionalization workshops for graduate students.

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Fall Quarter

• Participating in ASA and Professional Associations

  Thursday, October 12, 2017 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 11:45 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301

   

  Join us as we hear from some of the most active and engaged conference participants from the Sociology Department.

  Speakers:

  Kati Barahona Lopez, Sociology Graduate Student 

  Ben Crow, Professor of Sociology

  James Doucet-Battle, Assistant Professor of Sociology and Faculty Affiliate of the Science & Justice Research Center

  Meenoo Kohli, Sociology Graduate Student

  Steve McKay, Associate Professor of Sociology and Director of the Center for Labor Studies

  Aida Mukharesh, Sociology Graduate Student

  Uriel Serrano, Sociology Graduate Student

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  Is the World Urban?

  Monday, October 23, 2017 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 2:30 - 4:00pm

  Location: Humanities 210

  In what sense is the 21st century world "urban"? In this lecture, Neil Brenner critiques contemporary ideologies of the "urban age," which confront this question with reference to the purported fact that more than 50% of the world's population resides within cities. Against such demographic, city-centric understandings, Brenner excavates Henri Lefebvre's notion of generalized urbanization for conceptual and methodological insights into the 21st century planetary urban condition. He argues that the geographies of urbanization can no longer be conceptualized exclusively with reference to cities and metropolitan regions, but today encompass diverse patterns and pathways across the planetary sociospatial landscape, from Manhattan to the Matterhorn, from the Pearl River Delta to Mount Everest, from the Nile River valley to the Pacific Ocean. This variegated urban fabric must become the focal point for new approaches to urban theory, strategies of collective intervention and imaginaries of built and unbuilt environments.

  Neil Brenner is Professor of Urban Theory at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. His most recent books include New Urban Spaces: Urban Theory and the Scale Question (Oxford University Press, 2018); Critique of Urbanization (Bauwelt Fundamente Series/Birkhäuser Verlag, 2016) and Implosions/Explosions: Towards a Study of Planetary Urbanization (Jovis, 2014). Brenner formerly served as Professor of Sociology and Director of the Metropolitan Studies Program at New York University. Further information on Brenner’s current research and collaborative work can be found at: urbantheorylab.net.  

  Co-Sponsored by the Departments of Environmental Studies, Politics, the Center for Creative Ecologies, the History of Consciousness Program and the Critical Sustainabilities Project 

   

  Graduate Student Seminar

  Tuesday, October 24, 2017
  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301
   
  Following the campus discussion Is the World Urban?, Neil Brenner (Professor of Urban Theory at the Harvard Graduate School of Design) will discuss with graduate students the following readings: Debating Planetary Urbanization: for an Engaged Pluralism; The Hinterland, Urbanised? and Elements for a New Epistemology of the Urban co-authored with Christian Schmid. Please note: registration is limited to 20. Once registered, participants will be emailed the readings.

   

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Winter Quarter

• Cycling the New Urban Frontier: Bicycle Infrastructure, Gentrification, and the Urbanization of Environmental Politics

  Thursday, February 08, 2018

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301

   

  Few things capture the contemporary American enthusiasm for urban life quite like the bicycle. In the years since the Great Recession, cities across the United States have adopted bicycle infrastructure as a key element of sustainable development policy. The result is seemingly a paradox: while bicycling is inexpensive, and bicyclists are on the whole racially and economically diverse, the places that have invested in and become known for accommodating bicycling are gentrifying rapidly. This presentation draws on research conducted in San Francisco, Oakland, Detroit, and Philadelphia to examine two main forms of bicycle infrastructure: bike lanes and bicycle sharing systems. Through the institutional alignment of bicycle advocacy with key actors in the urban growth machine, these infrastructures have become core features of inter-urban competitive strategy. This leads to a demand-led form of infrastructure provision that reflects and reinforces sociospatial inequality at the neighborhood and regional scales. Ultimately, Stehlin argues, these contradictions pose real limits on the potential for bicycling as a meaningful response to climate change.
  

  John Stehlin is a lecturer and 2018 National Science Foundation Scholar in the Department of Geography at UC Berkeley. His research focuses on mobility infrastructure, uneven regional development, and race, class, and urban space in North American cities, and has appeared in Antipode, Environment & Planning A, Mobilities, and Urban Geography. He will speak on his current book project with the University of Minnesota Press, also entitled Cycling the New Urban Frontier, as well as new work on bicycle sharing systems, big data, and platform capitalism.

• Can We Build a Trustworthy and Trusted Press: News from The Trust Project

  Thursday, February 15, 2018

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301

  

  We all think we can tell the difference between opinion, advertising and accurate news. But how do we really know? Join Sally Lehrman in a discussion of this critical question of our times. Lehrman, an award-winning journalist and Visiting Science & Justice Professor, directs  the The Trust Project, a consortium of top news companies that are developing publically-accessible standards for assessing the quality and credibility of journalism. In her presentation, Lehrman will present the Project, and ask for our feedback on how to maximize the impact of the project.

  Read all about The Trust Protocol and The Trust Project and its partners (the The Economist, The Globe and Mail, the Independent Journal Review, Mic, Italy’s La Repubblica and La Stampa, and The Washington Post) at the following links:

  The Verge: Facebook adds trust indicators to news articles in an effort to identify real journalism

  CNN Tech: Facebook, Google, Twitter to fight fake news with 'trust indicators' 

  Sally Lehrman is an award-winning reporter and writer specializing in medicine and science policy with an emphasis on genetics, race, and sexuality. Lehrman is director of the journalism ethics program at the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, leads its signature Trust Project, a complex international collaboration that she began building in 2015 to strengthen public confidence in the news through accountability and transparency. Lehrman has written for some of the most respected names in national print and broadcast media including Scientific American, Nature, Health, Salon.com, and The DNA Files, distributed by NPR.

  Co-Sponsored by the UC Santa Cruz Science and Justice Research Center

• The Importance of Publishing and How To Do It

  Thursday, February 22, 2018 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301

   

  This panel will discuss the importance of publishing peer reviewed journal articles during graduate school. Speakers will share strategies for publishing articles in peer-reviewed journals. All graduate students are encouraged to participate.

  Panelists will include:

  Andy Murray, Sociology Graduate Student

  Rebecca London, Assistant Professor 

  Veronica Terriquez, Associate Professor

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Spring Quarter

• Using Research Collaboratives to Fuel Justice Movements

  Thursday, May 03, 2018 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College 301

  Angela Irvine, Principal Researcher, CERES Policy Research

  The current social and political moment in the US raises new questions about the possibility of achieving restorative justice, decarceration, and educational reform. Join Sociology@UCSantaCruz for our first Spring Colloquia by Angela Irvine, PhD from Ceres Policy Research.

  Irvine will present several analytic case studies highlighting the intersecting ways schools, courts, and prisons often work against efforts to better educate children, strengthen families and rehabilitate offenders, and offer insights on what next steps we can take now. In connection, Dr. Irvine will discuss how her social policy research has influenced her career trajectory, both inside and outside the academy.

  ANGELA IRVINE, PH.D. has more than 25 years of experience in education and social policy. Raised in Santa Cruz County, CA, Dr. Irvine earned her BA from UC Berkeley in 1988, her secondary teaching credential from St. Mary’s College of California in 1989, and her PhD in sociology from Northwestern University in 2002 while simultaneously serving as a National Science Fellow (NSF) in public policy and program evaluation. Dr. Irvine spent eight years running Ceres Policy Research from 2002 through 2010, four years as research director at the National Council on Crime and Delinquency (NCCD), and two years as a Vice President at Impact Justice. She has studied housing, education, health, and criminal justice policy. She has served as the principal investigator of a national study of youth deincarceration; a national study of lesbian, gay, bisexual, questioning, gender nonconforming and transgender (LGBQ/GNCT) young people in the youth justice system; a project to improve permanency for LGBT youth and youth of color within the criminal justice and youth justice systems; a survey of every detention hall, ranch, and camp in California to understand statewide pathways into the youth justice system for LGBT young people; and a National Institute of Justice researcher-practitioner partnership grant in Santa Cruz County to determine whether structured decision-making instruments used by adult probation departments can lead to more equitable probation outcomes for Latinos and women. She is currently working with youth justice organizations to create research collaboratives that center the voice of the community over research experts.

• Transcommunal Cooperation and Peacemaking in Soledad Prison: Teaching and Learning Behind and From Prison Walls

  Thursday, May 17, 2018 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Humanities 2, room 359

  How are peace and social justice actualized in a world of deep inequalities?

  How can communities create social change while also acknowledging the power asymmetries among different members?

  This panel discussion features some of the people involved in creating the UCSC/Soledad Prison course to discuss transcommunality: an idea and set of practices which draws from the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy) ways of thinking, and which approaches communities as coalitions that account for differences in their very act of coming together (Childs 2003).
  
  The panel discussion includes leaders from Barrios Unidos’ Prison Education Project, UC Santa Cruz professors, and Soledad Prison’s “Cemanahuac/One World Group” class (via phone). This event is part of the Sociology Department’s Spring Colloquium Series.
  Discussion Participants:
  DANIEL NANE ALEJANDREZ Founder and Executive Director of the National Coalition of Barrios Unidos and the “BU Prison Project.” UC Santa Cruz alumnus.
  
  DR. JOHN BROWN CHILDS Professor Emeritus of UCSC Sociology, author of Transcommunality, from the Politics of Conversion to the Ethics of Respect and volunteer teacher of the Transcommunality classes in Soledad Prison.
  
  WESLEY L. HAYE Veterans Advocate for “Veterans Healing Veterans” located in Marina, CA, and graduate of the Barrios Unidos Prison Education Project's “Transcommunal Peace Class”
  
  ERIKA LOPEZ Coordinator of the Barrios Unidos “Prison Education Project,” and undergraduate majoring in Sociology at UC Santa Cruz.
  
  DR. FLORA LU Professor of Environmental Studies and Provost, Colleges 9 and 10, UC Santa Cruz; and speaker in the Soledad Transcommunality class.
  
  SOLEDAD PRISON “Cemanahuac/One World Group” members who facilitate the Transcommunality class (via phone)
  
  Not present at this event, but part of the broader project is Dr. Bruce Schumm, Professor of Physics
  
  References: 
  Childs, John Brown. Transcommunality: From the Politics of Conversion to the Ethics of Respect. Temple Univ Press, 2003.

  Sponsored by the Sociology department with Colleges 9 and 10

• Professionalization Workshop on Mixed Method  Data Management in the Digital Scholarship Commons

  Thursday, May 31, 2018

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Digital Commons Scholarship 

  Presented by DSC Director Rachel Deblinger, Digital Humanities Librarian Kristy Golubiewski-Davis, and Professor of Sociology Miriam Greenberg.

  Most of us conduct mixed-methods research combining qualitative, qualitative, interpretive, and/or visual methods. In the process, we gather and use a wide and disparate array of data sources, including archival documents, interviews, ethnographic fieldnotes, imagery, material objects, and more. In the last few years a number of new software tools have been created to help us organize and analyze this data —including Hyperresearch, NVivo, Dedoose, and others. In this hands-on workshop, we will learn about the capabilities of these new tools, and try our hand at them. The workshops can be customized to suit the specific needs of participants. To this end, instructors will have participants fill out a form ahead of time to ensure the tools chosen are relevant for research projects. In addition, we will review broader data management questions, such as good strategies for storing, organizing, and protecting your data; the ethics of data sharing; and how to create your own data management plan (as is increasingly expected on applications for research funding.) The workshop will be held in the Digital Scholarship Commons, a great campus resource to make use of when conducting mixed-methods research.

   

• A Feminist Perspective to the Regulation of Sex Industry in Taiwan

  Tuesday, June 05, 2018 (flyer-PDF)

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College, room 301

  Chair Professor Chih-Chieh, (林志潔) Carol Lin, Distinguished Professor at National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) and Chair Professor of Social Justice of NCTU School of Law, Taiwan

  Sex worker’s rights movement began from 1997 when the Taipei City government terminated the public prostitution policy. However, the law still allowed organized groups to control the sex trade industry in many ways, including international human trafficking, exploiting prostitutes with high percentage of commission and violence, and the consideration of drugs and public health.  The law also only imposed sanction on prostitutes. Patrons are free to punishments. The unequal regulation was finally held unconstitutional by the Constitutional Court. Originally, the aim of the new restriction rule was to avoid unequal punishments on the vulnerable prostitutes. However, no local government created a “red-light district” since the law passed. Thus, selling sex is still illegal, and women are still disproportionately punished for engaging in commercial sex.  Feminists in Taiwan were divided into two groups. Some support the view that prostitution is the outcome of male dominance, and legalizing commercial sex not only oppresses women, but also reinforces gender stereotypes. Others hold that legalizing selling sex not only changes the traditional constraints on women’s freedom of choosing sex partners, but also empowers women who are situated under strenuous social or economic circumstances.  Her talk will introduce the history of Taiwan’s feminist movement and the development of sex industry, including the “red-light district” policy under the new law through different approaches 

  Chair Professor Chih-Chieh, (林志潔) Carol Lin is a Distinguished Professor at National Chiao Tung University (NCTU) and Chair Professor of Social Justice of NCTU School of Law, Taiwan. Her research focuses on criminal law, white-collar crime, and feminist legal theories. She has been voted as Best Teacher Award twice (2009 and 2014), and her MOOC course “Love, Sex, and Law” was selected as the Best Online Course by Taiwan’s Youtube. She was appointed as judicial reform advisor by the President Tsai of Taiwan and helped to draft Taiwan’s domestic violence law, rape law, security fraud, anti-money laundering law, anti-corruption law, whistleblower protection law, and trade secret protection law. Lin obtained her LL.B. and LL.M. degrees from National Taiwan University College of Law, and her second LL.M degree and S.J.D. degree from Duke University School of Law. She served as Conference Chair of the Asian Law and Society Association (ALSA) Conference in December 2017. She was also awarded as Distinguished Professor and Law School’s Chair Professor in the spring of 2017.

• Professionalization Workshop on Mixed Method  Data Management - follow up

  Monday, June 11, 2018

  Time: 11:40 - 1:15pm
  Location: Rachel Carson College, room 301 

  Informational Session on the Social Science Research Council - Dissertation Proposal Development Grant 

  Prof. Greenberg will share her experience working as a faculty director of the SSRC-DPD program on our campus for the last two years. This is a great program for students who will be in their 2nd or 3rd year during the 2018-19 academic year, providing funding to conduct exploratory summer research to aid in the preparation of their dissertation proposal.  Students also participate in grant writing and professionalization workshops, together with other students in the program. The program is particularly supportive of projects from students doing interdisciplinary research, and accepts students from Social Sciences, Humanities and the Arts. We will discuss relevant sections of the application and requirements.