 Vol.
12, No. 1, Dec 2010
Announcements
Join the Effort to Create
a New ASA Section
Efforts are underway to create a new American Sociological Association
on the Sociology of Consumers and Consumption.
CSRN has been functioning well as an informal network of scholars
interested in the study of consumption. As many are aware, we
have maintained a useful listserv, created a website (http://csrn.camden.rutgers.edu/),
published this bi-annual Newsletter, sponsored two, one-day
conferences in New York and Boston, with another planned for
this August in Chicago (see Call for Papers announcement in this
newsletter), organized and participated in a number ASA
Regular, Special and Thematic sessions over the years and have published
two ASA Syllabi Teaching sets.
Certainly quite a bit for an “unofficial” organization.
However, it has been felt for some time by many, that a more
formal organization will be beneficial.
Becoming an ASA Section will allow us to collect dues (which
will be in line in terms of cost with other Sections), have control
of our own sessions, have a succession of leadership through
elections, have receptions and give out awards (best graduate
paper, article, book, etc.).
We need 200 signatures to start the process of becoming a Section-in-Formation,
which will give us access to ASA resources and be able to sponsor
sessions at the annual meeting. We then have 2 years to get up
to at least 300 members to become a sustaining section.
If you are interested in joining this effort, please sign the
petition by following these directions:
Copy and paste the statement below and email it to csrn2011@camden.rutgers.edu.
In sending this email, I certify that I am an ASA member and that
I pledge to join the Sociology of Consumers and Consumption section as a dues-paying
member for at least the next two membership years once it commences.
If you are not an ASA member but intend on becoming one in 2011,
it is ok to support section status so long as you follow through
and join ASA by Jan 1, 2011.
If you know others who might be interested,
please forward them this announcement or point them to the CSRN
Website http://csrn.camden.rutgers.edu/index.htm where
information of newsletters and members can be found, as
well as the instructions for signing the petition http://csrn.camden.rutgers.edu/asa_section_petition.htm.
Questions? Contact Dan Cook dtcook@camden.rutgers.edu.
Consumer
Culture Theory Conference 2010
Northwestern University, Evanston IL,
USA
July 7-10, 2011
Call for Papers
ICOHTEC
SYMPOSIUM 2011 - Consumer Choice and Technology
The International Committee for the History of Technology’s
38th Symposium
Glasgow, Scotland, 2 – 7 August
2011
Deadline
for proposals is 31 January 2011
>>> more information
(pdf)
European Journal of Cultural
Studies – Special
Issue
Submission Deadline: 31st
December 2010
”Cultural Intermediaries in Context:
Locating Identity and Practice in the Formation of Value”Guest
Co-Editors: Jennifer Smith Maguire (University of Leicester); Julian
Matthews (University of Leicester)There has been an increase in
research around cultural intermediaries in recent years, jumping
off from Special Issues in Cultural Studies in 2002, and Consumption,
Markets and Culture in 2004. This Special Issue is intended to
move the field forward by foregrounding the issue of context: how
does location (across and within cultural fields; across and within
societies; across and within time periods) impact on the identities
and practices of cultural intermediaries? The Special Issue will
offer a timely collection that examines the present understanding
of the cultural intermediary, and the materiality of their cultural
work in the formation of value.The operations of cultural intermediaries
in commodity chains have developed as a recent focus of attention
for the sociology of culture and cultural studies. Rooted in the
work of Bourdieu (1984), and taken up within discussions of a radically
new stage of capitalism (e.g. Featherstone 1991; Lash & Urry
1987), cultural intermediaries have more recently been the focus
of a range of studies loosely grouped under the banner of ‘cultural
economy’ (e.g. du Gay and Pryke, 2002). This body of research
has examined the role of cultural intermediaries in mediating between
the production and consumption of cultural goods, and their place
more generally within the organization of economic and cultural
life. However, attention to cultural intermediaries’ identities
and lifestyles has yet to be fully integrated with close investigation
of their material practices of mediation. Furthermore, research
has thus far focused largely on single case studies of occupations,
despite the clear significance of cultural location and context
for the formation of value—for example, at different stages
within the ‘career’ (Méadel and Rabeharisoa
2001) of a product, or for the same occupation operating within
different fields. Thus, the interconnections of various intermediaries
operating in and across various fields, and how such cultural work
can be conceptualised generally remain fertile areas for further
study, discussion and debate.Empirically-grounded contributions
might consider a range of issues including, but not confined to:
- theoretical conceptualizations of the cultural
intermediary and the intersection of identity and practice
(including the tensions and synergies present in definitions
of the cultural intermediary and their work, as offered by
Bourdieu and later cultural economy studies);
- the role of context (including education,
patterns of professionalization, class habitus) in the formation
of cultural intermediary ‘dispositions’ and the
tensions that arise between objective credentials and subjective
dispositions, intuition, aesthetic sensibilities and so forth
in the performance of authority;
- the role of cultural location in the selection
and deployment of ‘devices’ for the formation of
value (including the specific, material practices involved
in bringing goods to market, identifying (with) and understanding
the intended market, performing credibility—for themselves
and their goods—via the mobilization of different forms
of capital, and so forth);
- the ecology of cultural intermediaries within
commodity chains (the ‘regimes of mediation’ (Cronin
2004), and the status, relative weight and interconnections
of cultural intermediaries operating within the same and across
fields);
- cross-cultural comparisons of cultural intermediaries
operating within the same field, and cross-field comparisons
of cultural intermediaries operating at comparable positions
in different commodity chains (calling attention to the relative
universality, or cultural- or field- specificity, of particular
forms of value and their production);
- comparisons of cultural intermediaries operating
in the same field, but working with goods that occupy different
status positions (calling attention to the question of autonomy
for those working with goods of restricted production compared
with those working with goods of mass production).
Submissions:
The deadline for papers is 31st December 2010.If you have any queries regarding
the suitability of your potential contribution please contact either of the guest
co-editors:
Jennifer Smith Maguire (email: jbs7@le.ac.uk)
Julian Matthews (email: jpm29@le.ac.uk)Submissions
should be sent electronically as Word documents to Jennifer Smith
Maguire (email: jbs7@le.ac.uk).
If this is not possible, then please send five copies to Jennifer
Smith Maguire, Department of Media & Communication, University
of Leicester, University Road, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK.Papers, in
English, should include an abstract of 100-150 words, with a suggested
target of about 7000 words (including notes and references). For
specific manuscript submission guidelines, please go to: http://www.uk.sagepub.com/journalsProdManSub.nav?prodId=Journal200898&crossRegion=antiPod
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Commodities & Consumption, Vol. 12(1) Dec 2010. |
