CALL FOR PRESENTATIONS
A Conference at SUNY Stony Brook June 7-9, 2012
The Center for Study of Working Class Life is pleased to announce the HowClass Works – 2012 Conference, to be held at the State University of NewYork at Stony Brook, June 7-9, 2012. Proposals for papers,presentations, and sessions are welcome until December 12, 2011 accordingto the guidelines below. For more information, visit our Web site at www.workingclass.sunysb.edu.
Purpose and orientation: The conference seeks to explore ways in which anexplicit recognition of class helps to understand the social world inwhich we live, and ways in which analysis of society can deepen ourunderstanding of class as a social relationship. Presentations should takeas their point of reference the lived experience of class; proposedtheoretical contributions should be rooted in and illuminate socialrealities. Presentations are welcome from people outside academic lifewhen they sum up social experience in a way that contributes to the themesof the conference. Formal papers will be welcome but are not required.All presentations should be accessible to an interdisciplinary audience.
Conference themes: The conference welcomes proposals for presentationsthat advance our understanding of any of the following themes.
The mosaic of class, race, and gender. To explore how class shapes racial,gender, and ethnic experience and how different racial, gender, and ethnicexperiences within various classes shape the meaning of class.
Class, power, and social structure. To explore the social content ofworking, middle, and capitalist classes in terms of various aspects ofpower; to explore ways in which class and structures of power interact, atthe workplace and in the broader society.
Class and community. To explore ways in which class operates outside theworkplace in the communities where people of various classes live.
Class in a global economy. To explore how class identity and classdynamics are influenced by globalization, including experience ofcross-border organizing, capitalist class dynamics, international laborstandards.
Middle class? Working class? What's the difference and why does it matter?To explore the claim that the U.S. is a middle class society and contrastit with the notion that the working class is the majority; to explore therelationships between the middle class and the working class, and betweenthe middle class and the capitalist class.
Class,public policy, and electoral politics. To explore how class affects publicpolicy, with special attention to health care, the criminal justicesystem, labor law, poverty, tax and other economic policy, housing, andeducation; to explore the place of electoral politics in the arrangementof class forces on policy matters.
Class and culture: To explore ways in which culture transmits andtransforms class dynamics.
Pedagogy of class. To explore techniques and materials useful for teachingabout class, at K-12 levels, in college and university courses, and inlabor studies and adult education courses.
How to submit proposals for How Class Works – 2012 Conference
Proposals for presentations must include the following information: a)title; b) which of the eight conference themes will be addressed; c) amaximum 250 word summary of the main points, methodology, and slice ofexperience that will be summed up; d) relevant personal informationindicating institutional affiliation (if any) and what training orexperience the presenter brings to the proposal; e) presenter's name,address, telephone, fax, and e-mail address. A person may present in atmost two conference sessions. To allow time for discussion, sessions willbe limited to three twenty-minute or four fifteen-minute principalpresentations. Sessions will not include official discussants. Proposalsfor poster sessions are welcome. Presentations may be assigned to aposter session.Proposals for sessions are welcome. A single sessionproposal must include proposal information for all presentations expectedto be part of it, as detailed above, with some indication of willingnessto participate from each proposed session member.Submit proposals as ane-mail attachment to michael.zweig [at] stonybrook.edu or as hard copy by mailto the How Class Works - 2012 Conference, Center for Study of WorkingClass Life, Department of Economics, SUNY, Stony Brook, NY 11794-4384.
Timetable: Proposals must be received by December 12, 2012. After reviewby the program committee, notifications will be mailed on January 17,2012. The conference will be at SUNY Stony Brook June 7-9, 2012.
Conference registration and housing reservations will be possible afterFebruary 20, 2012. Details and updates will be posted athttp://www.workingclass.sunysb.edu.
Conference coordinator:
Michael Zweig
Director, Center for Study of Working Class Life
Department of Economics
State University of New York Stony Brook, NY 11794-4384
631.632.7536
michael.zweig [at] stonybrook.edu
http://www.workingclass.sunysb.edu.