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- Sociology PhD candidate receives scholarship funds
- Congratulations to all our graduates
- Book Publications
- Summer Gold Poster Competition
Sociology PhD candidate receives scholarship funds
23 May 2012
Scholarship funds research on retirement saving barriers for women
Does the credit rating system discriminate against women and limit their ability to accumulate retirement savings?
That’s one of the questions to be examined in a new study funded by the Commission for Financial Literacy and Retirement Income.
Simon Copland, a PhD candidate at Victoria University’s School of Social and Cultural Studies, will apply the funding to consider the social implications of consumer credit scoring systems for women and men in New Zealand.
Retirement Commissioner Diana Crossan says applicants for the $45,000 three year scholarship were assessed on the basis of their research’s relevance to improving understanding of New Zealander’s retirement income issues.
We want to build research capability because research is an important tool for helping us ensure New Zealand has robust and appropriate retirement income policy both now and in the future. We were impressed by Simon’s subject matter and are very keen to review his findings.
His research will provide us with important insights into the potential long term effect that gender bias in accessing credit may have on the ability of women to acquire assets and build retirement income,” Ms Crossan says.
Mr Copland says he will use the funding to gather data over the next three years on the subjective experiences of women and men of credit scoring, with a particular focus on gendered aspects of financial and accounting technologies.
“I am absolutely thrilled to receive this funding, and recognition from the Commission that my research will provide useful insights for their work”.
Dr Allison Kirkman, Head of the School of Social and Cultural Studies at Victoria University says she is pleased that the topic is being given a critical sociological treatment.
“Social perspectives in studies of finance and commerce are becoming increasingly important. Simon’s research will introduce a human element to an area largely regarded as impersonal.“
Mr Copland also hopes to visit the Credit Research Centre at the University of Edinburgh later this year to compare social perspectives on US and European credit scoring models.
His research will also examine issues of surveillance and financial self-regulation, consumer identities, power/knowledge relationships and ethical aspects of commoditised information.
Congratulations to all our graduates
22 May 2012
Congratulations to all our students who graduated last week and took part in the parade through the city centre and the award ceremonies at the Michael Fowler Centre. In particular our two PhD graduates Paula Pereda-Perez and Lynzi Armstrong. Lynzi was a Criminology PhD student and the title of her thesis was 'Violence against sex workers'. Paula was a Sociology PhD student with her thesis entitled 'Meaning and Implications of Women in Chilean Politics'.
Book Publications
10 May 2012
The School of Social and Cultural Studies recently celebrated the book publications for three of their academic staff members:
Kevin Dew
The Cult and Science of Public Health: A Sociological Investigation
In this book I explore the role of public health in contemporary society. I draw on the concept of the cult of humanity as used by Emile Durkheim to argue that public health rituals and events unite people around what they hold in common – their humanity. As a cult of humanity, public health provides a moral force in society that replaces "traditional" religions in times of great diversity or heterogeneity of peoples, activities, and desires. As a moral force public health is one of the few institutional sites that provides a collective response to uncontrolled capitalism and unremitting globalization. But public health also has a tendency to ‘absolutism’, that is, to impose its vision on other spheres of action. This book focuses on the tensions between public health as a traditional science and public health as a form or advocacy, and argues that public health offers a vision for overcoming health inequalities and fostering new redistributive social programmes.
Chamsy el-Ojeili
Politics, Social Theory, Utopia and the World-System: Arguments in Political Sociology
It is common to hear that we live in unique, turbulent and crisis-ridden times and this turbulence, transformation and crisis are said to be deeply significant - perhaps threatening - for the human sciences. Responding to such claims, this book provides an accessible engagement with pressing contemporary topics, such as violence, social movements, equality, identity and democracy. Foregrounding the imagination of possibilities (utopia), the mapping of the present (theory), and the transformation of the world-system (historical and global questions), the book surveys central issues and paradigms in contemporary political sociology, urging a recommitment to certain concepts and traditions for guidance in thinking and acting in the world.
Patricia Mooney Nickel
Public Sociology and Civil Society: Governance, Politics and Power
The phrases public sociology, civil society, and governance describe a wide array of practices, from public intellectuality and political action to governing and public service. Often used interchangeably and with different meanings across varying disciplines, the capacity for these concepts to convey critical ideas is an important foundation for debating what it means to practice knowledge publically and to govern democratically. In Public Sociology and Civil Society Nickel weaves together various disciplinary understandings of the practice of knowledge and governance through the lens of recent debates over the ideal of public sociology and its emphasis on civil society. The book is framed in three parts addressing how sociological knowledge governs and the potential implications of governing in what were previously understood to be non-government spaces. Part one explores the emergence of public sociology as an ideal, as well as the broader public turn in the social sciences. Part two explores the changing relationship between government and civil society, including non-profit organizations. Part three draws these two themes together in an exploration of the politics of practice and relations of power.
Summer Gold Poster Competition
27 April 2012
Congratulations to Brydie Scott who was awarded a prize for her poster entitled, 'Intimate Risk, Elusive Risk', (Best Overall in Group Three, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences). The Summer Gold Poster Competition celebrated the achievements and experiences of students who took part in the Summer Research Scholarship scheme. Brydie was a summer scholarship recipient in Cultural Anthropology and was supervised by Dr Catherine Trundle.