Research Committee on
Women in Society, RC32

Program Theme: Women and Gender in an Unequal World: Challenges and Promises for Global Sociology

Program Coordinator

Evangelia TASTSOGLOU, Saint Mary’s University, Canada, evie.tastsoglou@gmail.com

Number of allocated sessions including Business Meeting: 26.

On-line abstracts submission

June 3, 2013, 11:00 GMT - September 30, 2013 24:00 GMT.

If you have questions about any specific session, please feel free to contact the Session Organizer for more information.

Proposed sessions

in alphabetical order:

A Cross-National Comparative Approach to CEDAW as an Instrument to Effect Women’s Rights and Gender Equality

Session Organizers
Solange SIMOES, Eastern Michigan University, USA, ssimoes@emich.edu
Manisha DESAI, University of Connecticut, USA, manisha.desai@uconn.edu

Session in English

The Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, dubbed the “international bill of rights for women”, has been adopted and ratified by 187 of 193 countries. The US – surprisingly to some but not to all - stands out as one of the few countries, together with Iran, Somalia, Sudan, Palau, and Tonga, that have not ratified the Convention. By ratifying CEDAW, countries commit to end de jure as well as de facto discrimination against Women. Nevertheless, besides the usual gaps found between policy making and implementation, there are other issues that lead to a debate about the extent to which CEDAW has been an effective instrument to foster women’s rights and gender equality.

On the one hand, the Convention has been used by women’s and feminist movements worldwide in order to demand the establishment of institutional mechanisms for monitoring and implementing gender equality policies, plans and programs in critical areas of women`s lives. On the other hand, several countries have ratified CEDAW with “reservations” that, arguably, directly or indirectly clash with the object and purpose of the Convention.

This session’s objective is to allow for a cross-country comparative approach to the varied ways the Convention has been promoted – or not – by the women’s movements and governments throughout the world as a key tool to effect institutional change leading to gender equality. How - and to what extent – has CEDAW been implemented in the countries where it was ratified? Why have some countries – and notably the US – not ratified the Convention? What are the implications of that domestically and internationally? In sum, what can we learn by an international dialogue about the Convention, comparing the different contexts in which CEDAW was ratified or not, effectively implemented or not?

Author Meets their Critics

Session Organizer
Glenda BONIFACIO, University of Lethbridge, Canada, bonifacioglenda@gmail.com

Session in English

Not open for submission of abstracts.
RC32 members` new books are being presented and discussed.

Confronting De-professionalization, Deskilling and Inequality: Immigrant Women’s Alternative Strategies for Survival

Session Organizers
Patience ELABOR-IDEMUDIA, University of Saskatchewan, Canada, patience.elabor-idemudia@usask.ca
Guida MAN, York University, Canada, gman@yorku.ca

Session in English

Contrary to contemporary notions of universalism, liberalism, democracy and equality in a globalized world marked by massive movement of people internationally, immigrants of color continue to confront discrimination on the basis of race, class, gender, ability and religious affiliation.

In Canada for example, the selection of immigrants for admission based on the point system, has led to the impression that discrimination has been eliminated from the process with equality prevailing. The fact remains, however, that upon arrival in the country after going through the rigorous screening process, the foreign credentials of most immigrants, particularly those of minoritized women, are devalued resulting in their de-professionalization and deskilling. This results in their inability to become gainfully employed for self- actualization in the Canadian society.

This session will explore the social, political and economic dimensions of this trend as well as examine the survival strategies adopted by minoritized immigrant women for coping with their marginalized position in their newly adopted country. Specific focus will be placed on immigrant women from China, Nigeria/Ghana and India in the presentation.

Crisis, Transnational Migration, and the Gender Order in Europe

Integrative Session: RC31, Sociology of Migration, RC32 Women in Society, RC38, Biography and Society, German Sociological Association and European Sociological Association – RN 33, Research Network on Women and Gender Studies
Not open for submission of abstracts.

Gender and Work in a Global Context

Session Organizers
Shobha Hamal GURUNG, Southern Utah University, USA, gurung@suu.edu
Kumiko NEMOTO, Western Kentucky University, USA, kumiko.nemoto@wku.edu

Session in English

Modernization, democratization, and globalization have prompted many nations to make gender equality a political, economic, and social imperative. The emerging adoption of egalitarian policies, combined with the women`s movement`s wide exposure of local women`s low status, has promoted the participation of women in the labor force and the reconciliation of work and family life. However, gender inequality and sex segregation persist in formal and informal sectors; occupational and organizational institutions; and local and globalized market places.

The session invites papers that examine organizational, employment, labor, and workplace structures and processes that produce or reinforce inequality of gender, as well as the roles of actors such as workers and employers in mediating and shaping social and cultural outcomes of inequality in local and global contexts.

The session will deal with papers that illuminate gender, work, and inequality in contemporary contexts, focusing on either macro or micro processes, with local or comparative perspectives. We are interested in understanding the various shapes of gender inequality that intersect with cultural, economic, and policy factors.

This session hopes to investigate thoroughly the formal and informal, organizational, and cultural processes and mechanisms in which gender inequality is reinforced.

Gender in Sexual Minorities Research: Focus on Asian Scholarship

Session Organizers
Saori KAMANO, National Institute of Population and Social Security Research, Japan, s-kamano@ipss.go.jp
Day WONG, Hong Kong Baptist University, China, daywong@hkbu.edu.hk

Session in English

It is conventional academic wisdom that the world is unequal, but there is less attention on the inequality embedded in sociological knowledge on the world, such that certain topics remain marginalized and certain regions remain mostly an object of research than a source of scholarship. In the past decade, research on sexual minorities in and produced in Asia has gained some visibility in international interdisciplinary conferences and an explosion of publications.

Following in this trend, we aim in this session to bring together current sociological research generated in the Asian context addressing the intersection of gender with sexualities. This section seeks theoretical and empirical research that explores these and related questions: What does recent research in Asia and/or on Asian subjects tell us about the configuration of gender and the category “women”? How do heteronormativity, heterosexism, homophobia, male-domination, sexism, and binary thinking (e.g. male versus female) mutually constitute the experiences of “women” and “men” in the Asian context? What implications do recent lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer studies in Asia have on current understanding of gender inequality? How do social divisions based on class, ethnicity, nationality, colonial experiences, and politics intersect with the relationship between gender and sexual orientation?

In light of growing critiques of the Euro-American domination of sociology, this session aspires to destabilizing, and hence, enriching Sociology in general and in particular the field of gender, by giving voice to hitherto neglected research on sexual minorities in Asia.

Gender, Culture and Innovation in the Bio-Economy

Session Organizers
Cynthia JOSEPH, Monash University, Australia, cynthia.joseph@monash.edu
Josephine BEOKU-BETTS, Florida Atlantic University, USA, beokubet@fau.edu

Session in English

The significance of bio-technology and the emerging bio-economy to primary production, health and industry, as well as national and global economic outputs, has been well documented (OECD, 2012; Roy & Ong, 2011). Understanding the social, cultural and technical dimensions of this sector also provides valuable knowledge regarding higher-level skills (complex communication, analytical and problem-solving skills) that are vital for productivity growth, GDP and successful participation in the global bio-economy (Dutta 2012,OECD, 2012). The focus of this panel is professional and semi-professional women in the biotechnology sector, an untapped group of knowledge workers in the bio-economy and knowledge economy (OECD 2012).

The papers on this panel explore the ways in which social relations and power dynamics within the bio-technology sector shape women`s identities working in this sector and their access to resources and opportunities (e.g., promotion, appropriate mentoring, networking opportunities).

Women in the bio-technology sector are not just scientists and professionals; they carry their cultural identity (as members of ethnic and religious collectives), their gender roles, their familial roles, community roles with them into their biotechnology workplace. This panel also looks at how the occupational identities of women in the bio-technology industries are bound up with their interactions with technological/technoscience artefacts and the work culture in emergent industries. Increased participation of women in the science, technology and innovation sectors will lead to a greater influence in shaping responses to some of the major socio-economic and scientific questions which impact directly on the lives of women (for example, targeted therapies for breast cancer, gender-sensitive health research, ethno-pharmacy, management of plant biodiversity).

Gender, Violence, and Disaster: Rebuilding and Co-Construction through Participation

Session Organizers
Mieko YOSHIHAMA, University of Michigan, USA, miekoy@umich.edu
Azumi TSUGE, Meiji Gakuin University, Japan, tsuge@soc.meijigakuin.ac.jp

Session in English

In this session, findings from a number of empirical investigations of women’s experiences over the two years following the Great East Japan Disasters in March 2011, will be presented. These studies of varied methodologies, coupled with participant observations and community-based participatory workshops, will elucidate the extent to and the ways in which gender and various other sociocultural and structural forces interactively affect women’s experiences in/after disaster at the individual, organizational/professional, community, and societal levels; how women, individually and collectively, respond to and make meaning of loss and destruction caused by disasters; and how they begin to take action to address them.

This session will examine the social processes of loss and dislocation, as well as rebuilding and co-construction in the lives of women in the dynamic interaction of social, cultural, and political environments in Japan and globally.

Gender, Violence, Human Rights, Peace: Activist / Research from Different Parts of the World

Session Organizers
Bandana PURKAYASTHA, University of Connecticut, USA, bandana.purkayastha@uconn.edu
Akosua ADOMAKO AMPOFO, University of Ghana, Ghana, adomako@gmail.com

Session in English

This session will showcase current knowledge about gender, violence, human rights and peace. People’s ability to build lives of human dignity – which is the ultimate objective of human rights – requires conditions of peace. We are acutely aware that violence spans a continuum from wars to violence in intimate spaces. Much of this violence is gendered so that the effects of violence – the gamut from coercion to physical and sexual abuse – are unequally borne by women. Scholarly and activist discussions of peace and human rights are often directed to macro or micro level structures and cultures within societies.

Papers in this session will emphasize activist and research knowledge on peace, claims for human rights, and efforts to mitigate violence in the authors’ part of the world.

Gender, Work and Family under Globalized Economy: Asia and Beyond

Session Organizers
Esther Ngan-Ling CHOW, American University, USA, echow@american.edu
Yu-Hsia LU, Academia Sinica, Taiwan, luyh@gate.sinica.edu.tw
Shirley Hsiao-Li SUN, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, shirley.sun@nyu.edu

Session in English

The purpose of this session is to examine changing gender relations in connection with shifting employment conditions and family relations in globalized economies in Asia.

Global economic fluctuation and recession since preceding decades’ global economic restructuring and late 1990s’ financial crisis brought about the increasing deregulation and privatization in the labor market which has resulted in increasing insecurity in the work organization and employment relations. Informal, precarious, contingent and migration-based work are examples of changing employment practices. Petty entrepreneurship is another prominent strategy for local industries, especially in Asia, in coping with market’s uncertainty. Various patterns of discrimination, inequality and injustice accompanying with the changing work organizations, employment relations and practices are in fact directly linked to gender relations, power and control.

In addition, citizenship rights and regimes have various relationships with production and social reproduction and thus affect diverse men’s and women’s identities, experiences, agencies and lives differently. For example, some citizenship regimes emphasize “conditional citizenship”, where citizens’ access to state welfare depends on their full employment; while other regimes stress citizenship-rights, universal state support is provided based on citizen-status. Papers may address either how changes in paid or unpaid work affect gender relations within and across households or how changes in family structure and dynamic shape gender relations in the workplace and/or both.

We aim to contribute to a deeper and more holistic understanding of the interconnections among gender relations, economic production, and social reproduction in Asia and beyond. These interconnections may be further compounded by intersectionality of class, race, ethnicity, nationality and age in different socio-cultural contexts.

Theoretical works based on Asian experiences and comparative research between Asia and other regions are particularly welcome.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

Gender differences in entitlements
Employment relations by gender
Family, work and women’s agency
Gender dynamics in family business
Gender, citizenship, and flexible employment
Gender, employment & fertility
Gender, family, work & migration

Gendering BRICS: To what extent and how have Economic Growth and Economic Development been translated into Increased Gender Equality in Emerging World Economies?

Session Organizers
Bila SORJ, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, sorjbila@gmail.com
Solange SIMOES, Eastern Michigan University, USA, ssimoes@emich.edu

Session in English

In the last decade the five BRICS - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – gained increasing world recognition as emerging powers, distinguished by their large, fast-growing economies and significant influence on regional and global affairs. A lot of attention has been given to the fact that, as of 2013, the BRICS countries represent almost 3 billion people, with a combined nominal GDP of US$14.9 trillion. Not much has been said, however, about the impact of economic growth on the reduction of poverty and inequality in general, and we know very little about the extent to which economic growth has translated into greater development gender equality.

This session will look into the relationship between economic growth, development and gender equality in the BRICS countries by asking: What have been the gains for women in education, labor force participation, employment sector (formal/informal), type of work (paid/unpaid), equal pay, occupational desegregation, access to top level positions, and the domestic division of labor? To what extent have gains led to greater equality between gender and among gender (among women on the basis of class, race, and ethnicity)?

Moreover, moving beyond the description of the current domestic market and labor positions of women and men in the BRICS economies, this session will seek to develop a cross-country comparative approach, supported by empirical evidence, of the factors that might explain gender inequality within and among BRICS such as economic variables (development models, growth rates, gendered economic globalization processes), political-institutional factors (type of state, social policies, labor relations, women’s movements agendas and influence), and value orientations (traditional versus modern attitudes towards gender roles). In sum, to what extent and how do economic growth and economic development translate into increased gender equality in the BRICS?

Global Cities and Women’s Emotional Labor

Session Organizers
Marlese DURR, Wright State University, USA, marlese.durr@wright.edu
Iris E. HARVEY, Kent State University, USA, iharvey1@kent.edu
La Pearl LOGAN WINFREY, Wright State University, USA, lapearllogan.winfrey@wright.edu

Session in English

As women in the global North and South experience recurring socio-cultural and economic stalemates, the question arises whether we recognize the effects of emotional labor and emotional well-being on their lived experience. Do we understand the influence of socio-cultural traditions united with religiosity for these women? Do we recognize how aspects of daily life tie to and inhibit their emotional well-being? Are we aware and/or informed on exactly how contraction and expansion of the global labor market impacts women’s concerns with socio-cultural traditions and well-being?

And, finally, are we attentive to the linkages between emotional labor and well-being with stressful life events for women globally? Such questions address the social psychological status of women intertwined with ever-increasing social transformations and /or legislation for social change. We invite papers addressing these questions across social, national, and international contexts.

Topics may include: Gender and social psychological independence; emotional well-being and supplemental household income; religiosity, socio-cultural pressures inside and outside the home; women’s movements and emotional conflict; stressful life events for women as breadwinners; social transformation and women’s well-being.

Interrogating Gender and State in Local, National and Transnational Contexts

Session Organizers
Evangelia TASTSOGLOU, Saint Mary`s University, Canada, evie.tastsoglou@smu.ca
Margaret ABRAHAM, Hofstra University, USA, margaret.abraham@hofstra.edu

Session in English

Not open for submission of abstracts.
This invited session aims at discussing the role of contemporary states in regulating gender relations, gender identities and gendered institutions in local, national and transnational contexts. To what extent and how are states still key – players in regulating gender? What has been the impact of globalization, multiple and intersecting structures of inequality, technology, international human rights and social movements on states regulating gender? The family, law, violence against women, immigration, security, the military, but also the labor market and welfare are some of the instances where states have historically played key roles.

Latin American Women’s Agency and Resistance in a Globalized World. Acciones y resistencia de las mujeres latinoamericanas en un mundo globalizado

Session Organizers
Alicia I. PALERMO, Universidad Nacional de Luján, Argentina, apalermo@uolsinectis.com.ar
Alicia DAMBRAUSKAS, Ministerio de Educación y Cultura, Uruguay, adambrauskas@hotmail.com

Session in English/Spanish

During the five centuries of colonization of Latin America, women have been involved in multiple struggles for their people and their own rights, yet their stories, with few exceptions, have remained silent and invisible. An example of this during the Conquest was the “strike of wombs” episode by native Nicaraguan women who wanted to avoid giving slaves to the well-known oppressor Pedro Arias Dávila. This event is practically unknown. On the other hand, in relation to the symbolic position assigned to women, the sad story of Malinche is well known. She was the Aztec woman considered a traitor because as a slave, she became lover and translator of Hernán Cortés, her captor.

The male, western and white glasses through which we have looked at our historical vicissitudes have generated omissions, misrepresentations and forgetfulness that require the emergence of different perspectives in order to broad our horizon. Embarking on this quest we’re inviting research papers about women’s resistance and women’s movements in Latin America. The purpose of the session is to share, analyze and disseminate learning about different approaches striving to achieve equity.

The social movements of Latin American women, since the beginning of the 20th century have taken different forms in claiming rights, and facing discrimination and injustice. Nowadays, the globalized world under a market logic, far from improving the distribution of wealth, has consolidated differences, discrimination and injustice. Therefore, we want to underscore the need to collect the wide diversity of voices and experiences of Latin American women, historically and presently subjected to discrimination based on gender, class and ethnicity (among others), and to carry out this session as a forum to develop critical thinking and promote another globalization guided by the hope of transformation.

Durante los cinco siglos transcurridos desde el inicio del proceso de colonización de América Latina, las mujeres han sido protagonistas de múltiples luchas por sus derechos y los de sus pueblos, sin embargo sus historias, salvo excepciones, han permanecido en el silencio y la invisibilidad. Poco y nada se sabe de la “huelga de úteros” que realizaron indígenas nicaragüenses para no dar esclavos durante la conquista al sí muy conocido opresor Pedro Arias Dávila. En cambio, sugestivamente en relación al lugar asignado simbólicamente a las mujeres, sí ha tenido amplia difusión la triste historia de Malinche, indígena azteca identificada con la traición por haber sido entregada como esclava y oficiar de amante y traductora de Hernán Cortés.

Los cristales masculinos, occidentales y blancos con que hemos observado nuestra peripecia histórica han generado omisiones, tergiversaciones y olvidos que hicieron y aún hacen necesaria la emergencia de otras perspectivas que amplíen el horizonte de nuestra mirada. Es en esa búsqueda que invitamos a presentar investigaciones vinculadas a las múltiples formas que ha adoptado y adoptan en la actualidad la resistencia femenina y los movimientos de mujeres en Latinoamérica, a los efectos de compartir, analizar y difundir aprendizajes que estimulen el logro de la tan anhelada y postergada equidad de género.

Los movimientos de las mujeres latinoamericanas, desde inicios del siglo XX, han adoptado diferentes formas para reclamar el ejercicio de sus derechos, afrontando la discriminación y las injusticias. En el actual mundo globalizado bajo una lógica mercantil, que lejos de mejorar la distribución de la riqueza, ha consolidado las diferencias, entendemos relevante recoger la diversidad de voces y experiencias de las mujeres latinoamericanas, discriminadas por razones de género, clase y etnia (entre otras) y concebir esta sesión como una instancia para desarrollar una reflexión crítica y promover otra globalización signada por la esperanza de la transformación.

Looking at Inequalities through the Intersectional Prism: Potentialities and Challenges

Session Organizers
Bula BHADRA, University of Calcutta, India, bulabhadra@gmail.com
Laura CORRADI, University of Calabria, Italy, lauracorradi.sociol@gmail.com

Session in English

Feminist theories of intersectionality for the last 30 years focused on how categories of oppression such as like race, ethnicity, nationality, class, different abilities, age, sexuality and gender, do intersect (Davis 1983, Crenshaw, 1994, Collins, 1998, Wekker, 2004, Lykke, 2003, 2005, McCall, 2005, Verloo, 2006, Yuval-Davis, 2006, Meekosha 2010). The benefits of intersectional approaches are due to the fact that it can be applied to a broad range of research topics. Integrally connected to the concept of intersectionality is the question of power, Foucault (1973), introduced as procedures of exclusion and inclusion leading to multi-dimensional inequalities.

Within the frame of post-colonial theory such a vision of power has been deconstructed as embedded in western domination – as Annibal Quijano pointed out in La colonialidad del poder (1992). In spite of greater analytical and explanatory ability of intersectional approach, there is still a serious dearth of intersectional studies globally to address the complex problems of multifaceted inequalities of our times.

This particular session will address issues related to the complexity of intersectionality towards identities in transition; the debate about additive and transversal intersectionality. We’ll try to answer to questions like: how should we make intersectionality more ‘mainstream’? How can we combine intersectional approach and post-colonial ethics and politics? The task of de-colonizing sociology from dominant ideologies proposed by many authors (Mignolo 2011, Connell 2007) are urgent and necessary process for a foundation of global social sciences that do not replicate the center-periphery dichotomy and inequalities within our studies.

Negotiating Gender and Generation in Transnational Cultures

Session Organizers
Marilyn PORTER, Memorial University, Canada, mporter2008@gmail.com
Peruvemba JAYA, University of Ottawa, Canada, jaya.peruvemba@uottawa.ca

Session in English

This session brings together research areas that are often separate. There is interesting work being done throughout the world on the family structures and practices of different ethnic and cultural groups; on the impact of policies and practices of multiculturalism on families; on the ways generations of immigrant families interact and negotiate change. The approaches and the problems vary in complex ways in different countries and contexts.

In this session we encourage contributors using a feminist perspective to address aspects of the following: transnational migration; families and gender relations; the realities of multiculturalism policies and politics for families; and cultural and ethnic transmissions across generation.

The goal of this session is to develop a more sophisticated analysis of these topics and to highlight the relations between gender, race, class, ethnicity and cultural diversity.

The session especially encourages researchers looking to compare their work with that of others with the aim of developing fruitful research collaborations.

RC32 Awards / Reception

Session Organizer
Evangelia TASTSOGLOU, Saint Mary`s University, Canada, evie.tastsoglou@smu.ca

Not open for submission of abstracts.

RC32 Business Meeting

Session Organizer
Evangelia TASTSOGLOU, Saint Mary`s University, Canada, evie.tastsoglou@smu.ca

RC32 Roundtable Session I. Women’s Experiences in Labor Markets, Families and Households in Globalized Society

Session Organizer
Josephine BEOKU-BETTS, Florida Atlantic University, USA, beokubet@fau.edu

Session in English

RC32 Roundtable Session IA. Housewives at the Intersection of the Local, National and Global

Session Organizers
Ayse SAKTANBER, Middle East Technical University, Turkey, sakta@metu.edu.tr
F. Umut BESPINAR, Middle East Technical University, Turkey, bespinar@metu.edu.tr
A. Idil AYBARS, Middle East Technical University, Turkey, aybars@metu.edu.tr

Session in English

This roundtable aims to focus on the category of housewives with a view to understanding the way they shape and are shaped by the local, national and global transformations. These transformations reveal themselves best in the rise of different trends such as traditionalism, conservatism, nationalism and cosmopolitanism. While the question of housewives has often been conceptualized within the limits of the domestic sphere, they equally interact with the economic, social and political trends at the local and the global levels.

To approach the issue of housewives from such a broad perspective is necessary within the context of the changing balance between work and private domains, increasing global mobility, intensified technological transformation, as well as newly emerging political configurations. The agency of these women has generally been neglected by mainstream studies on this specific category. However, the changes in the political arena and social class configurations point to the importance of the agency of these women, who are often regarded as a ‘silent majority’.

The changing organization of politics, the altered experience of motherhood and work, the rapid dissemination of global markets, global meanings and global consumption patterns through technology and the new media, the impacts of cultural globalization, the changing perception of the self in its relationships with others, as well as the increasing horizontal and vertical movement and geographic mobility of women all imply that women from different class backgrounds now experience housewifery in different manners and dimensions.

The objective of this roundtable is to open up the possibility for new thinking on the experiences, practices and identities of housewives in a changing world.

RC32 Roundtable Session II. Women and Gender in an Unequal World

Session Organizer
Akosua ADOMAKO AMPOFO, University of Ghana, Ghana, adomako@gmail.com

Session in English

RC32 Roundtable Session IIA. Are White Collar Women Workers “Proletarianized” in the Globalized Economy?

Session Organizer
Aylin AKPINAR, Marmara University, Turkey, aakpinar@marmara.edu.tr

Session in English

Globalization has involved feminization but the actual form that this has taken has raised some conflicting interpretations. On the one hand it has been argued that the demand of higher levels of multi-skilled work would bring more women to the higher levels of the labour market. On the other hand it has been argued that women were still over-represented in lower-paid & lower quality non-standard work even if their numbers have increased. Some others have pointed to the fact that women workers were seen as semi-skilled and that they had less promotion chances.

According to other researchers white collar women workers had lost their autonomy in the workplace as a result of the impact of technology. Yet, it was agreed upon that under the global economy the role of the state was marginalized and as a result women were left by themselves to bargain for the conditions of their employment.

We are in need of knowledge of the working conditions and gendered experiences of white collar women workers. The feminization of the “call centre work” has been assessed to a certain extent. Yet, we are still in need of information about the women workers’ working conditions in finance & banking sectors, human resources & management sectors, insurance companies, research companies as well as in plazas and the like.

This roundtable aims to contribute to bring in empirically based research knowledge by calling in for papers under the questions which will be formulated within the framework of this important issue.

Social Transformation of the Middle East and the Shaping of Gender and Family Relationships

Session Organizers
Suaad Zayed AL-ORAIMI, United Arab Emirates University, s.aloraimi@uaeu.ac.ae
Nazanin SHAHROKNI, University of Berkeley, USA, nazanin@berkeley.edu
Rima SABBAN, Zayed University, United Arab Emirates, rima.sabban@zu.ac.ae

Session in English

The Middle East today is one of the fastest changing regions in the world. Change is becoming the rule to a certain extent more than stability and continuation. Family in the region has been a site of great changes, and significant adaptation as well.
This session proposes to look at social change in the region and its impact on the family from multiple perspectives: the inner-family perspective such as (family intimate relationships, gender relationships, gender roles, family domestic violence, changing family values, changing family structures, changing believes and so on); and the outer-family perspective where the outside world impact families and their ability to survive, adapt, and be sustained.
Some of the suggested impacts on the family could be those of social media and / or technological advancements. Changing ideologies and believes could be looked as the outer-family perspectives impacting the family. For example, feminism could be seen as an ideology which has shaped families and gender roles in the region.
Finally, the session examines ways in which victims of violence can utilize collective belief systems (feminism or other) as a tool for self and collective empowerment. When studying the family, this session focuses more on the gender dynamics of it, however it is not limited to it.

The Global Migration of Gendered Care Work

Integrative Session: RC02 Economy and Society, RC32 Women in Society and RC44 Labour Movements
Not open for submission of abstracts.

Thinking Gender on a World Scale: Prioritising Feminist Theory from the South

Session Organizers
Raewyn CONNELL, University of Sydney, Australia, raewyn.connell@sydney.edu.au
Laura CORRADI, University of Calabria, Italy, lauracorradi.sociol@gmail.com

Session in English

In sociology and gender studies we are familiar with ideas from the global North and less familiar with feminist research and theories from the rest of the world. Following the professional norms of sociology, we rarely frame our research and international discussions with ideas from the global South where the great majority of the world’s women live. Feminist sociologists such as Fatima Mernissi, in Morocco, and Teresita de Barbieri, in Mexico, offered new conceptual perspectives decades ago. Yet little of this kind of thinking gets general international recognition or circulation.

This situation is ripe for change. Chandra Talpade Mohanty has called for “Feminism Without Borders”, Chilla Bulbeck for “Re-Orienting Western Feminisms” and Valentine Moghadam discussed the reshaping of feminism by transnational networks. There is an international movement for a post-colonial revolution in social science, in Africa, South America and India, with active members within ISA.The workshop is intended to bring these issues together within RC 32.

We give priority to theory because of its strategic role in sociology. Speakers in the panel will be invited:

to present conceptual or strategic work on gender issues from their regions
to respond to such work from global South regions
to offer thoughts on the reshaping of global gender theory

Participants in the workshop will have time to interact with developing proposals. One outcome of the session will be practical suggestions to RC 32 about how to foster South/South exchanges in feminist sociology.

Women and the Economic Crisis: New Challenges and New Forms of Gender Inequalities

Session Organizers
Chrysanthi ZACHOU, American College of Greece, Greece, czachou@gmail.com
Laura MARATOU-ALIPRANTI, Athens University, Greece, alipran3@otenet.gr

Session in English

The recent economic crisis and the austerity measures imposed on several countries in Europe and other parts of the world, challenged women’s position in society and the labor market, undermined their rights, impeded the realization of their aspirations, reinforced existing gender inequalities and created new ones. This session aims to document the crisis’ impact concerning the nature of gender-based power imbalances and their ideological or structural basis. Through case studies or comparative research, it intends to address the consequences of crisis in economic and socio-cultural terms, for diverse categories of women both in the context of specific nation-states and across the globe, as they are experienced individually or collectively.

The submitted papers could focus on:

the special hardships encountered by different categories of women (occupational, social, class, age, racial /ethnic etc.)
the impact of declining standards of living, the dismantling of the welfare state and poverty on women’s social position
the (changing ) nature of gender relations and the ways in which identities become (re)negotiated
the differential patterns of male-female experience in the private or public sphere
new forms of displacement and migration
collective responses or activist commitment to the ‘cause’ of gender equality and social justice.

Given the growing scholarly interest on the economic crisis in national and global terms, this session intends to contribute to the discussion about the ways in which this crisis intersects with gender ideologies and creates structural inequalities and new challenges for women today.

Women in the Academic Workplace: Challenging the Dynamics of Gender, Power and Knowledge

Session Organizer
Smita VERMA, Isabella Thoburn College, India, smitten_yeah@yahoo.com

Session in English

Women`s underrepresentation within academic space continues to be a reality even in our days, after decades of struggle for gender equality. Although the patriarchal organization of the university has stimulated an ongoing dialogue among intellectuals in academia giving rise to activities challenging dominant male perceptions and gender segregation, women continue to be relatively excluded , and at best subjected to acts of tokenism in the name of equal representation.

Gender influences women`s experiences within the academy as faculty members, as well as the academy`s expectations of them. This calls for a serious dialogue to acknowledge and understand the hiatus between the reality of universities today and the expectations from women faculty in universities. Discussing issues of leadership, promotions, tenure, among others will help in identifying and understanding the distinct pattern of gender bias across cultures and also diverse degrees of disempowerment at different stages in the process and in different locations.

The session proposes to focus not just on the quantitative analysis but also the qualitative understanding of the subjective experiences of women in academia. It is important not just to acknowledge and discuss the diversity of marginalization but also delineate the dynamics of power and knowledge experiences, so as to challenge the monolithic and masculine university structure.

Work, Women, Class and Care: Working Women in Contemporary European Cities

Session Organizer
Evelyn MAHON, Trinity College, Ireland, emahon@tcd.ie
Maria KONTOS, Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany, kontos@soz.uni-frankfurt.de

Session in English

This session emanates from research on FLOWS – a European FP7 project on the impact of local welfare systems on women’s participation in the labour market which is generating rich accounts of women juggling work and childcare, and responding to the care needs of their elderly relatives in eleven European cities. The European social agenda strives to promote social inclusion and to reduce social inequality. But women within the European Union still participate in the labour market under different social welfare systems and employment conditions. Gendered care related issues persist within all class contexts so women’s revolution is still an incomplete one. Similarities and differences between women from different class positions are emerging.

This session invites papers on women’s commitment and orientation to work in different class positions, how they enact their roles as working mothers, the roles played by fathers, social networks, nannies, domestic help and access (or not) to affordable childcare. How do women in different classes and occupational groups negotiate a balance between their work and family lives and do welfare state care policies help to reduce class related inequalities between working women?

Joint Sessions

Click on the session title to read its description.

Representation and Restoration of Women’s Experiences: Navigating between Colonial History and Postcolonial Present in the Asian Context

Joint session of RC32 Women in Society and RC38 Biography and Society [host committee]

	International Sociological Association June 2013
	isa@isa-sociology.org

Research Committee onWomen in Society, RC32