Sociology @ Mills

'Social glasses' may reveal a person's true colors

2012-02-07T22:02:00.000-08:00

'Social glasses' may reveal a person's true colors

"A rosy blush or the sickly green color of a person's skin can tell very different stories about mood and health to human eyes ― a deceptively powerful insight about eyesight. Now a startup has begun creating "social glasses" capable of ... harness[ing] the power of human eyes to notice skin color changes ...[that] may enable ordinary people still see common social signals through their dark shades." (InnovationNewsDaily 2/2/12)

What WILL they think of next? If this strikes you as NOT being an article in The Onion, you might also find interesting Alex Pentland's Honest Signals (a review here). Goffman's ideas about interaction rituals and strategic interaction will probably be in play for a little while longer, but stay tuned....

WEBINAR: LANDING YOUR DREAM INTERNSHIP

2012-02-06T18:05:00.000-08:00

The Public Policy Program is sponsoring this event. They are partnering with Career Services to offer it to a wider audience. If you are interested in federal internship opportunities (and, no, they are not ALL in DC!), they'd love to see you there!

Partnership for Public Service

WEBINAR: LANDING YOUR DREAM INTERNSHIP

Learn how to land your dream internship from Go Government!

This Call to Serve webinar is for students interested in finding and applying for internships for Summer 2012, as well as those advisors looking for more information about federal opportunities to share with their students.

During this session, we will highlight a number of exciting internships across government and show you how to research, find and apply for an internship that’s right for you.

Join us for this special viewing in Cowell 113

Wednesday, February 8, 2pm-3pm.

Tweet from Pew Research Center

2012-02-06T09:36:00.000-08:00

@pewresearch: You can search for any survey question we asked in the Pew Rsch Ctr for the People & Press database http://t.co/gsS4hkLa

The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press Poll Database

The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press Poll Database includes survey questions from all national People & the Press polls. To search for a question, enter any keyword or combination of words and/or select a topic area of interest.

What the Top 1% of Earners Majored In

2012-01-20T10:11:00.000-08:00

A post on the NYT Economix blog by Robert Gebeloff and Shaila Dewan describes data from the 2010 American Community Survey in terms of what fraction people with various college majors end up in the "one percent."

In case you are wondering, 2.5% of people with sociology degrees are in the one percent and they make up about 1.3% of the one percent. About 3.3% of anthropologists and archaeologists are in the one percent and they make up about 0.4% (there are fewer of the latter overall -- the ratio of soc to anthro/archaeo in the ACS data is about 4:1).

The full list is available on DocumentCloud.

Quantitative Visualizations of the One Percent

2012-01-15T12:25:00.000-08:00

Check out the excellent infographics accompanying this article! And then Read Paul Krugman's followup piece.

BUSINESS DAY

Among the Wealthiest One Percent, Many Variations

By SHAILA DEWAN and ROBERT GEBELOFF

Published: January 14, 2012

While the 1 percent has become a catch-all to describe the very wealthy, the members of this group are diverse, especially in where they live, what they believe politically and just how rich they are.

Debt: The First 5,000 Years with David Graeber

2012-01-13T13:58:00.000-08:00

Free lecture: Debt: The First 5,000 Years with David Graeber at California Institute of Integral Studies (Social and Cultural Anthropology Department)

Monday, January 30
7:00pm - 10:00pm
CIIS Main Building, Namaste Hall
FREE ADMISSION

From CIIS Website:

"The anthropologist David Graeber has a strong claim to being the house theorist of Occupy Wall Street. A veteran of the antiglobalization uprisings in Seattle and Genoa, he helped orchestrate the first 'General Assembly' in New York this summer, and has since become one of the movement's most outspoken defenders.
(But) Graeber's most important contribution to the movement may owe less to his activism as an anarchist than to his background as an anthropologist. His recent book DEBT: The First 5,000 Years reads like a lengthy field report on the state of our economic and moral disrepair... the book is also a philosophical inquiry into the nature of debt - where it came from and how it evolved. Graeber's claim is that the past 400 years of Western history represent a grievous departure from how human societies have traditionally thought about our obligations to one another. What makes the work more than a screed is its intricate examination of societies from ancient Mesopotamia to 1990s Madagascar, and thinkers ranging from Rabelais to Nietzsche - and to George W. Bush's brother Neil." -Thomas Meaney, New York Times Book Review (Read the whole article)

Every economics textbook says the same thing: Money was invented to replace onerous and complicated barter system-to relieve ancient people from having to haul their goods to market. The problem with this version of history? There's not a shred of evidence to support it.

Here anthropologist David Graeber presents a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom. He shows that 5,000 years ago, during the beginning of the agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems. It is in this era, Graeber shows, that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors.

With the passage of time, however, virtual credit money was replaced by gold and silver coins-and the system as a whole began to decline. Interest rates spiked and the indebted became slaves. And the system perpetuated itself with tremendously violent consequences, with only the rare intervention of kings and churches keeping the system from spiraling out of control. Debt: The First 5,000 Years is a fascinating chronicle of this little known history-as well as how it has defined human history, and what it means for the credit crisis of the present day and the future of our economy.

DAVID GRAEBER teaches anthropology at Goldsmiths College, University of London. He is the author of Towards an Anthropological Theory of Value, Lost People, and Possibilities: Essays on Hierarchy, Rebellion, and Desire. He has written for Harper's, The Nation, Mute, and The New Left Review.

Berkman Center for Internet & Society Summer Internship Program 2012

2012-01-12T09:17:00.000-08:00

Berkman Center for Internet & Society
Summer Internship Program 2012

Each summer the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University swings open the doors of our big yellow house to welcome a group of talented and curious students as full-time interns - Berkterns! - who are passionate about the promise of the Internet. Finding connected and complementary research inquiries among their diverse backgrounds, students represent all levels of study, are being trained in disciplines across the board, and come from universities all over the world to tackle issues related to the core of Berkman’s research agenda, including law, technology, innovation, and knowledge; the relationship between Internet and civic activity; and technology, law, and development.

Summer interns jump head first into the swirl of the Berkman universe, where they are deeply and substantively involved in the operation of our research projects and efforts. Becoming invaluable contributors to the Center’s operation and success, interns conduct collaborative and independent research under the guidance of Berkman staff, fellows, and faculty. Specific roles, tasks, and experiences vary depending on Center needs and interns' skills; a select list of expected opportunities for Summer 2012 is below. Traditionally, the workload of each intern is primarily based under one project or suite of projects, with encouragement and flexibility to get involved in additional projects all across the Center.

In addition to joining research teams, summer interns participate in special lectures with Berkman Center faculty and fellows, engage each other through community experiences like weekly interns discussion hours, and attend Center-wide events and gatherings with members of the wider Berkman community. As well, each year interns establish new channels for fun and learning, such as organizing topical debates, establishing reading groups and book clubs, producing podcasts and videos, and hosting potlucks, cook-offs, and BBQs (fortunately for us, people share).

The word "awesome" has been thrown around to describe our internships, but don't take our word for it. Zack McCune, a summer intern from 2008, had this to say: "it has been an enchanting summer working at the berkman center for internet & society. everyday, i get to hang out with some of the most brilliant people on the planet. we talk, we write (emails), we blog, we laugh, we play rock band. and when things need to get done, we stay late hyped on free coffee and leftover food. it is a distinct honor to be considered a peer among such excellent people. and i am not just talking about the fellows, staff, and faculty, though they are all outstanding. no, i mean my peers as in my fellow interns, who are almost definitely the ripening next generation of changemakers."

Time Commitment:
Summer internships are full time positions (35 hours/week) for 10 weeks. Our Summer 2012 program runs from Monday, June 4 through Friday, August 10.

Payment:
Interns are paid $11.50 an hour, with the exception of a number of opportunities for law students who are expected to receive some version of summer public interest funding (more about these specific cases at the link for law students below).

Please be forewarned that payment may not be sufficient to cover living expenses in the Boston area. No other benefits are provided, and interns must make their own housing, insurance and transportation arrangements.

Commitment to Diversity:
The work and well-being of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University are strengthened profoundly by the diversity of our network and our differences in background, culture, experience, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, and much more. We actively seek and welcome applications from people of color, women, the LGBTQ community, and persons with disabilities, as well as applications from researchers and practitioners from across the spectrum of disciplines and methods. The roots of this deep commitment are many and, appropriately, diverse. We are not nearly far enough along in this regard, and we may never be. It is a constant process in which there remains much to learn. We welcome your inquiries, comments and ideas on how we may continue to improve.

Eligibility:
- Internships are open to students enrolled across the spectrum of disciplines.
- Internships are open to students at different levels of academic study including those in bachelors, masters, law, and Ph.D programs (some flexibility with high school students is possible). Some positions will require that interns be enrolled in a particular kind of academic program.
- Summer interns do not have to be U.S. residents or in school in the U.S., and we welcome and encourage international students to apply.
- Summer interns do not need an existing affiliation with Harvard University.

To Apply:
We know what you're thinking. Yes please. I want that. That sounds magical. Did I mention that I make a mean artichoke dip? Here's what you should do...
Law students: If you are a law student interested in conducting research with the Berkman Center this summer, please find important additional information and application instructions here.
Students from all other disciplines: If you are a student from any discipline except law interested in conducting research with Berkman this summer, please find more information and application instructions here.
Required application materials for all include:
- A cover letter describing your skills and interests. When developing your cover letter, you may wish to consider the following questions: What has led you to pursue research with the Berkman Center and the issues we study? What would you like to gain from working with us this summer, and what will you contribute? How do you think the experience might influence your future efforts? Please feel welcome to address these and/or other topics you would like to share with us.
- A current resume.
- The contact information for two references (professional or academic).
The application deadline for all students for Summer 2012 is Sunday, February 12 2012 at 11:59 p.m. ET.
We look forward to hearing from you!
Questions? Email Rebecca Tabasky at rtabasky@cyber.law.harvard.edu.
----
Select Expected Summer 2012 Opportunities:
Broadband
Interns with the the Broadband Project will conduct primary and secondary research into fiber deployment, both in the US and abroad. Research topics may include municipal fiber networks, how competition impacts price and speed, and the role of spectrum in the broadband debate. More information about the Broadband Project can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/research/broadband.

Civic Engagement in Developing and Transitioning Countries
Interns will undertake a variety of research and writing around the use, impact, and design of digital tools for civic engagement in developing and transitioning countries. Inquiries will be broad-based, but particular attention will be given to the study of the promotion of topics such as transparency, accountability, justice and human rights, with a focus on Nigeria.

Cloud Computing Law and Policy
In Spring 2012, the Cloud Computing team at the Berkman Center in collaboration with KEIO University (Japan), the NEXA Center (Italy), and the University of St. Gallen (Switzerland) will make public its wiki-based repository of analyses, resources, and case studies on emerging issues, law, policy and current trends related to cloud computing. Building upon this foundation and under the guidance of Executive Director Urs Gasser, we will be developing specific research and analysis that leverages our international collaboration and existing resources, and ideally creates briefing materials that are useful to policymakers, industry participants, civil society members, and other actors. Interns will work directly with the team to develop associated research.

Cyberlaw Clinic
Interns with the Cyberlaw Clinic contribute to a wide range of real-world litigation, client counseling, licensing, advocacy and legislative projects covering a broad spectrum of legal issues involving the Internet, new technology, intellectual property law, youth online safety and child protection. The Clinic provides high-quality, pro-bono legal services to appropriate individuals, small start-ups, non-profit groups and government entities regarding cutting-edge issues of the Internet, new technology and intellectual property. Interns in the Cyberlaw Clinic can expect direct hands-on experience working with clients under the supervision of the Clinic's staff attorneys. More information about the Cyberlaw Clinic can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/teaching/cyberlawclinic.
Interns with the Cyberlaw Clinic will be students currently enrolled in a J.D. program in the United States.

Cybersecurity
Since Spring 2010, the Berkman Center team has been developing a cybersecurity wiki under the guidance of Jack Goldsmith. The wiki provides a set of evolving resources on cybersecurity, broadly-defined, and includes an annotated list of relevant articles and literature. This summer, we will be seeking to update this wiki by adding key resources that have been released since 2010. We also have a series of potential next steps, including, for example, an survey course and an analysis of the 'rhetoric' of cybsecurity, that we also plan to pick up and develop with summer interns.

Digital Libraries
Summer interns working on digital library issues will conduct research related to library users, content, governance, funding, publishing models, and related issues; stay abreast of developments in the digital library field (including news related to e-publishing, copyright, linked open data, and other areas); blog regularly on these issues; and contribute to the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) wiki and website. Depending on summer needs, they may also have the opportunity to create multimedia for the DPLA website. Summer interns will also conduct research on the legal aspects and considerations related to these issues. More information about DPLA can be found at: http://dp.la.

Digital Media Law Project
Summer interns at the Digital Media Law Project will work on a wide range of legal research and writing projects relating to media law, intellectual property, and the intersection of journalism and the internet. In past years, interns have updated the Legal Guide to media law topics, developed entries for the database of threats against online publishers, commented on current issues in law and media on the blog, and provided research and drafting assistance on amicus briefs. Interns may also be asked to assist with the operation and expansion of the Online Media Legal Network, an attorney referral service for digital publishers, and with other projects that the DMLP undertakes in conjunction with its partner organizations around the world. More information on summer internships with the DMLP can be found on the DMLP website at: http://www.citmedialaw.org/about/summer-internships.

Freedom of Expression
Summer interns for this suite of projects, which includes Herdict, Internet & Democracy, OpenNet Initiative, Global Network Initiative, and others, will blog regularly about issues concerning online freedom of expression; contribute to related data gathering efforts using online sources; conduct research on internet filtering, monitoring, and control efforts around the globe; update project Twitter and Facebook accounts; and assist international partners. In the past, freedom of expression interns have also contributed to literature reviews, hand coded online content, and supported research on foreign language blogospheres, Twitter and online communities in Russia, China, Iran and the Middle East. More information about some of Berkman’s work on freedom of expression can be found at the following links: http://www.herdict.org/web/ ; http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/idblog/ ; http://opennet.net/ ; http://globalnetworkinitiative.org/.

Geek Cave
Help Berkman's geek team keep the Center running. Interns joining the Geek Cave may extend open source software, build scalable websites, or manage the mixed desktop network that keeps us moving. If you’ve been to a Berkman site, you’ve seen the work of the geeks; we also work with partners across Harvard University. Our team works with ruby, perl, php, bash, jQuery, PostgreSQL, MySQL and a slew of other tools, and you can find more information at Berkman’s github: https://github.com/berkmancenter.

Harvard Open Access Project (HOAP)
HOAP fosters open access (OA) to research within Harvard, fosters OA beyond Harvard, undertakes research and policy analysis on OA, and provides OA to timely and accurate information about OA itself. Interns with the HOAP will will add relevant information to the Open Access Directory (OAD), a wiki-based encyclopedia of OA; and will contribute to the the Open Access Tracking Project (OATP), a social-tagging project organizing knowledge about OA. There may be opportunities to write research reports on commissioned topics, draft submissions to public-policy consultations, and help organize OA-related events on campus.

H2O
Interns working with H2O, a platform that allows professors to create entirely online casebooks that are easily sharable and remixable, will assist in the development of new casebook instances. Following the successful pilot of Prof. Jonathan’s Zittrain’s Torts Class Casebook in the Fall of 2011, this summer we will create several additional casebooks with other Harvard Law School professors. Classes may include Advanced Civil Procedure and Criminal Law. Law students who have an interest in deepening their knowledge in these subjects, as well as extremely dedicated aspiring law students, will work closely with the professors to deliver an entirely online casebook. More information about H2O can be found at: h2odev.law.harvard.edu.

Information Quality in the Digital Age
Under the guidance of Executive Director Urs Gasser, this project will focus on the multi-faceted phenomenon of "information quality" in the digital age. Building upon previous research efforts, the next stage of exploration will focus on electronic media and work towards a theory of information quality in the digitally networked environment, with a particular interest in the role and interplay of law, social norms, technology, and markets. Interoperability In June 2012, Urs Gasser and John Palfrey will release their book on Interoperability: The Promise and Perils of Highly Interconnected Systems. The book is inspired by their 2005 study and paper—“Breaking Down Digital Barriers: When and How Information and ICT Interoperability Drives Innovation” —which examined the relationship between interoperability and innovation in the ICT environment.

A key input into the process has been the development of supporting case studies that focus on lessons learned from sectors where interoperability is critical, such as transportation, currency markets, and energy. Interns will help to finalize existing cases for release, develop new ones, and also contribute to developing a set of associated online resources online, including a wiki and blog. More information about our Interoperability research can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/interop/.

metaLAB
The metaLAB is a research unit dedicated to innovation and experimentation in the arts, media and humanities, and metaLAB work ranges from inquiry into the history of media to advanced, open-source software development to installation art practices using hacked sensor devices. Summer interns will participate in current core research areas, including: modeling new forms of multimedia publishing and documentary art practice; creating augmented exhibitions using digitized cultural heritage and library collections; and organizing interdisciplinary gatherings of humanists, technologists, artists, legal scholars and other experimental thinkers. More information about the metaLAB can be found at: http://metalab.harvard.edu/.

Special Projects - Professor Urs Gasser
A summer intern will work on a variety of projects undertaken by Berkman's Executive Director Urs Gasser (e.g. work on privacy, globalization of law, cyberliability). Tasks include research for presentations, op-eds, and articles. This position requires the ability to find, absorb, critically analyze, and debate large amounts of written and other media materials from sources including scholarly articles, news articles and blogs, and interviews. Knowledge in German or an Asian language is a plus. More information about Urs’ research can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/ugasser.

Special Projects - Professor Jonathan Zittrain
A summer intern in this position will work on a variety of projects undertaken by Professor Jonathan Zittrain, assisting in a variety of research areas (e.g. human computing, mesh networking, and Internet filtering). Summer contributions include research for conferences and presentations (including, for example, JZ’s recent Colbert Report debate); brainstorming article outlines; fact-checking materials; and reviewing original article or paper drafts. This position requires the ability to find, absorb, critically analyze, and debate large amounts of written and other media materials from sources including scholarly articles, news articles and blogs, and interviews with public policymakers. More information about JZ’s research can be found at: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/jzittrain.

Youth and Media Lab
During a summer at the Youth and Media Lab, interns will contribute to various research, advocacy, and development initiatives around youth and technology. By researching young people’s interactions with digital media such as the Internet, cell phones, and video games, we seek to address the issues their practices raise, learn how to harness the opportunities their digital fluency presents, and shape our regulatory and educational frameworks in a way that advances the public interest.

A summer intern will work for one of the Lab’s three main tracks: exploratory research, curriculum development, and tool development. The research track includes literature reviews, surveys, focus groups, and one-on-one interviews to better map youth’s usage of technology. Building upon these findings, the curriculum track aims to develop and test educational modules in collaboration with youth, designed for both formal and informal learning settings. The modules address youth’s awareness and understanding of their technology usage and bear important policy implications. Third, the Lab’s team seeks to develop a set of media literacy tools (“navigation aids for cyberspace”) including an application to assess news quality, a set of badges, etc.

Spending a summer with the Lab means joining a diverse and creative team. Past summer interns have brought expertise and enthusiasm for human-computer interaction, digital art, filmmaking, radio production, joining team members excelling in areas such as law and policy, communications, and the social sciences. The Lab’s intellectual diversity encourages collective brainstorming and discussion of how each individual team member can advance the Lab’s agenda. More information about the Youth and Media Lab can be found at: www.youthandmedia.org.

Urban Studies Scholar on Occupy Movement

2011-11-15T19:30:00.000-08:00

Perhaps of interest: two blog posts by Peter Marcuse, Professor Emeritus of Urban Planning in the
School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia University:

What Space to Occupy in New York: A Two-Site Solution? suggests thinking through the possibility of (in New York, at least) having a "staging site" (where public events happen) and a "political incubator site" (where educational activities, discussions, the development and practice of alternative forms of political organization take place).

The Purpose of the Occupation Movement and the Danger of Fetishizing Space looks at the multiplicity of functions/purposes played by OWS in the struggle for a better world and then tries to discern the role played by space/territory in each as a way of assessing the importance of space. His conclusion:

The particular space being occupied should not be fetishized, should not become the prize, the conquest of which is the goal of the movement. It is only, for most aspects of the movement, symbolic; the rise and fall of the movement should not be linked to the extent of the physical occupation of a given space. The spaces sought for occupancy are not the prize for which the battle is being fought, but rather a terrain on which that battle takes place, and a more or less important source of support to facilitate the achievement of objectives more important than the command of a particular piece of ground.

Free Lecture by World Renowned Criminologist

2011-10-19T12:00:00.000-07:00

If you are interested in cities, social control, criminology, or the like, you should check out this free lecture.

Why have crime rates dropped across the country over the last 20 years? Why did crime rates drop even more in New York City? What lessons can Oakland learn?

Franklin Zimring, nationally acclaimed crime policy expert and Professor of Law at the University of California at Berkeley, shares lessons learned from extensive crime and enforcement research detailed in his new book: "The City That Became Safe; New York's Lessons for Urban Crime and Its Control."

When: Sunday October 23, 2011 - 3:00-5:00pm

Where: St. Lawrence O'Toole Church, 3725 High Street, Oakland

Presented by the Offices of Council members Pat Kernighan, District 2 and Libby Schaaf, District 4 FREE admission and parking, RSVP not required Questions? Please contact: Bruce Stoffmacher, Community Liaison / Policy Analyst Office of Councilmember Libby Schaaf, City of Oakland - District 4

o: (510) 238-7041

f: (510) 238-6910

CYBERSOCIETY SEMESTER: 2nd CALL FOR STUDENTS

2011-09-21T20:11:00.000-07:00

The new study abroad (SA) program "CyberSociety" (http://cybersociety-semester.org), which was announced earlier, is approaching its first term. We are making steady progress about the program's details and the specifics of the affiliation with Eötvös University in Budapest. We have formed agreements with teaching staff and secured the elements of the infrastructure.

This is a 2nd call for students for the 2012 Spring Semester.

Application deadline is November 15. For application details, consult the homepage at http://cybersociety-semester.org

The CyberSociety semester deals with innovative approaches in the social sciences. Besides sociology and social science majors susceptible to learn and adopt computational methods, the program expects physics, computer science, mathematics and different science majors with an interest to apply modeling and quantitative tools to social phenomena.

Please help us by advertising the program, contacting colleagues, students and administrators.

We are looking forward to a successful program!
Thank you for your support,

Best regards,

George Kampis and Peter Erdi,
Directors, BSCS

Research Assistant Job Announcement

2011-09-14T16:57:00.000-07:00

San Francisco Office

Who We Are: Harder+Company Community Research is a consulting firm whose mission is to strengthen the social sector by providing organizations with the information and tools they need to do their work effectively. Founded in 1986, our firm now has offices in San Francisco, Davis, Los Angeles, and San Diego, California. Our clients include nonprofits, foundations, and public agencies—and cover a wide range of topics including arts and culture, child welfare, education, health, human services, and philanthropy. For these diverse clients, we conduct needs assessments, evaluate programs and funding initiatives, and facilitate strategic planning and community engagement projects, among other services. For more information about our firm, visit our website: www.harderco.com.

Who We Need: Harder+Company seeks a Research Assistant in its San Francisco office to provide support on a diverse array of team-based research projects. The Research Assistant will be responsible for literature reviews; planning and assisting with focus groups; conducting interviews; entering, coding, and analyzing data; administering surveys; and assisting with the preparation and editing of reports. Some travel within California necessary. The ideal candidate would contribute to the diversity of Harder+Company and enjoy contributing to the effectiveness of organizations working for social change.

Position Responsibilities:

Assist with quantitative and qualitative primary data collection including interviews, focus groups, case studies, and surveys. May include assisting with the facilitation of focus groups.
Manage logistics for focus groups, case studies, surveys, and external meetings.
Enter data, prepare and label SPSS data files for analysis and reporting. Analyze survey data, including frequencies, cross-tabulations, means tables, and tests of statistical significance.
Conduct literature reviews and internet research.
Maintain communication with project team through emails and team meetings as needed.
Manage resources and time effectively and adjust to changing demands and priorities.
Assist with preparation of reports and presentations, including write-ups, editing, tables, charts, and formatting.
Maintain positive and professional interactions with clients and their stakeholders.
Skills, Qualifications & Experience:
Bachelor’s degree in social sciences or related field
At least 1 year of research experience, preferably outside the classroom
Demonstrated understanding of quantitative and qualitative research methods
Excellent critical thinking and problem-solving skills
Excellent writing and oral communications skills
Detail oriented with effective time management skills
Excellent interpersonal skills
Experience working with diverse populations
Ability to be an effective team player and to work independently
Bilingual preferred, but not required

This position is full time with an annual starting salary of $35,000 to $45,000 commensurate with experience.
Harder+Company offers a generous benefits package.

To apply: Send resume and cover letter to: jobs@harderco.com

Social Networks PhD Positions in Dublin

2011-09-13T18:35:00.000-07:00

The Dynamics Lab (http://geary.ucd.ie/dynamicslab) at UCD CASL and the Geary Institute in University College Dublin, in collaboration with the newly established IBM Dublin Research Lab (http://www-05.ibm.com/ie/ibm/overview2.html) , is seeking PhD candidates and postdoctoral fellows to work in the area of "Extreme Scale Social Network Simulations".

Sucessful candidate(s) are likely to have prior training in the computer and/or mathematical sciences or the business/social sciences combined with excellent computational skills.

The successful applicants will be funded by the IRCSET Enterprise Partnership Scheme. Interested candidates should send their CV by 20^th September 2011 to Dr Diane Payne at the Dynamics Lab, CASL and Geary Institute, UCD (Diane.Payne@ucd.ie) and Dr Georgios Theodoropoulos at IBM Dublin Research Lab (geortheo@ie.ibm.com).

For further information and enquiries please contact Dr Diane Payne (Diane.Payne@ucd.ie) and Dr Georgios Theodoropoulos (geortheo@ie.ibm.com)

General Overview

Social systems that need to be analyzed and modelled are becoming increasingly more complex in their structure and interdependencies. This coupled with the increasing capacity of scientific computation, as well as the various modelling techniques, challenges researchers to move towards extremely large scale social systems. Data are being collected and organized into databases at finer levels of granularity and these micro-data can now support individual-based simulations. Likewise computational power is advancing rapidly, so that researchers can now run large-scale micro-simulation models that would not have been computationally executable just a couple of years ago.

The Dynamics Lab at UCD, in collaboration with IBM, is particularly interested in exploring various ICT applications for research on governance and policy modelling within extremely large social networks. This collaboration links to IBM’s Exascale programme which has the aim to create and evaluate novel ideas to advance the design of extreme scale systems and applications.

Some potential areas for research focus include:

1. Social Networks and Distributed Collective Decision Making

2. Self-Organisation through Social Networks for Effective Emergency Response

3. Social Media, Civil Unrest and Collective Political Mobilisation

4. Political Blog Communication, Opinion Formation and Leadership

MIT Researchers Create New Urban Network Analysis Toolbox

2011-09-12T11:07:00.000-07:00

MIT Researchers Create New Urban Network Analysis Toolbox
MIT News (09/06/11) Caroline McCall

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers associated with CityForm Research Group have developed an Urban Network Analysis (UNA) toolbox that can help urban designers and planners describe the spatial patterns of cities using mathematical network analysis techniques. "Network centrality measures are useful predictors for a number of interesting urban phenomena," says MIT's Andres Sevtsuk. The new toolbox, which is an open source plug-in for ArcGIS, enables urban designers to compute five types of graph analysis measures on spatial networks, including reach, gravity, betweenness, closeness, and straightness. The tools utilize several features that make network analysis especially suited for urban street networks. The tools account for geometry and distances in the input networks, as well as incorporating buildings, which are used as the spatial units of analysis for all measures. The tools also allow buildings to be weighted based on their particular characteristics, such as volume, population, and general importance. In addition, the toolbox offers a set of analysis options to quantify how centrally each building is positioned in an urban environment and how easily a user can access different amenities from each location.
http://web.mit.edu/press/2011/urban-network-analysis.html

From ACM news via SOCNET via Barry Wellman

Sociology on Twitter

2011-09-11T14:23:00.000-07:00

You can use Twitter to follow the latest in the discipline of sociology. There's a consolidator called "This Week in Sociology" (@ThisWeekInSoc) or you can just track the hash tag #sociology. Tweets by the social theory class at Mills are marked #soc116.

2011-09-10T13:56:00.000-07:00

A graphic worth studying...

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/09/04/opinion/04reich-graphic/04reich-graphic-popup.jpg

Headline: America's Next Top Sociologist (from Slate)

2011-09-08T19:24:00.000-07:00

Reblog from Slate
America's Next Top Sociologist
A daylong photo shoot for Vogue pays only $150, women are like milk cartons, and other insights from the academic study of modeling.
By Libby Copeland
Posted Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2011, at 1:06 PM ET

Ashley Mears wrote a sociological study of fashion models after being oneThere's a long tradition among academics of embedding in an occupation to study it. In the middle of the last century, social psychologist Marie Jahoda worked in an English paper factory to learn about about the lives of factory girls. More recently, sociologist Loïc Wacquant studied boxers by becoming one, while Sudhir Venkatesh spent seven years with a gang in the Chicago projects. One academic worked as a cotton picker, another entered prison as an inmate. Ashley Mears embedded as a model. (Click for more...)

Old articles in JSTOR freed

2011-09-07T22:53:00.001-07:00

.@JSTOR Opens Up U.S. Journal Content From Before 1923: http://t.co/xIDzpgo "nearly 500,000 articles from more than 200 journals"” #soc116

Why study geography?

2011-09-07T22:38:00.000-07:00

Opportunity to Hear Robert Bellah at UCB

2011-08-24T16:27:00.000-07:00

COLLOQUIUM: “Where does Religion Come From?” Mon. Aug 29^th 2-3:30pm with a reception to follow (UC Berkeley – 402 Barrows Hall)

The Department of Sociology at UC Berkeley hosts Robert N. Bellah for their first colloquium of the semester. Bellah is Elliott Professor of Sociology Emeritus at Cal and awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Clinton in 2000. He will speak on the question, “Where does religion come from,” which is a central issue in his just published book, Religion in Human Evolution: From the Paleolithic to the Axial Age.

Bellah's new book just mentioned is a very ambitious project in the style of Durkheim's Elementary Forms. Were I not teaching, I'd be there!

Full student support for Trustworthy Computing Summer School

2011-06-01T16:35:00.000-07:00

Another bit of "what's out there..."

Full student funding for our trustworthy computing summer school is still available, providing for airfare, meals, and lodging! Based on the previous two years, students greatly appreciated and benefited from our program. We again have an exciting set of speakers:

> Boris Balacheff, HP
> Dave Challener, Johns Hopkins
> George Coker, USG
> Michael Donovan, HP
> Virgil Gligor, CMU
> David Grawrock, Intel
> Kari Ti Kostiainen, Nokia
> Fred Leong, USG
> Andrew Martin, Oxford University
> Jon McCune, CMU
> Liam O Murchu, Symantec
> Dimitrios Pendarakis, IBM
> Ron Perez, AMD
> Ariel Segall, MITRE
> Bob Thibadeau, Wave Systems
> Michael Wei, UCSD
>
Please forward this message to students who may be interested in attending. Hope to see you at TIW!

TIW 2011: Third Annual Trusted Infrastructure Workshop: Advanced Summer School on Architectures for Trustworthy Computing 19-23 June 2011, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh PA, USA http://www.cylab.cmu.edu/tiw

Co-located with TRUST conference 2011: http://www.trust2011.org 4th International Conference on Trust and Trustworthy Computing

REGISTRATION NOW OPEN - access directly or from event website https://web.campusservices.cmu.edu/conferences/registration.taf?ID=2011TIW

*** TIW Overview ***

When IT infrastructure technologies fail to keep pace with emerging threats, we can no longer trust them to sustain the applications we depend on in both business and society at large.

Ranging from Trusted Computing, to machine virtualization, new hardware architectures, and new network security architectures, and the challenges arising from the increasing ubiquity of sensitive operations on mobile devices, trusted infrastructure technologies attempt to place security into the very design of commercial off-the-shelf technologies.

The TIW is an open innovation event modeled as a highly interactive summer school, consisting of lectures, workshops, and other lab sessions. TIW is a collaboration between government, academia, and industry intended to benefit the cybersecurity research and development agenda by bringing together researchers in the field. It is aimed at bringing together researchers in the field of IT security with an interest in systems and infrastructure security, as well as MS or PhD students who are new to the field. Funding is available to support student attendance (see below).

We will have security leaders from academia, government, and industry providing lectures and leading discussions, labs, and research workshops.
>
> *** Agenda Highlights: Lots of new material vs. last year! ***
> - Plenary keynote lecture with TRUST 2011: 4th International
> Conference on Trust and Trustworthy Computing
> http://www.trust2011.org/
> Liam O Murchu - Reverse Engineering the Stuxnet Worm
> - Capture the Flag: hands-on, event-long competition leveraging trusted computing technologies
> - Combined gala dinner with TRUST 2011 attendees
> Learn about the very latest research in the area
> - Social outing: watch the Pittsburgh Pirates play baseball in the world-renowned PNC Park overlooking beautiful downtown Pittsburgh
> - Multiple technology lectures, research workshops, and hands-on labs.
> Learn more about open-source tools that can be used today
>
> For more details on the workshop and how to register, please visit
> http://www.cylab.cmu.edu/tiw

*** Full support student scholarships available! ***

Sponsors are providing student support in the form of scholarships to aid selected students to attend the workshop. The scholarship includes coverage of all costs of workshop attendance, including airfare (up to $500), lodging, and meals. Interested students should register online and include a brief statement detailing the reason why they would like to attend. While sponsorships are available in priority to students from US academia, a small number of sponsorships can will be given to foreign students, but may not cover full travel or visa fees.

TIW Sponsors:
>
> - Carnegie Mellon CyLab
> - NSF
> - HP Labs
> - Microsoft
> - Google
> - Wave Systems
>
> Contact:
>
> Registration / logistical details: Tina Yankovich
> Technical details: Jonathan McCune
>
> Venue:
>
> CyLab, Carnegie Mellon University
> CIC Building
> 4720 Forbes Avenue
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> _______________________________________________

Paid Summer Internship for Student with Programming Skills

2011-05-16T11:35:00.001-07:00

Possible job opportunity for a student with some programming skills…

http://www.missionanalyticsgroup.com/node/6

Summer Intern
Mission Analytics Group, Inc. is a new, non-advocacy policy consulting company based in San Francisco. We seek a smart, highly motivated undergraduate or graduate student to help our over-booked team this summer. This paid intern position can be structured to meet the abilities and interests of the selected candidate, but will focus in the areas of developmental disabilities, long-term care, HIV/AIDS or family services. The intern will work with an established team of researchers and analysts. Example responsibilities include statistical programming and data analysis, web-based research, literature review, proposal writing, and development of tables and reports. Skills in other areas such as website design (Drupal highly desirable), graphic design, copy-editing, or geographic information systems (GIS) are highly desirable.

Required Qualifications:

Coursework in economics, statistics, public policy, biostatistics, public health, or related subject
Excellent written and verbal communication skills
Expertise in Excel, PowerPoint, Word

Desirable Qualifications:

Background in one or more of the following areas: social services for children and youth, developmental disabilities, aging, Medicaid-funded long-term care (institutional and/or community-based)
Experience in policy research and evaluation or prior work in government
Experience in statistical programming using SAS or Stata

This is a full-time, temporary position. Time period to be determined, but is expected to fall between April and September. To apply, send cover letter and resume to jobs@Mission-AG.com. Cover letter should indicate preferred start and end dates. Mission Analytics Group runs pre-hire background checks, including employment verification and searches of criminal and civil records. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation or national origin.

Gender Bias, Social Stability, & Violence in China and India

2011-05-04T15:54:00.000-07:00

Two Important Social Theorists You May Not Have Met in SOC116

2011-04-30T10:41:00.000-07:00

Keynes vs. Hayek Round 2

This video is a part of a project called EconStories. I've been thinking about a similar project for sociology. Any takers?

Who is Reading Us?

2011-04-25T10:44:00.000-07:00

In the last 24 hours, we've had 40+ readers from:

Want to become a blogger at Sociology@Mills? Drop a line: danryan@mills.edu

Harold Garfinkel Dead at 92

2011-04-24T13:03:00.000-07:00

It has been reported (use of passive intentional -- I have not located any official announcement or obituary) that the sociologist Harold Garfinkel passed away this week at age 94. Garfinkel founded the school of thought known as "ethnomethodology," the study of the methods people use to account for everyday actions.

The founding text in the field is the 1967 collection Studies in Ethnomethology, an collection of case studies and theoretical essays. Perhaps the most famous of these is "Studies of the Routine Grounds of Everyday Activities."

Even students whose only exposure to sociology is an introductory course probably know of the most famous concept associated with Garfinkel: "breaching experiments" in which tacit and taken-for-granted rules of everyday interaction are exposed by breaking them (a sort of sociological Candid Camera). Facing in rather than out in an elevator may be the most well known (dozens of examples on You-tube).

Garfinkel studied with Talcott Parsons at Harvard in the late 1940s and early 1950s. During this time he encountered several recently immigrated European thinkers, including Alfred Schutz, from whom he learned about new ideas in social theory, psychology and, especially, phenomenology. His ethnomethodology developed somewhat in parallel with Schutz' work as two of the dominant branches in micro-sociology (the other being symbolic interactionism).

Garfinkel's career was spent at UCLA from which he retired in 1987. His most direct legacy today shows up in the fields of conversation analysis and related hyper-micro-sociologies. Many who work in the subfield of symbolic interaction would also cite his work. The painstakingly detailed observation of interaction also appears in research on product design, marketing, and human-machine interface design. His last book Toward a Sociological Theory of Information was published in 2008 but had been written in the 1950s.

Two New Posts at Sociology of Information Blog

2011-04-22T15:26:00.000-07:00

No Such Thing as Evanescent Data is about the "revelation" yesterday that iPhones, iPads, and likely other devices store geographic information.

Data Exhaust and Informational Efficiency is about a talk at the Palo Alto Research Center on the concept of "data exhaust" that has direct connections to what we do in the social sciences, interestingly, perhaps archaeology most of all.

Sample Job Ad for Using Sociology or Anthropology Degree

2011-04-17T10:01:00.000-07:00

A frequently asked question around here is "what kind of jobs are out there where I can use my sociology degree?" One answer is "research associate for an applied social science research organization." The ad below requires slightly more experience than you are likely to have upon graduating with a BA, but it gives you an idea of the repertoire of skills and experience employers like this are looking for.

For the record, I don't know anything about OMNI, but the list of skills and job activities here is pretty typical for research associate type jobs.

OMNI is an applied social science research and training/technical assistance nonprofit agency located in Denver, Colorado. OMNI promotes a diverse work environment and encourages individuals from all backgrounds to apply. OMNI routinely seeks candidates who are bilingual (Spanish and English-speaking) and who have experience working with Spanish-speaking populations.

OMNI Institute's mission is to contribute to a broader understanding of social issues, help improve the effectiveness of social programs and strategies, strengthen the larger nonprofit and public service infrastructures, and guide the adoption of more effective state and federal social policies through the provision of high-quality, client-centered social science research and evaluation, technical assistance and training services. OMNI is soliciting applications for a Research Associate II to join our staff and contribute to our efforts to improve social conditions through social science research and evaluation. The responsibilities of these positions will involve project management, independent research/evaluation, communication with clients, and oversight of work performed by research assistants, data managers and/or data entry specialists. Starting salary for this position is $38,810.

Research Associate II position has the following requirements:

A minimum of a BA/BS in a social sciences related field and 5 years experience in research is required. Completion of a Master's degree is preferred and can offset number of years of experience required.
Experience with project management is required. Experience with client management and staff supervision is preferred.
Experience with data management, cleaning and restructuring of data as well as a thorough understanding of basic descriptive and inferential statistics is preferred.
Applicants will be expected to work closely with community partners to collect, report, and use evaluation data. Prior experience is strongly preferred.
Applicants must have strong analytic, written and verbal communication skills.
Expertise in at least one of the following areas is required: evaluation methods; statistics; public health and/or epidemiology; substance use prevention; recruitment and collaboration; and data utilization and technical assistance.

OMNI Benefits include a comprehensive healthcare package, eligibility to participate in a 401(k) plan with an employer match, employee wellness program and a dynamic and progressive working environment. Interested persons should send a cover letter that specifies any salary requirements, two areas of expertise (as identified above), and experience in main areas of responsibility including research, project management, and staff supervision. Please include a resume outlining qualifications,work history, and references to:

OMNI Institute Attn:
Human Resources
899 Logan St., Suite 600
Denver, CO 80203-3156
(fax) 303-839-9420 -
Attn: Human Resources or jobs@omni.org (email).

OMNI is an applied social science research and training/technical assistance nonprofit agency located in Denver, Colorado. We have been providing clients with technically sound social science services since 1976. OMNI's client base includes governmental agencies, non-profit organizations, and private foundations. OMNI's experience cuts across many fields including community development, public health, early childhood and education, youth development, juvenile and criminal justice, and prevention and treatment of substance abuse. Visit us at www.omni.org.

Collaborate and put your social scientific insight to work?

2011-04-07T08:06:00.000-07:00

Innovation Exchange is a worldwide online community of innovators who can use the system to create teams to solve problems for rewards. Most of their "challenges" are about commercial products, others are about public awareness, a few are about public problems. All share the idea that they can be solved by Open Innovation, an idea to keep on your radar screen.

-- DJR (disclosure: I am on their advisory board, contributing ideas about how to form effective teams)


	Hi djjrjr,

The challenge 'Create an advertisement campaign for a small-size car' is ending - and they still need your help! Your idea captured in a 1-2 page document may be all it takes for you to claim this reward. If you have already submitted a solution and want to amend it with any additional information or insight, make sure you post your revised solution by April 15, 2011.
Regards,
IX Support Team

Create an advertisement campaign for a small-size car.

STATUS: Closing April 15, 2011
REWARD: $65,000 USD

Located in East Asia, this car manufacturing company is looking for an imaginative and persuasive advertisement campaign (TV and print) for its small-size class car. Ranked third in market share, this small-size car has some tough competition to overcome, but the company believes that an advertising campaign that is focused on enjoying good music on its car's premium sound system will set it apart from its competition. With this in mind, they want your great ideas for an advertisement campaign that is witty, sentimental, and sophisticated ... and they need your ideas very quickly!

Next Monday: Briggs on "Moving to Opportunity" at UCB Colloquium

2011-04-05T12:50:00.000-07:00

MONDAY April 11th
BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL
2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series
Spring 2011 Presents:

MOVING TO OPPORTUNITY: What a remarkable social experiment teaches us about theory, research methods and public policy

Xavier de Souza Briggs
Department of Sociology and Urban Planning, MIT
Associate Director of the Office of Management and Budget in the White House

Xav Briggs, who is on leave from MIT, is the only sociologist on President Obama’s senior domestic policy team at The White House. He will discuss lessons and implications of his new book, Moving to Opportunity: The Story of an American Experiment to Fight Ghetto Poverty. Moving to Opportunity tackles one of America's most enduring dilemmas: the unresolved question of how to overcome persistent ghetto poverty. Launched in 1994, the MTO program took a largely untested approach: helping families, on a voluntary basis, to move from high-poverty, inner-city public housing to low-poverty neighborhoods, some in the suburbs. The book's innovative, mixed-method approach emphasizes the voices and choices of the program's participants but also rigorously analyzes the changing structures of regional opportunity and constraint—in housing, education, the labor market, and more—that shaped the fortunes of those who "signed up," regardless of their goals, preferences and choices. It shines a light on the hopes, surprises, achievements, and limitations of a major social experiment, drawing on sociology, economics, social psychology, anthropology, and other disciplines. For all its ambition, MTO is a uniquely American experiment, and the book brings home its powerful lessons for policymakers and advocates, scholars, students, journalists, and all who share a deep concern for opportunity and inequality in our country.

Xavier de Souza Briggs is Associate Director of the Office of Management and Budget in the White House, overseeing a wide array of policy, budget, and management issues for roughly half the cabinet agencies—Commerce, Treasury, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Justice and Homeland Security—as well as the Small Business Administration, GSA, financial regulators, and other agencies. He is also an Associate Professor of Sociology and Urban Planning (on leave) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His latest book, with co-authors Sue Popkin and John Goering, is Moving to Opportunity: The Story of an American Experiment to Fight Ghetto Poverty (Oxford University Press, 2010).

FYI: Archaeology Summer School

2011-03-25T09:33:00.000-07:00

South Africa Paleontology, Paleoanthropology and Paleoecology Summer School through Arizona State

May 21–June 19, 2011 (6 credits)

The Institute of Human Origins in ASU's School of Human Evolution and Social Change, in conjunction with the Department of Archaeology, University of Cape Town (UCT), offers an internship focused on the west coast of South Africa. The ASU course co-coordinator is associate professor Kaye Reed, and the UCT course co-coordinator is Dr. Deano Stynder. In the program, students will learn about the ecology, paleoecology, and conservation of the unique habitat of this region; excavate 730,000-year-old fossils; and become familiar with the geology of the area.

For the first two weeks after arrival, you will attend lectures (along with UCT post-graduate students) in the analysis of African fauna at the University of Cape Town. During this time, you will reside in a conveniently located youth hostel and will have the opportunity to explore the sites and sounds of Cape Town on your own time. We leave for the field during the third week. For the next two weeks, we will excavate a newly discovered fossil locality (a series of paleo-hyena dens) that might date to the Middle Pleistocene. This locality is packed with faunal remains; it might even contain hominin remains (Homo heidelbergensis)! You will have ample opportunity to excavate and put into practice your newly acquired faunal identification skills! While in the field, we will live in a spacious house in the seaside village of Strandfontein. During the evenings, you will be expected to assist with the curation of the day's excavated finds and also to attend occasional lectures by staff and visitors.

Agenda

May 21-22: Arrive in Cape Town

May 23-June 3: Faunal lectures at the Department of Archaeology, University of Cape Town

June 4-18: Fieldwork at Cliff Point on the west coast of South Africa

June 19: Program ends

Coursework

Students will receive 6 credits of ASM 338: Anthropological Field Sessions for participation in this program.

Application Process

(Deadline to apply is April 1, 2011; decision made by April 22, 2011.)

Step 1
Students must submit their application, along with a 1-page, double-spaced statement explaining their academic background/goals, their research interests and why they are interested in participating in this fieldwork experience; they must also turn in an unofficial transcript (available through MyASU). Click here to download the application.

Step 2
Admitted students will be notified whether or not they are accepted into the internship by April 22. Once admitted, students will be required to sign up for the internship program through the Study Abroad office and pay a $100 application fee, which will go towards student health insurance while abroad.

Step 3
Students will sign up for 6 credits of ASM 338 Anthropological Field Sessions and attend a pre-departure orientation.

All materials should be handed to Lexi Shulla, the study abroad program assistant, in SHESC 233. Questions should be directed to shesc.global@asu.edu.

Costs

Below is a list of expected costs.

Program Time	32 Days
Application Deposit and Health Insurance	$120
Required # of Credit Hours	6
ASU In-State Tuition* ASU Out-of-State Tuition (6 credits)*	$2,665 OR $4,741
Health Insurance	Included
Passport	$130
Airfare	~$1,800
Program Fee (includes all accommodations, food while in the field, transportation to internship activities, laboratory supplies and training materials). This will be payable upon arrival at Cape Town.	$1,267
Recommended Allowance for Food while in Cape Town	$400
Recommended Allowance for Other Expenses (laundry, Internet, souvenirs and extra spending)	$400

*Based on 2009-2010 tuition, subject to change. Please check the tuition and fees schedule for the most up-to-date tution prices.

Call for applications opens soon. Places in the program are awarded in the order of application, so early application is always advised to be sure of securing a space.

LEXI SHULLA

Study Abroad Program Coordinator

School of Human Evolution and Social Change

College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Arizona State University | P.O. Box 872402 | Tempe, Arizona 85287-2402

480.965.1366 Fax: 480.965.7671 | e-mail: SHESC.Global@asu.edu

ASU School of Human Evolution and Social Change — Prepare to make a difference

SafeZONE Ally - asu.edu/safezone "Providing a safer, more receptive, and accepting campus climate for members of the LGBTQ Community at ASU"

Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail.

The Prospects for Peace and Democracy in Russia

2011-03-24T21:37:00.000-07:00

I'm guessing that none of us is going to be in Toronto next week, but thought some of you might find this interesting -- a bridging of the social capital literature, democratic revolutions (of recent decades and as we speak), peace and justice organizations, and new communication technologies. Book title link takes you to a talk and video.

Metta Spencer

Thursday March 31st

Dept of Sociology, U of Toronto, 725 Spadina Avenue, 1200-1:30

"The Prospects for Peace and Democracy in Russia"

Metta Spencer's new book, The Russian Quest for Peace and Democracy, is based mainly on hundreds of interviews between 1982 and 2010 that she conducted in Russia and Eastern Europe. It reflects not only the stories of leading members of Gorbachev's advisers, but also intellectuals and dissidents. Focusing on the remarkable interactions between Russian and foreign elites, especially during the Gorbachev years, it shows how markedly his democratic and peaceable political, foreign, and military policies came from Western peace workers. Because those transnational civil society organizations were obviously "bridging" groups (in Putnam's terminology) they were especially conductive to democracy. For twenty years, however, such associations have diminished-largely because Putin, to prevent a Russian color revolution, has blocked international political projects. For the sake of democratization, Spencer proposes that the new media (e.g. Skype) now be used to proliferate thousands of sustained transnational dialogues at the grassroots level.

DataONE Summer Internship Program: Open for Applications

2011-03-17T15:53:00.000-07:00

The Data Observation Network for Earth (DataONE) is a virtual organization dedicated to providing open, persistent, robust, and secure access to biodiversity and environmental data, supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation. DataONE is pleased to announce the availability of summer research internships for undergraduates, graduate students and recent postgraduates.

Program Structure

Up to eight interns will be accepted in 2011, each paired with one primary mentor and, in some cases, secondary mentors. Interns need not necessarily be at the same location or institution as their mentor(s). Interns and mentors are expected to have a face-to-face meeting at the beginning of the summer, and interns are encouraged to attend the DataONE All-Hands Meeting in the fall to present the results of their work. DataONE will pay all necessary travel expenses.

Schedule

March 15 - Application period opens
April 8 - Deadline for receipt of applications at midnight Pacific time
April 15 - Notification of acceptance. Scheduling of face-to-face kickoff meetings based on availability of interns and mentors
May 23 - Program begins*
June 27 - Midterm evaluations
July 29 - Program concludes
October 18-20 - DataONE All-Hands-Meeting, New Mexico (attendance encouraged)

* Allowance will be made for students who are unavailable during these date due to their school calendar.

Eligibility

The program is open to all undergraduate students, graduate students, and postgraduates who have received their masters or doctorate within the past five years. Given the broad range of projects, there are no restrictions on academic backgrounds or field of study. Interns must be at least 18 years of age by the program start date, must be currently enrolled or employed at a university or other research institution and must currently reside in, and be eligible to work in, the United States. Interns are expected to be available approximately 40 hours/week during the internship period (noted below) with significant availability during the normal business hours. Interns from previous years are eligible to participate.

Financial Support

Interns will receive a stipend of $4,500 for participation, paid in two installments (one at the midterm and one at the conclusion of the program). In addition, required travel expenses will be borne by DataONE. Participation in the program after the mid-term is contingent on satisfactory performance. The University of New Mexico will administer funds. Interns will need to supply their own computing equipment and Internet connection. For students who are not US citizens or permanent residents, complete visa information will be required, and it may be necessary for the funds to be paid through the student?s university or research institution. In such cases, the student will need to provide the necessary contact information for their organization.

Paid Internship for One with Top Quant Skills

2011-03-13T16:08:00.000-07:00

CrowdFlower, a venture-funded startup specializing in enterprise crowdsourcing, seeks a data quality intern for summer 2011. This person will work with our engineering and product teams to improve CrowdFlower's core platform by analyzing a large dataset. Candidates should be comfortable with basic programming, statistics, and ideally SQL.

Candidates will be expected to work 30-40 hours a week on site at CrowdFlower's office in San Francisco's Mission District. Intern positions are paid.

Projects may be similar to:

Running analysis to identify metrics that are predictive of worker quality
Running experiments on user interface changes
Running analysis to understand how the price paid to workers changes cost, accuracy and throughput

Contact Lukas Bergstrom at bergstrom@crowdflower.com with questions.

Strange Bedfellows: Anti-Pornography Feminists and Conservatives

2011-03-07T10:06:00.000-08:00

MONDAY March 7th

BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL

2:00-3:30pm

TODAY

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series

Spring 2011 Presents:

Strange Bedfellows: Anti-Pornography Feminists, Conservatives, and Social Movement Coalitions

Nancy Whittier

Department of Sociology

Smith College

The politics of sex and sexual violence are a site of interaction between unlikely allies, including feminists, conservative activists, and policy-makers. In this paper, I focus primarily on one instance of these interactions: opposition to pornography. Scholars of social movements puzzle over a putative coalition between anti-pornography feminists and conservatives, which appears to be an exception to the rule that coalitions require a basic level of ideological congruence. I use this case to argue that we need to think about coalitions and their consequences both more broadly and more precisely. I show how opposed groups with a shared similar goal interact with each other, distinguish between themselves and their opponent, influence each other, and disparately influence outcome depending on power, bureaucratic routines, and meaning-construction within the state. I argue, first, that movement representatives engaged in interaction only within state contexts, where outcomes were the product of complex meaning-making processes in which the parties are unequal in power. Second, the appearance of coalition with one’s enemies is politically risky and has substantial consequences for internal movement coalitions. In this case, the conflicts between feminists over pornography shaped later activism against violence against women. Finally, the case suggests a model of coalitions that distinguishes between rhetorical overlap and shared collective action, and between movements’ goals and the compromised outcomes they achieve.

Nancy Whittier is Professor of Sociology at Smith College and a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. She is the author of The Politics of Child Sexual Abuse: Emotion, Social Movements, and the State and Feminist Generations: The Persistence of the Radical Women’s Movement. This paper is drawn from a larger project on activism against sexual violence in the U.S. since 1980, focusing on interactions between feminists and conservatives, the gender and racial politics of sex crime policy, and the construction of meaning by activists within state contexts.

Five Tips for Getting a Job with your Social Science Degree

2011-03-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

Carol Ellick and Joe Watkins,
Five Tips for Getting a Job with your Social Science Degree
Informal brownbag lunch talk
Monday, March 7, 12:30-1:30

TODAY
Mills Hall 135

Two applied anthropologists, Carol Ellick, President of the consulting firm Archaeological and Cultural Education Consultants, and Joe Watkins, Chair of Native American Studies at University of Oklahoma, will be at Mills for this informal brownbag lunch talk next Monday. Ellick and Watkins are authors of The Anthropology Graduate’s Guide, to be published this month by Left Coast Press, Inc. Their talk should be of interest not just to anthropology majors, but to all those graduating with social science and related degrees. Come with your questions. For more information Mitch Allen, Anthropology/Sociology, mallen@mills.edu

Panel Discussion at Hastings: Wikileaks and Open Government

2011-03-04T12:06:00.000-08:00

SPECIAL LIBRARIES ASSOCIATION SAN FRANCISCO BAY REGION CHAPTER &
NORTHERN CALIFORNIA ASSOCIATION OF LAW LIBRARIES

Present

Sunshine Week Local Wikileaks Panel and 2011 National Webcast : The Road Forward on Open Government

Where: UC Hastings College of the Law
Classroom B
198 McAllister, San Francisco, CA 94102
Directions: http://www.uchastings.edu/about/directions/index.html

When: Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Sunshine Week is a national initiative to open a dialogue about the importance of open government and freedom of information. The Special Libraries Association, San Francisco Bay Region Chapter and the Northern California Association of Law Libraries will present the Sunshine Week 2011 National Webcast and a local Wikileaks panel.

The SLA/NOCALL sponsored event will feature a local panel of speakers discussing WikiLeaks as it relates to (and provides an alternative to) our current concepts of Open Government, as well as the bigger picture impact of WikiLeaks on the ways we access information. Confirmed panelists include:

Declan McCullagh, chief political correspondent for CNET, award-winning journalist, and frequent writer and speaker about technology, law, and politics. From 1998 to 2002, Declan was Wired's Washington bureau chief.
Rainey Reitman, Electronic Frontier Foundation’s activism lead. Her work focuses on WikiLeaks and the intersection between personal privacy and technology, particularly social networking privacy, locational privacy and online data brokers. She serves as a steering committee member for the Bradley Manning Support Network.
James Jacobs, Government Documents Librarian at Stanford and one of the founders of the Free Government Information blog (http://freegovinfo.info/).

The 2011 Sunshine Week National Webcast, The Road Forward on Open Government, will focus on the Obama Administration's commitment "to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government" by examining how this commitment is being put into practice -- from both a policy and a technical standpoint -- and what more the Administration can and should be expected to do to meet its goal.

The first panel will cover the policy aspects of the Administration's Open Government Initiative. Panelists include:

David S. Ferriero, Archivist of the United States (confirmed)
Gary Bass, Executive Director, OMB Watch (confirmed)
Steven P. Croley, Special Assistant to the President for Justice and Regulatory Policy, White House Domestic Policy Council

The second panel will discuss the effect technology has on the way people get and use information, how the government is trying to fill that need, and the strengths and limitations of the Administration's approach. Panelists include:

Jennifer LaFleur, Director of Computer-Assisted Reporting at ProPublica (confirmed)
Tom Lee, Director of Sunlight Labs at the Sunlight Foundation (confirmed)
Sheila Krumholz, Executive Director of the Center for Responsive Politics (confirmed)
Todd Park, Chief Technology Officer U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Agenda:

5:30—6:00       Registration and Networking
6:00—7:00        Local Wikileaks Panel
7:00—8:30        National Webcast

Menu: Assorted sandwiches, cookies, and salad. Please indicate if you prefer a vegetarian or vegan meal.

Cost: $20 for SLA and NOCALL members, $25 for non-members and guests, and $15 for students, retired, and unemployed.

DEADLINE: Please register online or mail your check by March 22, 2011

Online registration: http://units.sla.org/chapter/csfo/calendar/regform_2011_sunshine.html

(Note: You do not need a PayPal account to register through this PayPal-administered site.)

Prosocial Preferences and the Social Science of Sophomores

2011-03-01T17:55:00.000-08:00

Did We Overestimate the Role of Social Preferences? The Case of Self-Selected Student Samples

Abstract:

Social preference research has received considerable attention among economists in recent years. However, the empirical foundation of social preferences is largely based on laboratory experiments with self-selected students as participants. This is potentially problematic as students participating in experiments may behave systematically different than non-participating students or non-students. In this paper we empirically investigate whether laboratory experiments with student samples misrepresent the importance of social preferences. Our first study shows that students who exhibit stronger prosocial inclinations in an unrelated field donation are not more likely to participate in experiments. This suggests that self-selection of more prosocial students into experiments is not a major issue. Our second study compares behavior of students and the general population in a trust experiment. We find very similar behavioral patterns for the two groups. If anything, the level of reciprocation seems higher among non-students suggesting that results from student samples might be seen as a lower bound for the importance of prosocial behavior.

Source: Institute for the Study of Labor

Download full pdf publication | Link to online abstract

Thanks to Tricia at Resource Connection

Gender and Social Networking, Part 7b

2011-03-01T17:39:00.000-08:00

from The New York Times
Keeping Women Safe Through Social Networking

By JOE SHARKEY Published: February 28, 2011

EVERY female business traveler I know concedes that she has experienced at least some kind of sexual harassment on the road. Usually it’s verbal, though sometimes it’s physical.

But rarely is it reported — not to the authorities and not at the office, where a woman who talks about harassment on a business trip may worry about being marked as a problem traveler.

Now, though, something new and aggressive is being done to publicly address street harassment of women. It’s a movement driven by young women in the United States and abroad who are using social networking and crowd sourcing to shine a light on the issue and organize support for doing something about it.

Street harassment of women has been around “probably since the advent of streets,” said Emily May, 29, the co-founder of Ihollaback.org, a Web site that encourages women to share stories and provide data about harassment so they can map locations where it occurred. READ MORE

Conservatives and Universities

2011-02-28T09:07:00.000-08:00

MONDAY February 28th

BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL

2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series

Spring 2011 Presents:

The Institutional Making of the Modern Day Conservative:How Universities Influence Right-Leaning Styles

Amy Binder

Department of Sociology

University of California, San Diego

College plays a critical role in establishing and elaborating the worldviews and public performances of political actors. But while scholars know a good deal about progressive politics on campus, they know considerably less about college student conservatism. This paper compares the political styles of conservative students in two university systems—Eastern Elite University and Western Public University—and finds them to be markedly different. The authors locate the experiences of politically active conservative college students in a number of organizational structures, each of which provides additional layers of meaning to students’ unfolding political sensibilities. We find that students are active agents in their cultivation of political styles, but that they are also enabled and constrained in their individual proclivities by the organizational resources and cultural repertoires available to them on their campuses. We argue that styles of campus conservatism are much more than the result of “natural inclinations” that students bring with them to college—a simple mirror of students’ social class origins or early political expression. Rather, we contend that these dispositions are developed on campus—they are organizational products, which are built up through multiple interactions of shared culture.

Amy Binder is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of California San Diego and a 2010-2011 Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. Her primary areas of research are in the sociology of culture, education, social movements, and organizations. She is co-authoring Creating Conservatism: How Campuses Shape Political Discourse and Style with Kate Wood, a graduate student at UC San Diego

44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

2011-02-27T23:02:00.000-08:00

44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

Elliot Liebow, left, in a family photo taken during the 1960s, grew up in Washington and wrote "Tally's Corner," above.

Sunday, February 27, 2011

In college, I read Elliot Liebow's classic book "Tally's Corner: A Study of Negro Streetcorner Men." Where exactly was the street corner that he wrote about?

- Christine Helms, Washington
According to many sources, it was Ninth and P streets NW. Except Answer Man happens to know it wasn't. We'll get to its true location in a moment, but first, have you read "Tally's Corner"?

Answer Man hadn't. It's a remarkable book, an academic work - it grew out of Liebow's doctoral thesis - that isn't dry or boring. It's an in-depth look at a group of men who routinely hung out on a Washington street corner in the early 1960s. These are poor men, flawed men, unemployed and underemployed men. But they are treated with respect. And although Liebow used pseudonyms, giving the men such names as Tally, Sea Cat, Richard and Leroy, they come across as flesh-and-blood individuals. When "Tally's Corner" was published in 1967, the New York Times called it "a valuable and even surprising triumph." The late senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.) called it "nothing short of brilliant."

READ MORE

The Last Monarchy: The Inevitable Fall of Hierarchy and the Birth of the Intelligent Organization

2011-02-25T16:44:00.000-08:00

Palo Alto Research Center (formerly known as Xerox PARC) is ground zero for innovations in technology that characterize modern life (it's where the computer mouse was invented). They have a number of free lecture series very much worth going to. It's just over an hour from Mills, very straightforward drive.

DATE: Thursday, March 3

TIME: The talk will take place from 6:00-7:00pm, with networking (including light refreshments) beginning at 5:30

SHARE THIS: http://bit.ly/i2DuaO

WHO: Greg McKeown, Wall Street Journal Bestselling Author

WHAT: The Last Monarchy: The Inevitable Fall of Hierarchy and the Birth of the Intelligent Organization

How smart is your team? Have you ever been on a team where the individuals were intelligent but the team was unintelligent? While each team member could solve problems and learn quickly, did the team struggle in adapting to new realities to achieve its objectives? In this talk, I will share key bottlenecks that restrict smart people from creating smart organizations, as well as five concrete strategies for creating smarter teams.

WHERE: Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), a Xerox company | 3333 Coyote Hill Road | Palo Alto | CA | 94304

ABOUT THE SPEAKER: Greg McKeown is headquartered in Silicon Valley, where he works as a strategy advisor and executive coach to senior executives and their teams, as well as teaches around the world. He most recently worked with or taught groups at Apple, Google, Facebook, Salesforce.com, Symantec, and Twitter. He has conducted significant research in the fields of collective intelligence, leadership, and human systems, and is the co-author of the Wall Street Journal Bestseller Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter; Harvard Business Review article, Bringing out the Best in Your People; and Ivey Business Journal article, Are You An Accidental Diminisher? Prior to this research and teaching, Greg worked for Heidrick & Struggles' GlobalLeadership Practice assessing senior executives around the world. His work included a year-long project for Mark Hurd (then CEO of Hewlett Packard) assessing the top 300 executives at HP.

Greg holds a B.S. in Journalism and an MBA from Stanford University. Originally from London, England, he now lives in Menlo Park, California with his wife, Anna, and their four children.

Student Volunteers for Pacific Soc Meetings in Seattle Next Month

2011-02-20T09:54:00.000-08:00

I don't know how current this request for help is, but if you are going, you might want to contact Ms. Burdsall. -- Dan

Student Volunteers for PSA Registration Table

STUDENT VOLUNTEERS NEEDED TO HELP AT REGISTRATION IN SEATTLE
If you are a graduate or undergraduate student, please consider volunteering to help staff the PSA registration table during the annual meeting in Seattle. In return for three hours of volunteer time, PSA will waive the 2011 membership dues of $15 as well as the $20.00 registration fee for the meeting. We will need several volunteers during the following PSA Registration times.
March 10th Thursday, 8 am to 7 pm.
March 11 Friday 8 am to 5 pm.
March 12th Saturday 8 am to 4 pm.
If you are interested, please contact Tina Burdsall, Portland State Univ. at tdb@pdx.edu

Web Science Academy this Summer in Germany

2011-02-06T10:59:00.000-08:00

Web Science Summer Academy - Koblenz 2011

http://summeracademy.uni-koblenz.de/webscience

Nothing like the Web has ever happened in all of human history. The Web is the largest human information construct in history. The scale of its impact and the rate of its adoption are unparalleled. If we are to ensure that the Web benefits the human race we must do our best to understand it, engineer its future and ensure its social benefit. Web Science is the new interdisciplinary field targeting these objectives. The *Web Science Summer Academy* offers a unique combination of 8 courses in Web Science. The courses cover socio-economic as well as computer science subjects. All courses award 3 ECTS credits for transfer to home institutions upon passing exams or assignments.

Following the Web Science Conference in Koblenz, http://websci11.org, June 15-17, all courses will be held in English in a 4 weeks period between June 27th to July 22nd in the same venue.

Join Web Science Summer Academy and:

explore interdisciplinary facets of web science.
earn credit points for your studies at your home institution.
meet a lot of interesting people.
have fun enjoying a variety of social events.
if you want: acquire basic skills in the German language.

Courses

Socio-Economic Mini-Track

Social Web and Bibliometry (Prof. York Sure)
eParticipation (Prof. Maria Wimmer)
Entrepreneurial Design Thinking (Prof. von Korflesch)

Engineering Track

Semantic Web (Dr. Sergej Sizov)
Web Retrieval (Dr. Thomas Gottron)
Web Engineering (Prof. Ebert)
Mobile Application Systems (Prof. Hampe)
Security for Mobile Applications (Prof. Grimm)

Participation in Courses

We recommend participants to register for two or three courses. If you apply for three courses (or even more) please consider the amount of work and exams you will have to master in a rather limited period of time.

A good command of English is required to successfully participate in the courses.

Registration fee per course amounts to 175 Euro (late registration: 200 Euro), which includes the course materials. Students from Partner Universities of the Department of Computer Science of the University of Koblenz-Landau will receive fee waivers.

Traveling and Accommodation

Located at the banks of the rivers Rhine and Mosel, at the heart of Europe, and with only 1 hour distance to three international airports, Koblenz is easy to reach from anywhere.

The Summer Academy offers various accommodations for a low price. You may apply for a sponsor-subsidized accommodation.

The Web Science Summer Academy is held as part of the Summer Academy of University of Koblenz-Landau.

Please find more details about the (Web Science) Summer Academy on our website:

http://summeracademy.uni-koblenz.de/webscience

Contact

University of Koblenz-Landau
Campus Koblenz
Universitätsstrasse 1

56070 Koblenz, Germany
Email: summerac@uni-koblenz.de

Honest Brokers: The Politics of Expertise and the “Who Lost China” Debate

2011-01-31T08:45:00.000-08:00

TODAY! MONDAY January 31 TODAY!

BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL

2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series Spring 2011 Presents:

Honest Brokers: The Politics of Expertise and the “Who Lost China” Debate

Gary Alan Fine, Sociology, Northwestern University

Complex social system requires knowledge specialists who provide information that political actors rely on to help solve political challenges or social problems. But what happens in the aftermath of advice that is considered incorrect or harmful? In such circumstances, how do communities of experts preserve their reputation in the face of charges of incompetence or maliciousness? To examine challenges to expert reputations and their defense we examine the debate in the early 1950s over "Who Lost China?," the congressional attempt to assign responsibility for the fall of the Nationalist regime to the Communists. Using a "strong case," we examine the political battles that surrounded the motives of Professor Owen Lattimore of Johns Hopkins University. For epistemic authority an expert must be defined as competent (having a legitimated background), influential (providing consequential information), and innocent (claiming epistemic neutrality). Following from this structure of expertise, we analyze two forms of reputational attack: smears (an oppositional presentation of a set of linked and critical claims) and degradation ceremonies (the institutional awarding of stigma). Smears appear when reputational rivals lack authority, whereas the degradation ceremony operates in conjunction with institutional control. They have different relations to systems of power. Policy experts hope for control over an autonomous realm of knowledge, but when these claims conflict with institutional needs, their position may be undercut.

Gary Alan Fine is the John Evans Professor of Sociology at Northwestern University. He is currently a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in Social Psychology, and is known for his research on small group culture, ethnographic studies of leisure and work, rumor and gossip, and political reputations. He is the author of Difficult Reputations: Collective Memories of the Evil, Inept and Controversial; The Global Grapevine: Why Rumors of Terrorism, Immigration, and International Trade Matter; and Kitchens: The Culture of Restaurant Work. His current research includes a study of competitive chess, a theoretical analysis of small group culture, and an examination of political reputation in the civil-rights era South.

Who now reads Friedan?

2011-01-21T12:49:00.000-08:00

A review of Stephanie Coontz' (teaches history and family studies at Evergreen State College) new book on the reception and effects of The Feminine Mystique appears in next Sunday's NYT Book Review.

BOOKS

Mad Women

By REBECCA TRAISTER

Published: January 20, 2011

Halfway through “A Strange Stirring,” the social historian Stephanie Coontz — parsing the reception of “The Feminine Mystique,” Betty Friedan’s 1963 examination of middle-class female repression and despair — confesses to feeling some ambivalence over Friedan’s project, and hence her own.

Acknowledging the working-class and minority women left out of Friedan’s best seller, Coontz admits that while it is “pointless to construct a hierarchy of who hurt more,” her own initial reaction to Friedan’s elite scope “was to dismiss the pain of the middle-class housewives as less ‘real’ than that of their working-class sisters.”

READ MORE...

See also
Coontz, Stephanie. "Why 'Mad Men' is TV's most feminist show." The Washington Post, Sunday 10 October, 2010

Computing and Social Science Position at Bowdoin

2011-01-18T13:11:00.000-08:00

Bowdoin College invites applications for a Laboratory Associate & Programmer to work in the department of Sociology and Anthropology. The lab associate is responsible for the day-to-day operation of the Social Network Innovation Lab. He/she will be expected to understand data scraping techniques for integrating disparate data systems from online virtual communities. The position requires participation in an application development team environment which includes undergraduate students. Opportunities to publish papers with students and faculty are also possible depending on experience. One or more of the following duties may be required, depending on project circumstances: MySQL Database Administration; writing programs in Java, PHP and Structured Query Language (SQL); software architecture, design and production; web services design and administration; and/or exporting data for use in statistical analysis. This is approximately a three-year grant-funded position; the position will exist only so long as grant funds are able to support it fully.

Requirements: A Bachelor's degree in computer science/quantitative social science/related discipline, or higher or specific equivalent experience, is required. Applicants must possess excellent written and oral communication skills and problem solving skills, knowledge of working with MySQL, Linux, web-based APIs, and the ability to work independently and to work in a small team environment. Knowledge of at least one object-oriented programming language is also required. Familiarity with JSON, knowledge of data scraping, and familiarity with regular expressions preferred. A demonstrated portfolio of programming work, either in academic or industry settings, is required. Experience in basic statistics (including running correlations and generating statistical graphs), experience with working with undergraduate students, research experience (at a postgraduate level) strongly preferred.

This position is subject to a criminal history background check.

To apply, please visit https://careers.bowdoin.edu
<https://careers.bowdoin.edu/> and complete an online application for the position. Paper or emailed applications for this position will not be accepted. If you have any questions about this process, please call 207-725-3923 or email careers@bowdoin.edu. Bowdoin College is committed to equality through affirmative action, and is an equal opportunity employer.

Mills Alumna to Speak at UCB Sociology Colloquium

2011-01-18T10:48:00.000-08:00

MONDAY January 24th
BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL
2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series
Spring 2011 Presents:

How Poverty Became Capital: Millennial Modernity and its Discontents

Ananya Roy
Department of City and Regional Planning
University of California, Berkeley

The start of the new millennium has been marked by the emergence of a remarkable global conscience about poverty. In this talk, Ananya Roy examines the shift from the "end of history" to the "end of poverty." In particular, she shows how experiments with "bottom billion capitalism" are central to millennial modernity and its frameworks of global liberalism. The world's bottom billion, now imagined as microentrepreneurs, constitute the new frontiers of global finance capital. By focusing on a highly popular development technology, microfinance, Roy outlines how such bottom billion markets are constructed in various regions of the world. However, the enterprise of converting poverty into capital is fraught with contradictions. Drawing on several years of ethnographic research conducted in the circuits of finance capital and in the circuits of expertise, Roy emphasizes the limits of such forms of subprime accumulation. From the World Bank to the Grameen Bank, from Citigroup to Hezbollah, she traces the counter-practices, contestations, and ruptures that haunt the making of millennial modernity.

Ananya Roy is Professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of California, Berkeley, where she teaches courses in the fields of comparative urban studies and international development. Roy also serves as Co-Director of the Global Metropolitan Studies initiative and as Chair of the newly established undergraduate minor in Global Poverty and Practice. Roy is the author of City Requiem, Calcutta: Gender and the Politics of Poverty and most recently of Poverty Capital: Microfinance and the Making of Development. The research for the latter was funded by a National Science Foundation grant. She is currently completing a book, edited with Aihwa Ong, titled Worlding Cities: Asian Experiments and the Art of Being Global.

ICPSR Summer Undergraduate Internship Program -- 2011

2011-01-17T20:40:00.000-08:00

ICPSR Summer Undergraduate
Internship Program -- 2011

The Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), the world's largest archive of digital social science data, is now accepting applications for its annual summer internship program. ICPSR is a unit within the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. ICPSR's data are the foundation for thousands of research articles, reports, and books. Findings from these data are put to use by scholars, policy analysts, policy makers, the media, and the public.

Interns spend ten weeks from June 7 - August 13, 2011, at ICPSR (Ann Arbor, Michigan), during which they will:

· Work in small groups and with faculty mentors to complete research projects resulting in conference-ready posters

· Gain experience using statistical programs such as SAS, SPSS, and Stata to check data, working in both UNIX and Windows environments

· Attend courses in the ICPSR Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research

· Participate in a weekly Lunch and Lecture series that covers topics related to social science research and professional development.

Compensation:
$3,000 - $5000* stipend, room and partial-board in university housing, and a scholarship covering the cost of fees, texts, and materials for coursework in the ICPSR Summer Program.

Application Procedure:
Interested individuals should submit a cover letter of interest, resume or CV, two letters of recommendation, list of relevant courses, and contact information for the required two professional or faculty references (that may be submitted under separate cover) to:
ICPSR Human Resources, Attn: Summer Internship Program, P.O.Box 1248, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106-1248
Email: careers@icpsr.umich.edu
Applications due by February 15, 2011.

* Stipend amount and citizenship requirement pending funding from the National Science Foundation's Research Experience for Undergraduates program.

Check us out on Facebook and Twitter!
Qualifications:

Undergraduate standing and completion of sophomore year in a social science major, with interests related to one of ICPSR's Thematic Collections
Strong academic credentials
Knowledge of a statistical software package such as SPSS, SAS, or Stata
Previous experience with social science research via work or class project
Demonstrated leadership, problem solving, and strong verbal and written communication skills
Ability to prioritize tasks, work on multiple assignments at once, and manage ambiguity
Ability to work both independently and as part of a team with professionals at all levels
Expected graduation of Dec. 2011 or later
United States citizenship or permanent residency*

www.icpsr.umich.edu/ICPSR/careers

Kaplan Test Prep Books Free Today at Amazon

2011-01-13T10:19:00.000-08:00

Apparently, today, Amazon.com is offering all the E-book versions of Kaplan test prep books for free. No need to have a Kindle, you can use the E-book on a Mac or PC. Get your prep books for free

Senior Seminar Class 2010 Pre-Celebrates Thesis Finishings

2010-12-16T14:25:00.000-08:00

Corks popped to celebrate the end of the thesis journey for the sociology senior seminar class of 2010 on Tuesday 14 December. It was one day before manuscripts were due -- making these smiles all the more amazing. Not a drop of "one-day-to-go anxiety" in the house!

L to R Kerri Thorp, Dawn Liu, Charli Prete, Lili Mano, Dan Ryan, Meredith Wensel,
Melody Sage, Erika Honan. Back: Sarah Martin, Kali Berg, Ariunaa Thomas

After champagne, (no real pain for this crowd), crostini, pizza, and salad it was time to blow out a symbolic candle on a cake that featured a very real Hayward fault running right through the middle. Consensus was reached that this crack in the cake was symbolic of absolutely nothing. The titles and abstracts of theses submitted so far appear below. Congrats to members of the class of 2011 (and especially to those who are December grads : Kerri! and Melody!).

MONGOLIAN IMMIGRANTS IN THE BAY AREA
A STUDY OF GENDER ROLE AND THE ASSIMILATION PROCESS

Ariunaa Baatarkhuu Thomas

This is a qualitative study which explores Mongolian immigrants’ experience living in the United States by using in-depth interviews to generate narratives. These in depth interviews were conducted between October and November 2010 with 10 (5 female and 5 male) Mongolian immigrants who live in the Bay Area. The participants were recruited by using the “snowball sampling” method. The main focus of the project is to reveal the importance of gender role differences in the assimilation process. The participants were asked about the topics ranging from family, occupation and their immigration experience. I hypothesized that Mongolian women would experience easier assimilation than Mongolian men because of the residual effects of Mongolian traditional patriarchal society. However, the immigration experiences described by my ten participants suggest that there is only a slight difference between Mongolian women's and men's assimilation.

TWO WAYS TO RECLAIM AND RE-IMAGINE RADIO: A COMPARATIVE ETHNOGRAPHY OF RADIO ARCO IRIS AND FREE RADIO SANTA CRUZ

Melody Sage

This research is a comparative ethnography of two Free Radio stations, one in Santa Cruz, CA, USA and one in Jalapa Del Marquez, Oaxaca, Mexico. In light of mass corporate consolidation of radio stations on a global level, Free Radio stations have arose to re-imagine radio as a community tool. Compared here are the philosophies, goals, programming, and organizational structure of two such stations. The data were collected using a collaborative, public interest ethnography method.

TODAY’S MEDICINE: A LOOK AT MODERN AND ALTERNATIVE CHOICES

A Study of Motivation and Medicine

Erika Honan

This paper deals with the differing worlds of alternative and modern, scientifically based medical treatment. Using the scientific method, modern day medical treatment has cured and treated multitudes of disease. Even with all of the advances in the modern world, doctors and scientists, can, at times fall short of satisfying the needs and desires for wellness and comfort.

MEDICALIZATION OF CHILDBIRTH:

THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN A DIALECTIC STRUGGLE

Lillian Mano

Childbirth is a battleground. This research examines female participation and interactions with medicalization and the ultimate medical outcomes through the lens of childbirth. Included is discussion of the historical transition from midwife and female dominated childbirth practices to the medically dominated and professionalized childbirth practices experienced today. This research challenges the generally accepted notion that male domination and the exclusion of women from medical knowledge is the root cause of this shift. The contest waged between women and medicine has been a dialectical struggle which has ultimately defined each transition in childbirth.

A QUALITATIVE COMPARISON OF LESBIAN AND HETEROSEXUAL FEMALE CROSS-PLAYERS
WITHIN THE BOYS’ LOVE COMMUNITY

Meredith Wensel

This study focuses on a recently formed subculture that has developed around a genre of Japanese animation and comic books popularly known boys’ love (BL). Scholarly and popular writings about BL usually examine the evolution of the genre and theorize about its meanings for women; I chose to focus on cross-play and role-play, two of the BL community’s central activities. I compared the interests and activities of heterosexual and lesbian participants to determine whether sexual orientation would predict differences between them. The data that I collected from BL community participants did not support my original hypothesis that there would be some significant variation between the two groups. Using respondents’ coded data to analyze the intersection of cross-play and role-play, I identified four ideal types of cross-players: informal, performance, part-time, and full-time players. While this was empirically interesting, the only verifiable comparison that I can make about my two groups based on the data is that lesbian cross-players in the BL community are more likely to role-play than their heterosexual counterparts.

NEW ROLES: FAMILIES OF CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES

A Study of Families of Multiple Children with Disabilities and Role Theory

Dion “Charli” Prete

This study analyzes the parental and sibling roles, changes of self-identity, and the impact of stigma and social identity in families of children with disabilities in the immediate family unit. First, this study focuses on the basics of the sociology of the family. Second, it explores the general knowledge, history, and statistics of disability in the United States. Finally, it concludes with an analysis of the sociology of families of children with disabilities and the impact on parents and siblings. Our analysis will include how stigma, Goffman’s Impression Management Theory and Social Identity Theory play an important role in understanding the family dynamics of children with disabilities. This study uses secondary analysis of data collected in previous research on family dynamics, roles and structure of families of children with disabilities. These studies focus on all types of disabilities, chronic illnesses, complex and continuing health needs.

ASA Moves Annual Meeting from Chicago to Who Knows Where

2010-12-15T10:25:00.000-08:00

This just in from ASA. Note that the theme of this year's annual meeting is "Conflict: Multiple Dimensions and Arenas." A change in location might make it easier for some of you to attend.

Dear Colleagues:

I know that many of you who have been following the news about stalled labor contract negotiations in Chicago are wondering about our 2011 Annual Meeting. A very protracted labor dispute between the service workers of UNITE HERE Local 1 and Chicago hotels has been taking place and there is no sign of an end. We have been concerned for some time that the uncertainty of a union agreement will adversely affect the ASA 2011 Annual Meeting.

The contracts between Chicago union hotels and UNITE HERE expired August 31, 2009. Since that time, there have been 11 bargaining sessions but contract negotiations are stalled. We have waited as long as possible to see if the contract situation would be resolved in deference to the importance of Chicago as a venue to the 2011 program. Without any resolution clearly in sight, the ASA Council voted unanimously to move the meeting from Chicago because ASA cannot guarantee that the facilities and environment necessary for our scholarly deliberations will be available.

Acting on Council 's decision which was made this past weekend, the Association has notified the host hotels in Chicago that, under these circumstances, we will not hold our meeting there this coming August. ASA will incur no major contractual costs for pulling out of Chicago in 2011.

An alternative site for the 2011 Annual Meeting has not yet been selected. ASA is exploring several possibilities with an emphasis on minimizing disruption to everyone's plans. We anticipate that arrangements for a new site (and potentially slightly different August dates) will be completed soon. The announced deadlines and planning timeline (i.e., Call for Papers submissions and the launch of the program schedule) for the 2011 are still in place.

The decision to move the meeting has not been an easy one, but there was little alternative if we were to ensure the success of the meeting for all participants. We are working with President Randall Collins and the 2011 Program Committee to ensure minimal impact on the invited program. The ASA will announce the new venue as soon as the decision has been made.

Thank you for your commitment to the Association and for your support of our 2011 Annual Meeting.

Sincerely,

Sally T. Hillsman, PhD
Executive Officer
American Sociological Association

For additional information, see the official press release. Please do not reply to this message as it is being sent from an unmonitored e-mail account for outgoing messages only. For assistance or information, contact meetings@asanet.org.

An Interesting Web Book "App"

2010-12-13T16:25:00.000-08:00

What reminds you of what? When one reads -- or hears about -- a book, one almost unconsciously make connections -- this book is a little bit like that book. When you tell someone you are interested in some topic s/he will often say, "well, then you should have a look at ...."

Now there is a web resource, http://www.librarything.com/, that implements this as a combination of a personal library catalog and a social network. It allows you, virtually, to surf your own library and connect from books you know to books that are related to it.

When I played around with it looking for books on the sociology of information I got a bookshelf that nearly mirrored my collection in this area, but with a few titles I was unfamiliar with thrown in:

Holiday Book List

2010-12-13T14:14:00.000-08:00

Putnam, Robert & David Campbell. American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us.

"In recent controversy over the national motto, In God we trust, Putnam and Campbell see a symptom of profound change in the national character. Using data drawn from two large surveys, the authors plumb these changes. The data show that the tempestuous sixties shook faith in religion and that the seventies and eighties incubated a strong resurgence of devotion. But the two most recent decades add another twist, as young Americans have abandoned the pews in record numbers. Still, despite recent erosion of religious commitment, Americans remain a distinctively devout people" (Amazon).

Tina Seelig, What I Wish I Knew When I Was Twenty: A Crash Course on Making Your Place in the World. Harper Collins 2009.

Jacket blurb: "Tina Seelig is one of the most creative and inspiring teachers at Stanford. Her book ought to be required reading." — Robert Sutton, author of The No Asshole Rule.

Adam Smith: An Enlightened Life by Nicholas Phillipson (Yale 2010, 32.50)

"How the man of feeling became the god of finance." (New Yorker)

Claude Levi-Strauss: The Poet in the Laboratory by Patrick Wilcken (Penguin 2010, 29.95)

"Antihumanist, polymath, and autodidact." (New Yorker)

The Thousand Autumns of Jacod de Zoet: A Novel by David Mitchell (Random House 2010, $26)

"A formidable historical novel" (New Yorker).
"Mitchell’s historical novel about a young Dutchman in Edo-era Japan is an achingly romantic story of forbidden love and something of an adventurous rescue tale" (NYT).

Reinventing Knowledge: From Alexandria to the Internet by Ian F. McNeely and Lisa Wolverton (Norton 2009, $25.95)

"Jumping through the computer screen" (NYRB)

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande (Metropolitan Books 2009, $26 (paper coming 1/11).

A small book about a small but powerful idea: organizational (and individual) performance can be markedly improved with the mundane device called a "check list." Much of the case material is from medicine (millions of dollars and hundreds of lives saved by consistent following of five steps when doing central line insertions), but the book also takes you into the cockpit of jetliners. Hardback available for as low as $12 and the paperback comes out in January.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath (Random House 2007, $26).

This book is a few years old but I think it's better than the "sequel" that came out last year. The subtitle tells you what its about — lots of excellent, research based insights into how to make your ideas good ones. A short read with good idea-density. Cheaper than list on Amazon and as low as $10 used/paper.

40: A Doonesbury Retrospectiveby by G.B. Trudeau (Andrews McMeel 2010, $100.00).

A review byGarry Wills in the November 25, 2010 NYRB : "Outstripping the News".

The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration. By Isabel Wilkerson. (Random House 2010, $30.)

"This consummate account of the exodus of blacks from the South between 1915 and 1970 explores parallels with earlier European immigration" (NYT).

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. (Crown 2010, $26.)

"Skloot untangles the ethical issues in the case of a woman who unknowingly donated cancer cells that have been the basis for a vast amount of research" (NYT).
The moral conundrums posed by wikileaks might make this book about bad acts for good causes a timely read. AMERICAN SUBVERSIVE. By David Goodwillie. (Scribner, $25.) "A bombing unites a blogger and a beautiful eco-terrorist in this literary thriller, an exploration of what motivates radicalism in an age of disillusion" (NYT).

James T. Fisher, On the Irish Waterfront: The Crusader, the Movie, and the Soul of the Port of New York. (Cornell U. Press, 2010)

"For anyone who has ever been moved by Marlon Brando delivering the immortal line, 'I coulda been a contender,' this book is a must. Through state-of-the-art research, James T. Fisher recreates the tough, corrupt universe of the waterfront, a huge commercial and criminal bounty where careers were built, noses broken, dissenters murdered, riches gained and lostand it all became the basis for one of the most cherished American movies of all time. On the Irish Waterfront is a major act of historical restoration and a fascinating yarn told by a skilled literary maestro." T. J. English, New York Times bestselling author of Paddy Whacked, The Westies, and Havana Nocturne.

William Issel, For Both Cross and Flag: Catholic Action, Anti-Catholicism, and National Security Politics in World War II San Francisco (Temple U. Press, 2010).

"Issel's splendid book… is a sad and tragic tale…. [that] illustrates the wisdom of the Greek tragedian Aeschylus, who said, 'In war the first casualty is truth.'"
—Charles Fracchia, The Institute for Historical Study Newsletter
Issel recounts the civil right abuses suffered by Sylvester Andriano, an Italian American Catholic civil leader whose religious and political activism in San Francisco provoked an Anti-Catholic campaign against him. … Issel presents a cast of characters that includes archbishops, radicals, the Kremlin, J. Edgar Hoover, and more to examine the significant role faith-based political activism played in the political culture that violated Andriano's constitutional rights. … interesting implications for contemporary events and issues relating to urban politics, ethnic groups, and religion in a time of war" (Amazon).
Kindle edition: http://www.amazon.com/Both-Cross-Flag-Anti-Catholicism-ebook/dp/B0030EH8K8

A New Human by Morwood and Van Oosterzee (Left Coast, 2009)

"In October 2004, a team of Australian and Indonesian anthropologists led by Mike Morwood and Raden Pandji Soejono stunned the world with their announcement of the discovery of the first example of a new species of human, Homo floresiensis, which they nicknamed the "Hobbit." This was no creation of Tolkien's fantasy, however, but a tool-using, fire-making, cooperatively hunting person. The more Morwood and his colleagues revealed about the find, the more astonishing it became: standing only three feet tall with brains a little larger than a can of cola, the Hobbits forced anthropologists and everyone to reconsider what it means to be human." (Amazon)

The Hobbit Trap: How New Species Are Invented by Maciej Henneberg, Robert B Eckhardt, John Schofield, and Phillip Vallentine Tobias (Left Coast, 2010)

"When scientists found the remains of a tiny hominid on an Indonesian in 2004, they claimed they found a totally new species of human ancestor (homo floresiensis), and called it a Hobbit. Film crews rolled in and the little creature took the world by storm, but a group of prominent scientists, including Maciej Henneberg and Robert Eckhardt, smelled a rat" ( Amazon).

The Bone Readers: Science and Politics in Human Origins Research by Claudio Tuniz, Richard Gillespie, and Cheryl Jones (Left Coast)

Deals with the political and academic fights over human origins research more generally. Just won a Choice Magazine Outstanding Academic Book Award.
“This excellent book not only clearly presents the science behind research on human origins, but also the personalities and the politics.” –Professor Chris Stringer FRS, The Natural History Museum, London

Gay Marriage: Why It Is Good for Gays, Good for Straights, and Good for America by Jonathan Rauch (Holt Paperbacks 2004)

"Marriage, when it's right (and usually when it's wrong), is a subject that stirs strong feelings. Gay marriage inspires its own set of passions, with opponents decrying it as a step that will undermine the very fabric of society while supporters posit it as an inevitable next stage in step-by-step acceptance of homosexuality by mainstream America. Appearing as the issue heats ups following President George W. Bush's call for a constitutional amendment that would block the gathering tide of gay nuptials, this polemic by Atlantic Monthly/National Journal writer Jonathan Rauch deftly walks a fine line, both personalizing the subject (Rauch is a gay man with a longtime lover and a lifelong wistful attitude about marriage) and addressing it with an intellectual poise informed by historical and philosophical perspectives" (Amazon)

"Mommy Penalty" Varies by Profession

2010-12-12T14:48:00.000-08:00

Business
Economix: M.B.A.’s Have Biggest ‘Mommy Penalty,’ Doctors the Smallest
By By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
Published: December 6, 2010
Among highly educated women who take time off from their careers to raise their children, women with M.B.A.’s suffer the largest percentage “mommy penalty,” while those with medical degrees suffer the lowest proportionate loss, with female Ph.D.’s and lawyers falling somewhere in between.
[more...]

Social Science Palooza

2010-12-07T09:57:00.000-08:00

From the opinion page of the New York Times a hymn to the social sciences by DAVID BROOKS December 6, 2010. Although Brooks is pigeon-holed as "the conservative commentator," his ideas cover a wide spectrum and he stands out as a champion of the use of all manner of social science to inform policy debates. This piece is worth quoting in full. The journalist he mentions at the start writes for the Ideas column in the Boston Globe. See, for example, this 2008 column, "Surprising insights from the social sciences: Bullying, choosing a double major, and a mystery in the bathtub."

Op-Ed Columnist

Social Science Palooza

By DAVID BROOKS

Published: December 6, 2010

"Every day, hundreds of thousands of scholars study human behavior. Every day, a few of their studies are bundled and distributed via e-mail by Kevin Lewis, who covers the social sciences for The Boston Globe and National Affairs. And every day, I file away these studies because I find them bizarrely interesting.
Josh Haner/The New York Times

"In this column, I’m going to try to summarize as many of these studies as space allows. No single study is dispositive, but I hope these summaries can spark some conversations:

"Female mammals tend to avoid close male relatives during moments of peak fertility in order to avoid inbreeding. For the journal Psychological Science, Debra Lieberman, Elizabeth Pillsworth and Martie Haselton tracked young women’s cellphone calls. They found that these women had fewer and shorter calls with their fathers during peak fertility days, but not with female relatives.

"Classic research has suggested that the more people doubt their own beliefs the more, paradoxically, they are inclined to proselytize in favor of them. David Gal and Derek Rucker published a study in Psychological Science in which they presented some research subjects with evidence that undermined their core convictions. The subjects who were forced to confront the counterevidence went on to more forcefully advocate their original beliefs, thus confirming the earlier findings.

"Physical contact improves team performance. For the journal Emotion, Michael Kraus, Cassey Huang and Dacher Keltner measured how frequently members of N.B.A. teams touched each other. Teams that touched each other frequently early in the 2008-2009 season did better than teams that touched less frequently, even after accounting for player status, preseason expectations and early season performance.

"According to John Gaski and Jeff Sagarin in the Journal of Neuroscience, Psychology and Economics, there is a surprisingly strong relationship between daylight saving time and lower SAT scores. No explanation was offered.

"For an article in The Review of Economics and Statistics, Mark Duggan, Randi Hjalmarsson and Brian Jacob investigated whether gun shows increase crime rates. They identified 3,400 gun shows in Texas and California and looked at crime rates for the areas around the shows for the following month. They found no relationship between gun shows and crime in either state.

"Self-control consumes glucose in the brain. For an article in the journal Aggressive Behavior, Nathan DeWall, Timothy Deckman, Matthew Gaillot and Brad Bushman found that research subjects who consumed a glucose beverage behaved less aggressively than subjects who drank a placebo beverage. They found an indirect relationship between diabetes (a disorder marked by low glucose levels) and low self-control. States with high diabetes rates also had high crime rates. Countries with a different condition that leads to low glucose levels had higher killing rates, both during wartime and during peacetime.

"We tend to admire extroverted leaders. But Adam Grant, Francesca Gino and David Hofmann have added a wrinkle to this bias in an article in The Academy of Management Journal. They found that extraverted leaders perform best when their employees are passive, but this effect is reversed when the employees are proactive. In these cases, the extroverted leaders are less receptive to their employees’ initiatives.

"Beautiful women should take up chess. Anna Dreber, Christer Gerdes and Patrik Gransmark wrote a Stockholm University working paper in which they found that male chess players pursue riskier strategies when they’re facing attractive female opponents, even though the risk-taking didn’t improve their performance.

"People remember information that is hard to master. In a study for Cognition, Connor Diemand-Yauman, Daniel Oppenheimer and Erikka Vaughan found that information in hard-to-read fonts was better remembered than information transmitted in easier fonts.

"Would you rather date someone who dumped his or her last partner or someone who was the dumpee? For an article in Evolutionary Psychology, Christine Stanik, Robert Kurzban and Phoebe Ellsworth found that men will give a woman a lower rating when they learn that she dumped her last boyfriend, perhaps fearing they will be next. But women rated men more highly when they learned that they had done the dumping, perhaps seeing it as a sign of desirability.

"These studies remind us that we are strange, complicated creatures — deeply influenced by primordial biases and our current relationships. But you don’t have to settle for my summaries of these kinds of studies. Go to the National Affairs Web site, where there are links to Kevin Lewis’s daily batch of studies. A day without social science is like a day without sunshine."

http://search.boston.com/local/Search.do?s.sm.query=%22Kevin%20Lewis%22&s.filterDisplay=Boston+Globe&new=n&s.tab=globe&s.si%28simplesearchinput%29.sortBy=-articleprintpublicationdate

PhD Studies in New Zealand : Digital Media, Culture+Context and Industrial Design

2010-12-03T22:18:00.000-08:00

CALL FOR PHD APPLICATIONS

The Design Research Innovation Lab at Victoria University of Wellington's (NZ) School of Design is pleased to announce we are currently accepting applications for students interested in pursuing a PhD in Design. The application deadline is 1 March 2011.

Call for Candidates

Victoria University of Wellington's Design Research Innovation Lab invites applications for PhD candidates. Prospective candidates with exceptional creative and analytical skills seeking to study design from philosophical, cultural and practice-led perspectives are encouraged to apply. Potential candidates will be expected to make a substantial contribution to design knowledge, extending current understanding within the discipline and discourse of design research.

The DRIL PhD programme emphasises the advancement of interdisciplinary knowledge and supports practice-led research through its emphasis on creativity as a process of investigation, culminating in an original design composition and a substantial written exegesis critically analysing the methodology, process, and documentation of the final creative composition.

The program has three areas of concentration: Digital Media, Culture+Context and Industrial Design. Our current areas of research focus and expertise include:

Design-Led Futures for Science, Technology & Energy
Digital Image Cultures & Digital Media Design
Historical & Cultural Studies of Design
Interaction Design & Emotion

DRIL is a dynamic research group driven by the interests and expertise of outstanding research faculty as well as the research projects of participating PhD students. The DRIL programme fosters a vibrant and collaborative interdisciplinary research environment that cultivates respect for different perspectives and emphasises a willingness to explore new and challenging ways of thinking, doing and making. While particular research strands are identified above, innovative collaborations are encouraged and new researchers will be supported through the development of research partnerships both within the University and externally with industry and public organisations. To support a variety of research interests and activities, students have access to excellent facility resources including multimedia computers and software, an electronics lab, woodworking and metal workshops, laser cutters, CNC routers and 3D rapid-prototyping facilities.

Through the Design Research and Innovation Lab students also have the opportunity to actively participate in professional academic life. Our diverse faculty provide collegial mentorship in research activities from reading groups and proposal writing workshops to preparing conference presentations, exhibitions and publications. DRIL also supports the School's research-led teaching efforts, and postgraduate students have the opportunity to deliver design-related courses as part of our Bachelor and Master of Design Innovation programmes. Scholarships and doctoral assistantships are available to exceptional students on a competitive basis, and further funding opportunities may be available through faculty research projects.

We hope that you are inspired to learn more about our programme and faculty (http://www.vuw.ac.nz/design/) and we look forward to hearing from you.

For details on how to apply, please visit: http://www.victoria.ac.nz/fgr/prospective-phds/applying.aspx

For information on scholarships, please visit: http://www.victoria.ac.nz/home/admisenrol/payments/scholarships/

For further information, please contact

Dr Anne Galloway
Chair, Research Sub-Committee
School of Design
Victoria University of Wellington
PO Box 600
Wellington 6140, New Zealand
(T) +64 04 463 6230
(E) anne.galloway@vuw.ac.nz

Dr Leon Gurevitch
Postgraduate Research Coordinator
School of Design
Victoria University of Wellington
PO Box 600
Wellington 6140, New Zealand
(T) +64 04 463 6207
(E) leon.gurevitch@vuw.ac.nz

Documents required for PhD application

A portfolio of creative work demonstrating the breadth of the applicant?s prior experience in design or related creative discipline.
A statement of research interests.
An example of academic writing.
Two referees' reports provided on the correct VUW template, sent by the referee only from a verifiable institutional email address, or as a signed hard copy.
Verified transcripts and certificates for each national and/or international degree earned and, if from an EU country, the Diploma Supplement. (International students must also include grade conversion tables.)

Research www.designculturelab.org

Interesting New Tool from Google for Cleaning Data

2010-12-03T21:48:00.000-08:00

Announcing Google Refine 2.0, a power tool for data wranglers

Google acquired Metaweb last July and has release a version of their Freebase Gridworks, an open source software project for cleaning and enhancing entire data sets as Google Refine.

Google Refine is a tool for working with messy data sets, including cleaning up inconsistencies, transforming them from one format into another, and extending them with new data from external web services or other databases.

The product is used, among other places, in the the data journalism and open government data communities (see. for example, Chicago Tribune, ProPublica and data.gov.uk). To learn more about what you can do with Google Refine 2.0, watch the following screencasts:

Oral History Workshop in February

2010-12-02T12:02:00.000-08:00

For those of you with a qualitative or ethnographic bent, this is a great opportunity to top up your skills.

Our popular oral history workshop will be held again Saturday, February 5. This one day introductory workshop, free to students and faculty, will be taught once again by oral historian and USF history professor Kathryn Nasstrom.

Registration will begin in January. Contact me for questions or more information.

Nancy MacKay

OLHP Coordinator

Head, Technical Services and Special Projects Library, Mills College 5000 MacArthur Blvd.

Oakland, CA 94613

510/430-2028

mackay@mills.edu

Resource News from the Library at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences

2010-11-27T11:56:00.000-08:00

Perhaps it's not the right time in the semester to discover new online resources -- or perhaps some intellectually stimulating procrastination fodder is just what the doctor ordered....

This short video, from Tricia, the librarian at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, introduces

an Online Collection From the BBC Archive: The Gay Rights Movement in the UK
audio recordings of current U.S. Supreme Court Oral Arguments (audio of earlier Supreme Court oral arguments is also available online.
the Internet Archive (awesome resource) has a section on Old Time Radio Shows that might be of interest to those reading about the beginnings of the culture industry.

Click HERE for the video (~3 minutes)

Doctoral Research Opportunity

2010-11-19T20:11:00.000-08:00

We invite applications to the Ph.D. Program in Design and Planning in the College of Architecture and Planning at the University of Colorado for research on some aspect of children or youth and the built or natural environment. Applicants should have a strong interest in the physical environment as a context for behavior, development and intervention. A degree in planning, design or allied discipline is preferred but not required. We welcome applications from countries in the North as well as the South.

Contingent on approval, the program will provide funding, including tuition, to a qualified applicant, who will be expected to work 20 hours per week as a Research Assistant or a Teaching Assistant. Support will continue in subsequent years, pending satisfactory progress through the program.

The successful applicant will be affiliated with and work in the Children, Youth and Environments (CYE) Center for Research and Design. The CYE Center includes faculty from planning, the design professions and cognate areas, as well as about one dozen PhD students from various backgrounds.

For information about the Center and its projects, see:

http://www.cudenver.edu/cye

For more information on the PhD Program and how to apply to it, see:

http://ucdenver.edu/academics/colleges/ArchitecturePlanning/ExplorePrograms/phd/Pages/Phd.aspx

February 1, 2011 is the application deadline for Fall 2011 admission.

For more information, contact:

Willem van Vliet-

Director, Children, Youth and Environments Center
College of Architecture and Planning
University of Colorado, CB 314
Boulder, CO 80309-0314
USA

Willem.vanvliet@colorado.edu

Graduate Research Assistantships at NCSU

2010-11-17T11:12:00.000-08:00

North Carolina State University - Graduate Program in Sociology

GRADUATE RESEARCH ASSISTANTSHIPS STUDYING LOW-INCOME FAMILIES AND
CHILDHOOD OBESITY

Please forward this announcement widely to prospective Master’s or Ph.D. students in Sociology. We are seeking high quality applicants for up to three graduate research assistantships on a five-year qualitative
research project on low-income families and childhood obesity. Awards are available beginning in Fall 2011. Assistantships are for one and possibly multiple years and include stipend, full tuition remission, and fully-paid health insurance.

Research assistantships are associated with a USDA-funded project on the structural (social, cultural, political, economic, and environmental) factors that contribute to childhood obesity among low-income and
minority populations. Students will participate in a community-based project that will involve interviewing low-income mothers about their food practices and perceptions and working with community groups to
develop community-driven, culturally-appropriate policy changes that increase food access and address the specific challenges faced by these families. Students will have the opportunity to be actively involved in
the entire research process. Students with any combination of the following interests are particularly encouraged to apply:

•       Sociology of food and/or agriculture
•       Environmental sociology
•       Gender
•       Race and ethnicity
•       Social stratification
•       Sociology of family

Please contact Sarah Bowen (sarah_bowen@ncsu.edu) or Sinikka Elliott (sinikka_elliott@ncsu.edu) for more information about the project.

Students and faculty at NC State engage in a broad range of research projects that utilize both quantitative and qualitative methods and take place in both domestic and global settings.   An additional strength of
the program is our faculty’s strong commitment to mentoring graduate students, in teaching and in research. Faculty strengths include sociology of agriculture and food systems; environmental sociology; race, class, and gender inequality; family and life course; work and the economy; global social change and development; and crime, delinquency, and social control. Please see our website (http://sociology.chass.ncsu.edu/graduate.php) for more information about the program.   To be considered for an assistantship, applications for graduate study are due by January 1, 2011.

What Social Scientists Do, volume 43, number 17

2010-10-14T15:09:00.000-07:00

The following ad is for a post-doc and so none of us is eligible (though projects that need post docs always need research assistants so a little googling could go a long way for soon-to-graduate types), but it gives you another angle on the kinds of things people are doing with sociology (and other social science) degrees in connection with new media.

And note that we are offering a sociology of mass communication this spring!

USC's Annenberg School for Communication is seeking a Postdoctoral Research Associate to join its Media, Activism, Participatory Politics (MAPP) Case Studies Project.

The Postdoctoral Research Associate will assume significant responsibility in conducting case study based research for the Project. This research will investigate the continuities between participatory culture and civic engagement. As such, qualified candidates should be aware of current research trends in fan studies, civics, globalization and/or media studies and should be ready to apply that knowledge to the case study research.

The Postdoctoral Research Associate will have earned an advanced degree and/or conducted previous qualitative research in one or more of the above listed areas. Successful candidates must be able to work independently and apply knowledge of domestic and international participatory cultures and civic action to the development of innovative models of civic learning and identity.

Fluency in one foreign language, especially Spanish, is strongly preferred. The Postdoctoral Research Associate will report to the Project's Research Director.

The University of Southern California (USC), founded in 1880, is located in the heart of downtown L.A. and is the largest private employer in the City of Los Angeles. As an employee of USC, you will be a part of a world-class research university and a member of the "Trojan Family," which is comprised of the faculty, students and staff that make the university what it is.

See the Movie; Assess the Commentator

2010-10-08T17:25:00.000-07:00

In today's Times, David Brooks says "The Social Network" is not good sociology, but it is good psychology.  What do you think?

Opinion

The Facebook Searchers

By DAVID BROOKS

Published: October 7, 2010

“The Social Network” is spot on with its parsing of who wins and loses in our information economy and hypercompetitive meritocracy.

"In 1952, two-thirds of Harvard applicants were admitted. The average verbal SAT score for incoming freshmen was 583. If your father went to Harvard, you had a 90 percent chance of getting in.

"Harvard’s president at the time, James Bryant Conant, decided to change that. Harvard could no longer be about birth and WASP breeding, he realized. It had to promote intelligence and merit. Within eight years, the average freshman had a verbal score of 678 and a math score of 695. New sorts of people were going to Harvard — more intellectual and less blue blood. But Conant didn’t want his school to be home to unidimensional brainiacs. He hoped to retain the emphasis on character.

"In “The Social Network,” the director David Fincher and the screenwriter Aaron Sorkin imagine that these two Harvards still exist side by side. On top, there is the old WASP Harvard of Mayflower families, regatta blazers and Anglo-Saxon cheekbones. Underneath, there is the largely Jewish and Asian Harvard of brilliant but geeky young strivers.

"This social structure will be familiar to moviegoers. From “Animal House” through “Revenge of the Nerds,” it has provided the basic plotline for most collegiate movies. But as sociology, of course, it’s completely fanciful." [Read More]

The Quantified Self: Meetup tomorrow, Wednesday, October 6, 2010 6:00 PM!

2010-10-05T13:25:00.000-07:00

Some of you sociology/anthropology types might find this "meetup" group dedicated to "the quantified self" interesting. What they mean by QS is any form of "self-tracking." It is, at once, the data collection of the future and, in its way, an intriguing manifestation of the protestant ethic.

--Dan

	Meetup Reminder The Bay Area Quantified Self Meetup Group
Your group has a Meetup tomorrow! You still need to RSVP.

What

QS Show&Tell #16 (Autodesk Gallery in SF)

When

Wednesday, October 6, 2010 6:00 PM

Who

159 Yes

Where

Autodesk Gallery
One Market Street, 2nd Floor
San Francisco CA 94105

159 Self-Quantifiers RSVPed Yes, including…




see all

Meetup Description

Please join us for yet another interesting, fun night of self-tracking presentations, sharing ideas, and showing tools. This time we will be at the breathtaking Autodesk Gallery in San Francisco, with innovations ranging from 3-D printed gadgets to augmented reality displays for us to responsibly play with. It's an amazing setting - thanks to Carlos Olguin at Autodesk for hosting us!
Our theme for the presentations will be location, transportation, consumption, and energy. If you are self-tracking in any way, please come and share your methods and results during the opening workshop, or volunteer to give a talk. We will also be experimenting with a sticky-note board where people with similar interests can find each other - thanks to David Fetherstonhaugh from IDEO for this suggestion!

6 -7:30 pm SOCIAL HOUR AND WORKSHOP:

If you have a self-tracking project, gadget, app, or idea you'd like to share or demo, but you don't want to get up and talk about it, the workshop hour is for you. You don't need to have a prepared talk, or permission to show something. Just come and bring what you have. We will have tables and power strips where you can plug in a laptop if you like, but paper is good too.
Think: "science fair." With healthy snacks and wine to get the conversation flowing.
Just to be clear, we save the talks for personal accounts of self-tracking and self-experimentation, rather than sales/investor pitches. But of course we are also interested in tools! If you are making something useful for self-trackers – software, hardware, web services, or data standards – please demo it in this workshop portion of the Show&Tell.

7:30 pm – 9 pm QS SHOW&TELL TALKS

For this meetup, we're excited to have a theme of location, transportation, consumption, and energy. We have some exciting speakers planned, to be announced soon! If you'd like to talk about your project, please let us know in advance so we can discuss your topic and how much time you'll need. Bonus points if your talk includes the use of AutoCAD or other Autodesk software!
QS SPONSORS: OUR THANKS TO AUTODESK AND HEALTHTAP

An incredible space is generously being provided by Autodesk. Thanks too to HealthTap, our first annual sponsor, for supporting the Quantified Self movement expansion across the country and around the world.

Three cheers to them for making our gathering possible!

QS SPONSORSHIP - WHAT IT IS

We use the sponsor money to pay for professional video recording and healthy refreshments, as well as to fund projects that help the larger QS community. If you or your company are interested in sponsoring Quantified Self, please let us know.
See you there!

This Meetup Group is sponsored by

Autodesk · CureTogether · HealthTap

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Meetup, PO Box 4668 #37895 New York, New York 10163-4668

Meetup HQ in NYC is hiring! http://www.meetup.com/jobs/

UCB Colloquium: Mobilizing Inclusion -- TODAY at 2 p.m.

2010-09-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

MONDAY September 13th

BLUMER ROOM – 402 BARROWS HALL

2:00-3:30pm

The Berkeley Sociology Colloquium Series FALL 2010 Presents:

Mobilizing Inclusion: Getting Out the Vote among Low-Propensity Voters

Lisa García Bedolla

Graduate School of Education

University of California, Berkeley

Melissa Michelson

Department of Political Science

Menlo College

Political participation studies have consistently found that socioeconomic status (SES) -- education, occupation, and income -- is the best predictor of voter turnout. Yet, over the past decade hundreds of field experiments have shown that get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts, usually a short conversation on a voter's doorstep, changes individual behavior. Given the voter's resources do not change as a result of that conversation, how can we explain why GOTV works? Using a foundation of over 300 field experiments fielded across six electoral cycles, we put forward a cognitive explanation for the power of GOTV. We argue that brief conversation, because it takes the form of a narrative social interaction, changes the voter's cognitive schema. In addition, through their voting practice, these marginalized voters are not only changing their own self-perceptions, but they are also redefining and expanding the American electorate -- what we call "governmentality from below." It is at this intersection between the individual and the social context that the transformative potential of GOTV may be realized.

What's Out There: Grad School in Internet Journalism

2010-08-02T15:20:00.000-07:00

The details of this probably make it inappropriate for current students, but it gives you an idea of some alternative paths through grad school that you might not ordinarily hear about.

-- Dan

University of Leeds
Institute of Communications Studies

Research Associate in Internet Journalism
(fixed-term) (Part-time PhD studentship linked to a 50% FTE Teaching Assistantship)

This post is an excellent opportunity for a graduate with research ambitions and experience in journalism to make the transition to an academic career. It offers a part-time PhD studentship and a 50% FTE teaching assistantship.

The position is a clearly defined training/career development position and will provide the opportunity for study towards a PhD on a part-time basis coupled with part-time teaching experience in the Institute of Communications Studies. Teaching responsibilities will be allocated in the light of current workloads of existing academic staff, and of the experience and aptitude of the successful applicant Potential PhD topics should be within the area of journalism studies.

You must possess a Master's degree in journalism, broadcast journalism, online journalism, or a related discipline such as media studies, communication studies or sociology. The ability to take responsibility for allocated teaching duties and excellent interpersonal and communication skills are also essential to the post.

The post is available from 20 September 2010 (or as soon as possible thereafter) for a fixed term until 19 September 2012. At the end of the fixed-term contract, subject to satisfactory performance, you may be reappointed for 2-4 years (depending upon how long it takes to complete the PhD), but the training post will not be extended beyond 19 September 2016.

University Grade 6 (GBP24,273 - GBP28,983 p.a. pro rata) plus annual stipend of GBP6,300; PhD fees will be paid by the Institute.

Informal inquiries may be made to the Head of Institute, Professor David Hesmondhalgh, via email to d.j.hesmondhalgh@leeds.ac.uk.

To download an application form and job details please visit http://hr.leeds.ac.uk/jobs/. Alternatively these may be obtained from vpaempl@leeds.ac.uk. tel +44 (0)113 343 7003 or +44 (0)113 343 3731

Job ref 311029 Closing date 23 August 2010

Interviews will be held on 13 September 2010

Jobs with a Sociology Major

2010-05-16T12:00:00.000-07:00

The following is not a job for which a BA in sociology would qualify you, but I thought it'd be useful to pass it along to supplement your mental database of sociology related jobs. The field of online content creation is a growing one, and will, I suspect, play a larger and larger role in higher education over time (for better or worse, one can add).

Here's the job posting:

Cengage Learning delivers highly customized learning solutions for colleges, universities, instructors, students, libraries, government agencies, corporations, and professionals around the world. These solutions are delivered through specialized content, applications, and services that foster academic excellence and professional development, as well as provide measurable learning outcomes to its customers.

Aplia, a Cengage Learning product, is revolutionizing how students learn. We create online, interactive learning solutions that increase student effort and engagement in their high school and college courses. We have helped 1,000,000 students at more than 1,300 institutions since product inception in 2002 and are looking for eager and like-minded individuals to join our brainy, creative, and lively group!

The Content Writer will create new Sociology content and shape our Sociology online tools to best serve students and professors alike.

This is a full-time, on-site position located in our Belmont, CA office.

Specific Responsibilities:

Write, review, and edit online teaching materials for undergraduate Sociology courses
Work with our team of content developers and project editors to help determine priorities and accomplish goals of Aplia's Sociology discipline
Be familiar with our current content to advise the sales and support teams on any content-related questions
Assist students and teachers by answering content specific questions
Review and develop innovative Sociology tools to best serve our students and professors

Basic Qualifications Required:

Master's degree in Sociology
Must have experience teaching undergraduate courses in Sociology
Excellent knowledge of grammar and command of the English language
Top-notch written and oral communication skills
Computer savvy with the ability to quickly pick up technical skills
Bright, hard-working, flexible, dedicated, and team-focused self starter
Ability to meet deadlines and work in a fast-paced environment

Preferred Qualifications:

PhD in Sociology
Formal editorial / writing experience
Familiarity with the Aplia platform

To be considered, please submit a cover letter along with your resume. http://tbe.taleo.net/NA1/ats/careers/requisition.jsp?org=LEARNING&cws=1&rid=3659

The New Demography of American Motherhood

2010-05-11T10:59:00.000-07:00

A recent report, "The New Demography of American Motherhood," by Gretchen Livingston and D’Vera Cohn of the Pew Research Center "examines the changing demographic characteristics of U.S. mothers by comparing women who gave birth in 2008 with those who gave birth in 1990. It is based on data from the National Center for Health Statistics and the Census Bureau. It also presents results of a nationwide Pew Research Center survey that asked a range of questions about parenthood."

"Among the key findings of this report:

"Age: Mothers of newborns are older now than their counterparts were two decades ago. In 1990, teens had a higher share of all births (13%) than did women ages 35 and older (9%). In 2008, the reverse was true -- 10% of births were to teens, compared with 14% to women ages 35 and older. Each race and ethnic group had a higher share of mothers of newborns in 2008 who are ages 35 and older, and a lower share who are teens, than in 1990.
"Marital Status: A record four-in-ten births (41%) were to unmarried women in 2008, including most births to women in their early 20s. In 1990, 28% of births were to unmarried women. The unmarried-mother share of births has increased most sharply for whites and Hispanics, although the highest share is for black women.
"Race and Ethnicity: White women made up 53% of mothers of newborns in 2008, down from 65% in 1990. The share of births to Hispanic women has grown dramatically, to one-in-four.
"Education: Most mothers of newborns (54%) had at least some college education in 2006, an increase from 41% in 1990. Among mothers of newborns who were ages 35 and older, 71% had at least some college education.
"Explaining the Trends: All the trends cited above reflect a complex mix of demographic and behavioral factors. For example, the higher share of college-educated mothers stems both from their rising birth rates and from women's increasing educational attainment. The rise in births to unmarried women reflects both their rising birth rates and the shrinking share of adults who are married.
"Attitudes about Parenthood: When asked why they decided to have their first (or only) child, the overwhelming majority of parents (87%) answer, 'The joy of having children.' But nearly half (47%) also say, 'There wasn't a reason; it just happened.'"

Read Online Report or download PDF of full report.

Publish Post

How Does "Pay It Forward" Happen?

2010-05-08T13:23:00.000-07:00

A little bit of positive social science to start the summer. Below you can watch a lecture given at the meeting of the American Sociological Association, 2008, on the topic of generalized exchange. An example of the nexus of sociology (e.g., Simmel on exchange and gratitude, social control), anthropology (e.g., norms of reciprocity, altruism), and economics (e.g., laboratory experiments using games).

How Pay it Forward Happens? from sslevine on Vimeo.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

What's Hot: Sociology of Surveillance and Security

2010-05-06T09:08:00.000-07:00

A part of our ongoing series of "what's out there" posts...

Postdoctoral Fellowship on Surveillance and Security
"Exploring U.S. Department of Homeland Security Fusion Centers."

Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, USA.

We are seeking a postdoctoral-level scholar for a research project on the social, legal, and technical dimensions of DHS "fusion centers." This project will document and evaluate the information sharing practices of fusion centers, with a focus on variations in data sharing across fusion centers. The primary researchers on this project are Torin Monahan (Vanderbilt University) and Priscilla Regan (George Mason University). This will be a one-year position beginning this summer, with the possibility of renewal for a second year.

Applicants should have familiarity with the field of surveillance studies and possess a Ph.D. in a relevant social science field (e.g., sociology, science and technology studies, criminology, anthropology, communication, political science, or law and society). Applicants must have advanced methodological expertise in interviewing and participant observation, excellent writing skills, and motivation to take initiative to ensure the success of the project. The ideal applicant will have demonstrated experience in related research and a record of publishing research results. The postdoctoral fellow will take the lead on collecting and analyzing data, writing articles and reports, and presenting findings at conferences. Periodic out-of-state travel will be required for data collection.

The beginning salary for this full-time position will be $39,360 (plus health benefits). The fellow will be expected to be in residence in Nashville, Tennessee, for the duration of the position and be an active colleague at Vanderbilt University.

This fellowship is made possible through a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation. The research will contribute to an international research project called "The New Transparency," which is facilitating multi-national and cross-cultural comparisons of the global security industry.

Torin Monahan, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Human & Organizational Development
Associate Professor of Medicine
Vanderbilt University
www.torinmonahan.com
NEW BOOK: Surveillance in the Time of Insecurity

Conference Streaming Live this Thursday

2010-05-04T16:04:00.001-07:00

http://politicsofopensource.jitp.net/

The Annual Journal of Information Technology and Politics (JITP) thematic conference JITP 2010 will stream live this Thursday and Friday, May 6 & 7. The live stream is sponsored by Panopto.com and there will be link available at the conference Web site. The full program is online at: http://politicsofopensource.jitp.net/program

Sociology @ Mills

'Social glasses' may reveal a person's true colors

WEBINAR: LANDING YOUR DREAM INTERNSHIP

Tweet from Pew Research Center

What the Top 1% of Earners Majored In

Quantitative Visualizations of the One Percent

Debt: The First 5,000 Years with David Graeber

Berkman Center for Internet & Society Summer Internship Program 2012

Urban Studies Scholar on Occupy Movement

Free Lecture by World Renowned Criminologist

CYBERSOCIETY SEMESTER: 2nd CALL FOR STUDENTS

Research Assistant Job Announcement

Social Networks PhD Positions in Dublin

MIT Researchers Create New Urban Network Analysis Toolbox

Sociology on Twitter

Headline: America's Next Top Sociologist (from Slate)

Old articles in JSTOR freed

Why study geography?

Opportunity to Hear Robert Bellah at UCB

Full student support for Trustworthy Computing Summer School

Paid Summer Internship for Student with Programming Skills

Gender Bias, Social Stability, & Violence in China and India

Two Important Social Theorists You May Not Have Met in SOC116

Who is Reading Us?

Harold Garfinkel Dead at 92

Two New Posts at Sociology of Information Blog

Sample Job Ad for Using Sociology or Anthropology Degree

Collaborate and put your social scientific insight to work?

Next Monday: Briggs on "Moving to Opportunity" at UCB Colloquium

FYI: Archaeology Summer School

South Africa Paleontology, Paleoanthropology and Paleoecology Summer School through Arizona State

Agenda

Coursework

Application Process

Costs

The Prospects for Peace and Democracy in Russia

DataONE Summer Internship Program: Open for Applications

Program Structure

Schedule

Eligibility

Financial Support

Paid Internship for One with Top Quant Skills

Strange Bedfellows: Anti-Pornography Feminists and Conservatives

Five Tips for Getting a Job with your Social Science Degree

Panel Discussion at Hastings: Wikileaks and Open Government

Prosocial Preferences and the Social Science of Sophomores

Did We Overestimate the Role of Social Preferences? The Case of Self-Selected Student Samples

Gender and Social Networking, Part 7b

Conservatives and Universities

44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

44 years later, Tally's Corner is revealed

The Last Monarchy: The Inevitable Fall of Hierarchy and the Birth of the Intelligent Organization

Student Volunteers for Pacific Soc Meetings in Seattle Next Month

I don't know how current this request for help is, but if you are going, you might want to contact Ms. Burdsall. -- Dan

Student Volunteers for PSA Registration Table

Web Science Academy this Summer in Germany

Honest Brokers: The Politics of Expertise and the “Who Lost China” Debate

Who now reads Friedan?

Computing and Social Science Position at Bowdoin

Mills Alumna to Speak at UCB Sociology Colloquium

ICPSR Summer Undergraduate Internship Program -- 2011

ICPSR Summer UndergraduateInternship Program -- 2011

Kaplan Test Prep Books Free Today at Amazon

Senior Seminar Class 2010 Pre-Celebrates Thesis Finishings

ASA Moves Annual Meeting from Chicago to Who Knows Where

An Interesting Web Book "App"

Holiday Book List

See also: http://mills-soc116.wikidot.com/holiday-book-list-2010

Putnam, Robert & David Campbell. American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us.

Tina Seelig, What I Wish I Knew When I Was Twenty: A Crash Course on Making Your Place in the World. Harper Collins 2009.

Adam Smith: An Enlightened Life by Nicholas Phillipson (Yale 2010, 32.50)

Claude Levi-Strauss: The Poet in the Laboratory by Patrick Wilcken (Penguin 2010, 29.95)

The Thousand Autumns of Jacod de Zoet: A Novel by David Mitchell (Random House 2010, $26)

Reinventing Knowledge: From Alexandria to the Internet by Ian F. McNeely and Lisa Wolverton (Norton 2009, $25.95)

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande (Metropolitan Books 2009, $26 (paper coming 1/11).

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath (Random House 2007, $26).

40: A Doonesbury Retrospectiveby by G.B. Trudeau (Andrews McMeel 2010, $100.00).

The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration. By Isabel Wilkerson. (Random House 2010, $30.)

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. (Crown 2010, $26.)

James T. Fisher, On the Irish Waterfront: The Crusader, the Movie, and the Soul of the Port of New York. (Cornell U. Press, 2010)

ICPSR Summer Undergraduate
Internship Program -- 2011