Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World: Introduction

I've been thinking a lot lately about why I love Sociology so much and why the rest of the world does not.

An article in the Huffington Post by Scott Atran called The Folly of Defunding Social Sciences raised some important points. The last sentence caught my eye:

There is more to being a citizen than voting!

The Founding Fathers envisioned a Republic with an enlightened citizenry educated in "all philosophical Experiments that Light into the Nature of Things ... and multiply the Conveniences or Pleasures of Life" -- not just technical training for jobs that pay well.

I have come to believe that it is an "enlightened  citizenry" that our government fears the most. And I've come to believe (or rather, have strong evidence suggesting) that Sociology is a key to enlightenment.

So over the next week I will be posting daily my Top 7 Things Sociology Offers the World.

Stay tuned!

Next: Sociology offers a fuller picture of our condition as human beings. (Published March 25, 2013, 6am PDT)

Something for Which I Am Thankful

I teach a course called "Race and Ethnic Groups in Contemporary Society" and have been asked on several occasions, "what can we do to end racism?" Here is my answer, though simplified:

1. Own up to our racist history--we need to start talking openly and honestly about how America became one of the richest countries in the world through colonization, exploitation and oppressive domination.

2. Have a national discussion regarding restitution and healing of the wrongs that have been committed. I don't know the answer, but I do know we will never find one until we start looking for one.

3. Be grateful. Any wealth we Americans have, any material goods for which we can be grateful on a day such as today, was built on the backs of slaves and stolen from the indigenous peoples who were the first "occupiers." It does not matter if you came here after these deeds were done. You live here, you benefit. So those of us who were the children of the colonizers and slave owners, and those of us who were not, should never forget that the cities we live in, the food we eat, the houses over our heads, and the bounties we share were made possible by the sacrifices made by these peoples.

It is my belief that from these three steps healing could begin. We should be open to where it leads us.

I just saw this article about The Thick Dark Fog. I think it looks like a good start for a national conversation:



The film is still in production and needs contributions to help it get finished. You can contribute on the Human Arts Association website (be sure to select The Thick Dark Fog as the project, though it looks like they have a number of worthy projects to help with this national conversation.

Finally, consider Truth Out's call for United States Truth and Reconciliation Commission to begin to provide for the damage that has been done and also to provide a way for the stories of indigenous people to be heard.

So I hope, on the national day of thanksgiving, you will join me in the gratitude I feel to these sacrifices and the other ongoing sacrifices that exploited people make, sometimes willingly, sometimes under force, to others. We take so much for granted. Today, let us stop and take note of the truth. The truth will set us free.

Empowerment as a Response to Stigma

Erving Goffman, in his now seminal work, Stigma: Notes of Management of Spoiled Identity, asserted that persons who are discredited through social stigma find ways of coping with that status. These methods have a single thing in common -- none of them change the stigma. This is because in order for stigma to change, the people holding the discrediting ideas about the status must change their attitudes and their behaviors.

This does not mean, however, that understanding these coping mechanism is not important. And the relationship between those who hold stigmatizing views and those who suffer from a "spoiled" social identity is more complex than often represented.

A new study, The Role of the Fatosphere in Fat Adults' Responses to Obesity Stigma: A Model of Empowerment Without a Focus on Weight Loss in the online journal, Qualitative Health Research explores blogging as a method of coping with fat stigma.

By way of background, blogging about fat acceptance has been around almost as long as blogging. I personally started blogging in 2001 when a friend set me up and created FattyPatties. What started as a "joint" blog ended up with me pretty much sharing my life's events on a semi-regular basis with my thoughts on being fat and fat acceptance thrown in often. Much of the writing I did on FattyPatties became the basis for Taking Up Space. I was one of the 44 bloggers who were interviewed for this study.

There is a lot that could be said about this study. It certainly is original research in that few have even asked fat people what their lives are like. Most studies about fat, fatness and even fat acceptance have centered around the effect of weight on health. Most of that research assumed the same stigmatizing assumptions that the general public has about being fat. So in that body of literature, this study is refreshing and rare.



But as a sociologist, I was also interested in this concept of empowerment in face of stigma. The dilemma for most stigmatized people is that they have little control over their social identities. Stigma "spoils" social identity because it prevents the stigmatized person from impression management. No matter what a stigmatized person does, their actions are interpreted through the stigma.

I've experienced this myself often. People are "shocked" to find out that I am smart, educated, articulate and so forth. The first impression I give is fat and all the negative things that go with it. I am praised for "bravery" when I'm simply being myself and accepting myself. And, for those who do not take the time to get to know me, I am dismissed as lazy, obsessed or defensive because I have the audacity to not fit the stereotype and to be educated about it. In short, if I deviate from the expectation of being lazy, jolly, stupid, ugly, etc., it is noted. Even those who like me do so through the lenses of the stigma as they are surprised at finding me not those things.

That is why stigma doesn't change because I don't fit the bill. All of my efforts are about my behavior and thinking, not the one who stigmatizes. I have no doubt that knowing me may change the minds and hearts of a few people, if they are open to the change. But it is they who change. Not me.

Still, it can be said that those of us who have publicly talked about our plight might be influencing those hearts and minds and empowering ourselves in the process. I find this an interesting question and one that goes beyond Goffman's theory and most of what's been written about stigma since Goffman.

Empowerment is a difficult concept sociologically. Generally, it has been psychological in nature. Basically, it has been constructed as a sense of personal identity that rises above or beyond one's social identity. From a sociological point-of-view, empowerment may not change group dynamics that much and could be seen as problematic because it can be used to ignore social dynamics. In other words, if I feel empowered but the power dynamics have not really changed, am I just reinforcing those dynamics instead of changing them?

But blogging is a different aspect of this empowerment. Blogging is social. Blogging is creating the possibility of changing the dynamic. And blogging can be a form of organizing into groups of resistance to power.

I share a portion of our book with my Soc 101 students and ask questions about stigma management in relationship to the excerpt. One of the questions is about what the author (me) can do about the fat stigma? The answer I'm looking for is "nothing" because a stigmatized person is not the one who can change it. But I often give partial credit for another answer that comes up frequently: the author is changing the stigma by challenging it, writing about it and living differently.

I like the process identified in this research. It rings true to me personally. I had several crisis moments that led me to empowerment. But I think that there is another stage that bloggers move to as it were and that is challenging power structures. In a way my movement of my writing from FattyPatties to the book to now blogging for Psychology Today is an example of that transformation from a personal experience to an empowered experience to someone who challenges the forces that set up the stigma in the first place.

Of course, glance at the comments and you can see that I still am stigmatized in writing about fatism. But with the new media and the ability to be "out" in much more public ways, perhaps it is time to expand Goffman's ideas and challenge the concept that the discredited cannot find a voice in social discourse. It is, of course, a complex question.

Sociology and the Space Shuttle

As the space shuttle Atlantis launches on its final mission and the last mission of the entire program, I felt it was important to mark the contribution of a sociologist, Dr. Diane Vaughan, then of Boston College, in changing how NASA addressed risk organizationally.


Vaughan's book The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA really didn't get a lot of attention when she first published it. It became a staple in engineering schools but got little attention from NASA.

Then in February 2003, the Columbia went down. Suddenly, Vaughan's work got noticed.

We are proud to be one of the first media outlets to draw attention to her work and the possible relevance to the second accident. I knew Vaughan and her work from attending BC for a semester. We called her the morning the Columbia went down and set up the interview for our radio show First Person Plural.

As the world watches the final shuttle mission, we thought it would be worthwhile to offer that interview again.

Enjoy!

(note, depending on your computer and internet connection, this may take a few minutes to load)

My Fall 2011 Schedule -- Tell Your Friends!

Fall Class Schedule is out - here's what I'm teaching:

SOC 102 Contemporary Social Issues
Sec 2001 Call # 83296 CHEYENNE Campus Room 1681 1218 T/Th 9:30AM - 10:50AM

SOC 205 Ethnic Groups in Contemporary Society
Sec 2001 Call # 83301 CHEYENNE Campus Room 1218 T/Th 11:00AM - 12:20PM

SOC 101 Principles of Sociology
Sec 2017 Call # 83245 CHEYENNE Campus Room 1060 T/Th 6:00PM - 7:20PM

Tell your friends and neighbors :)

The American Ruling Class: View of the Power Elite

Last week I showed two of my classes a delightful film called The American Ruling Class, which bills itself as a "documentary, drama, musical." It lives up to the billing.

The drama part is the storyline of two recent Yale graduates who are trying to figure out what to do with their lives now that they are ready for the "real world." Other fictional parts include classmates, workers, a Pentagon press corps, and musical entertainers, including some wonderful kids.

The documentary part involves the film's creator, Lewis Lampham, long-time editor of Harper's Magaine and self-identified member of America's Ruling Class. Lampham coaches the fictional Yalees by introducing them to a wide range of real life members of various sectors of media, literary, Hollywood and political elites. There is little indication of how many of these well-known persons are "in" on the fictional aspects. In this way, the film reminds me of Sacha Baron Cohen's work where the lines between fiction and reality are blurred. Highlights include Walter Kronkite, Kurt Vonnegut, Barbara Ehrenreich, James Baker, Hodding Carter, and Bill Bradley.

The musical part involves several times in the film when the point is driven by workers, press corps and kids breaking out in song. Of course, there is also a magical bus ride with Howard Zinn, who conducts a tour of an alternative American history that sought to set up a ruling class and suppress dissent, accompanied by a Phillip Glass composition from Koyaanisqatsi. And rounding out the musical aspects of the film, is a wonderful encounter with Pete Seeger, who is strumming a banjo on a country road and providing sage wisdom about social change.

If you are looking for cut and dry answers to the questions of whether the ruling class controls the rest of us, whether holding power means the opportunity to do great good or whether power corrupts absolutely, you will be dissatisfied with this film. It is highly ambiguous, reflecting, I believe Lampham's own mixed feelings about the privileges that he has enjoyed.

One of the more interesting aspects of the film is the obvious role that two prominent private organizations play in providing a gateway to becoming a part of the class: the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission.

One of the graduates is introduced to the Council on Foreign Relations as the doorway he must pass through in order to become part of The American Ruling Class. The other graduate, a little more reluctant to become a member, is sent to a wide range of political, military and philanthropic leaders, each of whom is a member of one or both of these organizations.

When I teach about C. Wright Mills's Power Elite, I point out that one of the features of an elite is that they are simply acting within their social circles, no evil cartel needed. Because these powerful persons share social spaces, they often make decisions like most of us, thinking of their own interests and those of their social circles, acting along the norms that they have been taught and viewing the world in ways they have been socialized. The difference is that when these elites act, other people's lives outside their circles are affected. The effects can be unintentional, but they are real, nonetheless.

Only after watching this film did I learn more about the Council on Foreign Relations and the Trilateral Commission. I was amazed. These organizations are the centers of power on both sides of the political spectrum. These are where the elite meet and do business. These are where power is brokered, expanded and solidified.

When I teach about Mills's point that no evil cartel is necessary, I also point out that doesn't rule out conspiracies. Conspiracies are not necessary, but they certainly are more efficient. After learning more about these two organizations, I am now worried that I was more right about this than I want to be.

Add to this, another aspect of world elitism of which I've only recently become aware, the annual Davos meeting of the World Economic Forum. While the news media loves to show G-fill-in-the-number-this-year summits of political leaders and financial advisors supposedly setting trade policy, little media coverage is given to Davos outside of business news. Yet this is where elites from around the world meet to set policy not only for governments, but for developing countries, social agendas, multi-national corporations, academic grants and media production.


If you are concerned about the fact that 1% of the world's population now owns over 40% of the world's wealth, then these three organizations should be on your radar. If you are concerned about the growing poverty the world is experiencing the wake of the events of 2008 and the so-called financial meltdown, these three organizations should be on your radar. If you want to understand why political power is much more complex than the news channels want you to believe (like much more complex that what the current president is doing today and how are the two-sides of one coin political parties are dividing their time), then these three organizations should be on your radar.

This is the power elite and as predicted they are getting more powerful in many ways.

I have a lot more to say about power and I do not believe the power elite is the only power game. But I do think it is important to know about this if you want to give the correct context to media. Because, currently in the United States, the media are acting as smoke and mirrors.

Toto is looking behind the curtain. We should probably follow suit if we want to find our way to our brains, our hearts, our courage and our homes.

What a Day--Stigma is alive and well

I wrote a little blog entry on Psychology Today yesterday and today all hell broke lose and I spent the day being attacked on a number of personal levels, including threats to my job at CSN.

As a description of the blog I wrote:

Judging character, work ethic, health or worth on the basis of how somone looks is ALWAYS prejudice. No one should be treated as "less than human" because of their body size.FATISM is a matter of cultural stigma. This blog is about cultural and social issues, not a health debate.

Talk about a prophecy. First controversy and the judgements about my character, my work ethic, my health and my worth were all over the place.

I think the thing that interests me most as a sociologist is that I was considered "obsessed" because I have written about this. These persons were defending themselves on the basis of credentials and a body of work, but as a stigmatized person I was considered "biased," "obsessed" and "deaf to other points of view" because I, too, had a body of work.

I have never seen a more beautiful example of what Goffman meant by spoiled identity. If I wrote and researched the topic, I am obsessed. If I am uniformed and unwilling to change, I am ignorant and need help. My body was code for "stupid," "unhealthy," "lazy," and "incompetent." It makes me wonder what they would have used if I had been thin.

I have written in other places about my reluctance to be a "professional fat person." Today was a reminder of both why I became one and why I hate it.

It remains my hope, however, that having become one, I can use the example of fat stigma to end all stigma. Stigma is a horrible cultural practice and one that hurts both individuals and society.

I Take Up Space: New Blog on Psychology Today

I'm excited about kicking off a new blog at the Psychology Today website. The blog is called "I Take Up Space" and is about the consequences of fatism. The site has millions of visitors each month, so I'm hopeful that it will become an outlet for discussing Fat Studies as an emerging field and promoting sociological perspectives on these issues as well.

I write about the failure of New Year's Resolutions and the Moral Panic of the War on Obesity in my first effort.

(Please forgive my cross-posting if you read me in more than one place.)

New York times Article about Banking Oversight

A Secretive Banking Elite Rules Trading in Derivatives


Thought this might be of interest after watching Capitalism: A Love Story and discussing Power Elites.

BOTH SOC 101 CLASSES CANCELLED TODAY, THURSDAY DEC 2

THE NELLIS (SEC N21) AND LATE NIGHT (SEC 829) CLASSES ARE CANCELLED TODAY, DEC 2


I have lost my voice and not feeling well. Please go to Angel and read more extensive information.

See you next week. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause.

Wendell Potter and Michael Moore on Keith Olbermann's Countdown

Since we discuss both the role of whistle blowers and the health care debate in class, I thought this might be of interest.

My Critique of the New York Times Article on US as Banana Republic

My facebook friend and fellow Sociologist, Lesliegh Owens wrote on Facebook comments to my New York Times Blog entry:

"Pattie, I'm intrigued by your comments about cultural production and social infrastructure. Would you please expand a bit? Huge thanks!"

I could write a whole lot on this, but suffice it to say that ownership of production includes ownership of cultural production such as media, education and the arts. This means that, as Gramsci noted, the interests of a very few are being served up hegemonically as being "American" interests. Thus, what feels natural or normal by the vast majority of Americans is actually only good for a very small percentage of Americans.

As far as infrastructure goes, we saw in this last election a group on the right who looked like a grassroots movement, but were highly funded by billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch along with puppetmaster, Karl Rove, and a group on the left who looked like a grassroots movement, but were highly funded by billionaire George Soros.

With the ridiculous Supreme Court ruling that corporations have freedom of speech, we now have a select few who are funding and influencing a chess game of politics using "common" folk as pawns. Everyone wonders why this midterm election seemed so visible when most midterm elections are usually dull with little turnout. Well what we are seeing is an election battle between two billionaire camps, that top 1%. It is interesting to consider the election in light of the NY Times article.

If you saw, Capitalism: A Love Story, you know about the Citigroup plutonomy memo which lamented the fact that we have voting rights. Well, I think we just witnessed in the past two years exactly how the rich are going to handle the voters -- fund them and get them riled up through media.

By concentrating so much on the personal aspects of these inequalities, I think Kristof missed some real structural and cultural changes that this inequality is creating and the very real ways it is changing our so-called democracy into something very undemocratic.

Looking for Participants in Study at Purdue--NO MORE

MICHAELA HAD SUCH A LARGE RESPONSE THAT THE SURVEY CLOSED IN A LITTLE OVER 3 DAYS! -- SHE SAYS THANKS FOR THE SUPPORT!
============================

Michaela Null, a doctoral student in Sociology at Purdue University is looking for individuals who are interested in volunteering to participate in her study on the "embodiment of size-accepting fat women, with attention to the ways in which gender, race, orientation, and body size intersect" (from her website):

If you are interested in volunteering to participate in an interview, I ask that you take an electronic informational survey, which will take approximately 5 minutes. Please go here and complete the informational survey. After all survey data is collected, participants will be selected for interviews, which will be conducted in-person, by phone, or via internet video chat, and will last between an hour and an hour and a half.

Participation is voluntary and participants must be at least 18 years old.

This project has been approved by my university’s Institutional Review Board, which protects human subjects of research. I will provide confidentiality to all volunteers and participants will be referred to by a pseudonym in all research documents.

If you have any questions regarding this study, you can contact me at mnull@purdue.edu. For more information on me, you can access my university profile. You can also contact Professor Eugene Jackson, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Purdue University, at jacksone@purdue.edu.

Sincerely,

Michaela A. Null, Doctoral Student in Sociology, Purdue University