Just published, three new papers.
My re-thinking of hegemony and masculinity in the light of colonial and postcolonial relations. It’s part of an impressive issue of a French journal about hegemony in gender relations, you’ll find it at: http://gss.revues.org/3363
My re-thinking of hegemony and masculinity in the light of colonial and postcolonial relations. It’s part of an impressive issue of a French journal about hegemony in gender relations, you’ll find it at: http://gss.revues.org/3363
Reference: Connell, Raewyn. 2015. Hégémonie, masculinité,
colonialité. Genre, sexualité & société [En ligne],
13 | printemps 2015, mis en ligne le 01 juin 2015. URL :
http://gss.revues.org/3429 ; DOI : 10.4000/gss.3429.
Abstract. This paper raises questions about
hegemony in gender relations, in the light of the global sociology of
knowledge, postcolonial studies of masculinities, and politics of gender
reform. It argues for an approach
that highlights global power relations, the colonial disruptions of gender
orders, and the varying hegemonic projects for masculinity formation that
attempt to stabilize gender relations in always-uncertain circumstances.
In
the same vein, the paper on southern perspectives in feminist theory, which was
behind the Feminist Theory annual
lecture in London which you will find on video here.
Reference: Connell, Raewyn. 2015. Meeting at the edge of fear:
theory on a world scale. Feminist Theory,
vol. 16 no. 1, 49-66.
Abstract: Rich and sophisticated analyses of gender have been produced
around the postcolonial world. But the theory in this work gets little
recognition in the current global economy of knowledge. Feminist theory needs
an understanding of the coloniality of gender, seeing the gender dynamic in
imperialism and the significance of global processes for the meaning of gender
itself. The agendas of feminist theory are being re-shaped on issues that
include constitutive violence, power and the state, identity, methodology, and
the land. An alternative structure of knowledge is emerging that can re-shape
the global terrain of feminist theory and its connections with practice.
The
title comes from this poem by Saleha Obeid Ghabesh:
The
evening will be under my disposal
and
the meeting at the edge of fear is mine
I
am another Buthayna
perfume
springs from me
as
well as love and diaspora
Next, my rethinking of gender and social justice has
just been released in Portuguese in a social science journal from Brasil. You can access it online: http://cascavel.ufsm.br/revistas/ojs-2.2.2/index.php/seculoxxi/article/view/17033
Reference: Connell, Raewyn. 2014. Questões de
gênero e justiça social. Século XXI,
Revista de Ciéncias Sociais, vol. 4 no. 2, 11-48.
Abstract: Questions
of identity, and deconstructionist methods, have characterised gender theory in
the global North in recent decades.
But the key issues about gender in the global South are social issues,
which require a different approach to understanding gender. Social theories of gender and justice
now recognize the multiple dimensions of gender issues, such as organization,
violence, recognition and problems of embodiment. We move beyond dichotomies to questions of change,
multiplicity (e.g. of masculinities) and the different gender orders across the
world. As the pioneering work of
Heleieth Saffioti showed, gender analysis deals with large-scale
structures. The dominant economy
of knowledge privileges theory from the global North. But increasingly we recognize the coloniality of gender and
the gender analysis that come from the post-colonial majority world. This includes different approaches to
identity, to power and the state, and new thematics such as the relation
between gender and the land. In
developing the gender perspectives that are needed for the pursuit of gender on
a world scale, South/South relations will be vital.
Good
colleagues at the University of Sydney have produced a book of provocative
essays on contemporary issues in education. I have a piece in it on the market agenda in education and
how it can be opposed:
Reference: Connell, Raewyn. 2015. Markets all around: defending education in a neoliberal
time. Pp. 181-197 in Helen
Proctor, Patrick Brownlee and Peter Freebody, ed., Controversies in Education: Orthodoxy and Heresy in Policy and Practice.
Cham: Springer.
Opening:
In this chapter I will not be proposing
a heresy about education. My idea
of education is so orthodox it is almost boring. But I will be proposing a heresy about education policy – a heresy in defence of
education. Australian education
has been reshaped, over the last generation, by a cascade of policy and
organizational changes. They have
been introduced separately and by different governments, but have all, with
hardly any exceptions, increased the grip of market logic on schools,
universities, and technical education...
Finally,
two pieces on the making of social science in Australia. The first is based on my keynote
address at the 50th anniversary conference of TASA, the Australian
Sociological Association.
Reference: Connell, Raewyn. 2015. Setting sail: the making of
sociology in Australia, 1955-75. Journal
of Sociology, vol. 51 no. 2, 354-369.
Published online May 2014, DOI: 1177/1440783314532174, jos.sageput.com.
Abstract. This paper examines the
knowledge-creation project called Sociology that was launched in Australia
between 1955 and 1975. An
energetic founding group created a network of departments, assembled a
workforce, and were rewarded with rapid growth. Their intellectual project emphasised data collection,
scientificity and social reform, closely modelled on sociology in the global
metropole. Underneath was a mostly
functionalist concept of ‘a society’ and a strong conviction that Australian
Society was a case of modernity.
They succeeded in creating an empiricist science, which played a role in
Australian reformism in the 1970s and 80s, and reached a high point in the work
of Jean Martin. However many younger sociologists were dissatisfied with the
founders’ science, and launched other knowledge projects in the following
decades. The founders’ strategy
for making sociology in Australia led to a deep contradiction about Australian
coloniality, unresolved in contemporary sociology.
And
with perfect timing, this was published not long before the release of the
biography of Professor Jean Martin, Australian pioneer of sociology, multiculturalism
and women’s presence in higher education.
I was invited to write the Foreword to the book and was very pleased to do so.
Peter Beilharz, Trevor Hogan
and Sheila Shaver, The Martin Presence:
Jean Martin and the Making of the Social Sciences in Australia, Sydney,
NewSouth Publishing, 2015.
You can find details online
here: https://www.newsouthbooks.com.au/books/martin-presence/