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Upcoming Identities Event!
New on the Identities BlogRevitalising language through digital media
UNESCO’s Atlas of Endangered Languages recognises over 2,500 endangered languages worldwide. Languages represent not just a form of communication, but also the cultural knowledge of that language. However, in his book Language Death, David Crystal estimates that the world is in danger of losing nearly half of all accumulated knowledge at the current rate of language loss. With language intrinsically tied to culture, many communities that experience a decline in the use of their native language perceive it as a sign that their culture is dying.
Boxing with identities
The use of identity markers in sport has received considerable attention from scholars in a number of disciplines over a number of decades. This has been looked at in a variety of different sports and includes insightful studies published in Identities such as the works of Paul Campbell and Daniel Burdsey on football and Constancio Arnaldo on boxing.
LGBTQ+ support for the populist radical right
'A radical Islamist terrorist targeted the nightclub (…) in order to execute gay and lesbian citizens, because of their sexual orientation. It’s a strike at the heart and soul of who we are as a nation.' The statement from then-Presidential nominee Donald Trump followed the 2016 mass shooting at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. Later, in 2020, Trump referred to himself as 'the most pro-gay President in America'. Simultaneously, he appointed overtly anti-LGBT candidates to judicial positions and oversaw various policies legitimizing the exclusion of LGBTQ+ people.
When work is political
The work of workers’ co-operatives and their worker-members hold great relevance in politically and economically rather dismal times. My Identities article, ‘Radical democratic citizenship at work in an adverse economic environment: the case of workers’ co-operatives in Scotland’, explores five workers’ co-operatives in view of how they collectively and democratically make decisions as well as give space, therein, to personal matters and circumstances of the worker-members.
What is 'religion' for populists?
The adamant defense of Christianity by far-right populists, as well as their ostensible display of Christian symbols such as the rosary, have been interpreted as hijacking religion from the hands of religious leaders and institutions. In fact, religious leaders have often accused far-right politicians of instrumentalizing religion for political gain, while far-right politicians have accused religious leaders of not defending Christianity against Islam. In a sense, far-right populist actors present themselves as being better interpreters and defenders of Christianity than religious leaders.
Being the ‘Martin Luther King’ of the classroom: Black people solving the faults of racism
As part of my final year at university, I completed research for my undergraduate dissertation, with a focus on the racial disparities within experience and attainment in higher education institutions. Bunce et al (2019) found that whilst 78% of white students are likely to receive a ‘good degree’ (2:1 or higher) only 66% of Asian students and 52% of Black students would reach the same classification, emphasising the hidden barriers for Black students. It was obvious that there was an invisible burden that many of the Black students I spoke to felt responsible to bear. One student described it as being the “Martin Luther King of the classroom”, the constant requirement to correct racism that goes ignored by those who are not Black.
Grenfell Tower: enactments of grief, remembrance and activism
On the 14th June 2017, a horrific fire swept through Grenfell Tower in west London, killing 72 people and leaving hundreds more homeless and traumatised. For those of us who witnessed the tragedy unfold, either directly or through media coverage, the images of the burning tower beyond the control of the firefighters, will stay with us for a lifetime.
The gender-religion nexus in Romanian politics
In 2018, Romania organised a national referendum with the goal of defining in the Constitution that a family is composed of a man and a woman. Most of the parliamentary political parties openly supported the issue. The turnout failed to pass the 30% threshold needed for the referendum to be validated, but 93% of those who voted were in favour of this restrictive definition of family.
The social hauntings within narratives of plight
Avery Gordon identified a problem with sociology over two decades ago when they wrote Ghostly Matters: Haunting and the Sociological Imagination. Despite the sociological aim of unlocking knowledge about social life, the emphasis on empiricism left what remains absent outside its purview. According to Gordon, haunting is the means of understanding how what remains absent within social life attempts to make itself known.
The problem with patriotism
Patriotism is having a moment. From French President Emmanuel Macron’s claim that patriotism is ‘the exact opposite of nationalism’ to UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer’s call for party members to be ‘proud of being patriotic’, centrist and progressive politicians are appealing to patriotism as a bulwark against the rise of right-wing nationalism. In the US, a July 2021 YouGov poll found that sixty-nine percent of respondents believed that a person could be considered patriotic while participating in a protest for racial equality.
The populist hype, the people and the far right
You keynoted the 5th annual Populism Specialist Group workshop which focused on the theme ‘Populism: New Perspectives’. What are your general impressions? Where is the field moving these days? The various panels and papers confirmed to me that part of the field is moving in some very interesting and promising directions and it was a real honour to provide a keynote for the Populism Specialist Group as it is to me the most exciting forum to discuss populism.
From Hurricane Katrina to George Floyd
The murder of George Floyd in the spring of 2020 sparked an outcry against police brutality and racial injustice in the United States. In the wake of the killing, support for the Black Lives Matter movement rose sharply among white Americans. Shows of support ranged from the (controversial) posting of blacked-out photos on Facebook and Instagram, to patronage of black-owned businesses, to marching in BLM protests.
Interracial couples and the phenomenology of race
In majority white countries, the Black Lives Matter protests that unfolded after the murder of George Floyd were accompanied by the intensification of public debates on systemic racism and white allyship. Some media focused on Black-white couples, discussing the impact of these events on white partners’ understanding of anti-black racism in their Black partners’ lives. As part of the ERC-funded project ‘Regulating Mixed Intimacies in Europe (EUROMIX), over the past four years I have explored Black-white couples’ experiences of racism and discrimination in their everyday lives.
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Call for Commentaries to
Identities COVID-19 Blog Series:
COVID-19 Response and the Remapping of the Boundaries of State, Nation and Citizenship
Despite COVID-19 being officially a pandemic that poses a global threat to health, economic well-being and political stability, and instead of generating new forms of transnationalism and global solidarity, it has, in fact, nourished various exclusionary ideologies. These have reaffirmed the role of the nation-state as the pre-eminent institution and ‘power-container’ in the Global North, and in ways that have made apparent colonial legacy and practise.
The current climate of populism, resurgent exclusionary ethno-nationalism, authoritarianism and racism, and retreating internationalism reinforces existing (as well as creating new) patterns of discrimination and inequality both at state and individual level. Undoubtedly, this disproportionately affects poorer countries and those groups/individuals already facing intersecting social, economic and health vulnerabilities....
The current climate of populism, resurgent exclusionary ethno-nationalism, authoritarianism and racism, and retreating internationalism reinforces existing (as well as creating new) patterns of discrimination and inequality both at state and individual level. Undoubtedly, this disproportionately affects poorer countries and those groups/individuals already facing intersecting social, economic and health vulnerabilities....
