sociology

Steven Thrasher (Ep. 5)

Steven Thrasher is a writer for the guardian and a PhD student in American Studies at New York University. In this conversation with University of Texas Sociology Professor Ben Carrington, Thrasher discusses his first encounter with Stuart Hall’s work.

The interview provides insight into Hall’s intellectual reach. Thrasher shares how his engagement with Hall comes from a journalistic perspective. Having first read the British intellectual in his American Studies classes, Thrasher discloses feeling initially confused about why a British scholar would be relevant to American Studies. However, he found Policing the Crisis to be especially important for his thinking about covering the aftermath of Michael Brown’s shooting and the ongoing Black Lives Matter movement.

The conversation includes a discussion of how being a public intellectual is not limited to the academy, but also how Hall created a space in which black people can take up the space of public intellectual. Likewise, Thrasher and Carrington comment on the importance of popular media as a “gatekeeper of intellectual space” and Twitter is posited as a useful platform for making intellectual interventions in the public sphere.

-Anima Adjepong

Les Back (Ep. 1)

Situated on Goldsmiths, University of London campus, this conversation between Ben Carrington, Professor of Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and Les Back, Professor of Sociology at Goldsmith’s, University of London, considers the contributions that Stuart Hall made to the field of cultural studies and the loss that has been felt since his passing.

The discussion between Carrington and Back touches on topics such as the complimentary relationship between Stuart Hall and Richard Hoggart, Hall’s role as an interpreter of British culture and Back’s experience in the making of “At Home and Not at Home: Stuart Hall in Conversation with Les Back.”

Back emphasizes Hall’s intellectual generosity, his practice of collaboration, and his ability to engage the big issues through both commonplace cultural practices and extraordinary political events. Ending in front of the New Cross Inn, the conversation turns to why Hall remains a relevant intellectual figure both for cultural studies and for the increasingly limited possibilities within academia to do critical work.

The interview draws to a close with Back’s thoughts on what he misses most about Stuart Hall, including his understated sense of humor.

-Maggie Tate

Plagiarism

“Thou shalt not steal” might be an old concept, but when it comes to ideas we’re still in the infant stages of understanding how theft works. So we might ask, “why does it matter if someone plagiarizes someone else? It’s not like I took an object from someone else.”

It turns out, it’s a big deal. In this edition of Two Guys on Your Head, Dr. Art Markman and Dr. Bob Duke talk about why.

Dr. Aldon D. Morris (Ep. 04, 2016)

Host John L. Hanson speaks with Dr. Aldon D. Morris, professor of Sociology and African American Studies at Northwestern University, and author of “The Scholar Denied: W.E.B. Dubois and the Birth of Modern Sociology.”