The Department of Sociology Welcomes Two New Faculty Members!
In 2009, we welcome two new faculty members to the Department of Sociology. Luisa Farah Schwartzman and Erik Schneiderhan join the faculty as Assistant Professors of Sociology at UTM in the areas of Race and Ethnicity, and Sociological Theory respectively.

  Luisa Farah Schwartzman did her PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she specialized in the areas of social stratification and race and ethnicity. She is generally interested in understanding how subjective understandings of social categories are affected by – and also help reproduce -- social structures, and how these relationships vary cross-nationally. Her recent work has examined how Brazilian racial classification and boundary-dynamics matter for our understanding of the reproduction of racialized inequality, and for assessing the effectiveness of policies aimed at attenuating racial disparities. She is currently involved in two co-authored projects. One project examines how affirmative action policies get re-interpret and localized as they are implemented in Brazil. The other project uses longitudinal data to examine how children of immigrants that came to the U.K. in the 1970s classify themselves in recent censuses.

 Erik Schneiderhan completed his PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in August of 2009. He specializes in historical sociology, political sociology, sociological theory, public policy, deliberation, and African Studies. Professor Schneiderhan currently has two substantive research interests:  the sociological study of deliberative processes and the study of social provision in the United States and Canada during the nineteenth century.  He is also currently in the early stages of research examining how families deliberate on care giving for family members with Alzheimer’s.  In particular, he is interested in deliberations concerning the placement of individuals in residential supervised care. Professor Schneiderhan completed his dissertation on Jane Addams, Hull House and the provision of care in the U.S. in 1870-1908.
 

Congratulations to Lisa Kaida, whose sole-authored paper, "Pathways to Economic Mobility for Immigrants in ‘Bad’ Jobs" won the Best Student Paper Award from the Canadian Population Society for papers submitted to the CPS 2009 annual meeting, held in May 27-29 in Ottawa, Ontario. This is the second CPS Best Student Paper award for Lisa. In her recent paper, Lisa examines the effects of education and language training on the exit from low wages among recent immigrants to Canada. Her sophisticated multivariate analysis of the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada finds that recent immigrants do move out of low wages with additional investment in their skills within four years after arrival. This finding has important policy implications, notably that education and language training in the host country can provide newcomers pathways to economic advancement even if many of them initially face challenges in transferring their pre-existing skills in the Canadian labour market. The paper is part of Lisa's  dissertation, "Pathways to Successful Economic Integration: The Dynamics of Low Income and Low Wages among New Immigrants to Canada,"  which is being completed with Professors Monica Boyd, Cynthia Cranford, and John Myles serving as members of the dissertation committee. 

Congratulations to Phillipa Chong, recipient of the 2009 Canadian Sociological Association’s Best Student Paper Award!

Congratulations to Phillipa Chong whose paper, "Race, Ethnicity, Nation, and Worth: How literary critics use authors' race and ethnicity as tools for critical appraisal" was selected for the 2009 Best Student Paper award by the Canadian Sociological Association.  This national award recognizes an exceptional student-authored paper, presented at the Annual Meeting of the CSA, and judged by the CSA Awards Committee to be the best paper in the competition.  In her study, Phillipa examined how the race and ethnicity of authors influenced the way literary critics interpreted and evaluated their novels.  Based on analysis of 267 fiction reviews from the NY Times and the New Yorker magazine, Phillipa found that the race and ethnicity of non-white and non-Anglo writers was often used as an interpretive lens for understanding the significance of the novels.  In contrast, the race/ethnicity of white-Anglo writers was largely seen as irrelevant for discussing their literary works.  She concludes with comments on how prevailing ideas about racial and ethnic difference in the United States are mobilized to inform ideas about literary difference.  Phillipa’s paper was developed for the 2nd-year graduate research practicum.

Congratulations to the faculty members receiving research grants from federal granting agencies in 2009!

A number of our faculty members are beginning new and exciting research projects in 2009.  The following six projects were recently awarded funding from one of Canada’s major funding agencies.

• Monica Boyd, Social and Economic Integration of Immigrant Children and Young Adults (SSHRC Standard Research Grant)
• Ronit Dinovitzer, The Stratification of the Legal Profession in Canada (SSHRC Standard Research Grant)
• Adam Green, Keeping Gay and Bisexual Men Safe: A History of HIV Prevention Work in Toronto (CIHR operating grant)
• Kelly Hannah-Moffat and Paula Maurutto, Customized Knowledges: Risk, Diversity and Gender in Specialized Courts (SSHRC Standard Research Grant)
• Anna Korteweg, Politics, the Media and Immigrant Integration Debates in the Netherlands, Germany and Canada (SSHRC Standard Research Grant)
• Candace Kruttschnitt, Testing the narrative of penal change: the conditions of confinement in the Netherlands and the UK in the 21st century (SSHRC Standard Research Grant)  

Congratulations to recent Ph.D. Graduate, Bernie Hogan, on receiving the Dordick Dissertation Award from the Communication and Technology Division of the International Communication Association!

Bernie's dissertation is entitled "Networking in Everyday Life". In it, he contends that the use of multiple media in everyday life make social interaction more complicated and uncertain than before. This is because individuals can now adopt one of many different styles of communication, some of which focus primarily on email, mobile phones, social network software or in-person contact.

The result of this differentiation is that while individuals might be able to maintain contact with more friends and acquaintances in principle, in practice individuals end up contacting those who are the most socially accessible. That is, people do not necessarily use this media to optimize contact with their emotionally closest ties, but end up contacting people who are either the most active/vocal, nearby and best connected.

As individuals adopt these new media, they undermine existing and longstanding social norms of  public and private spaces (or public and private time) without offering a coherent normative framework as a substitute. This situation leads to what he refers to as the "paradox of convenience", whereby each media is adopted because of the convenient features it offers. But the unintended consequence is that since different people use these media to different extents it makes life more inconvenient.  Instead, individuals are "differentially accessible" via each medium, with few obvious cues available for determining who is available by what medium and when.

Data for this study comes from 350 random-sample surveys and 86 follow-up social network-oriented interviews in East York, a former borough on the east side of downtown Toronto, Canada. The data were collected in 2005, before the widespread adoption of social networking software, but after the widespread adoption of cellular telephones, instant messaging services and email.

A copy of Bernie's dissertation can be downloaded from:
http://individual.utoronto.ca/berniehogan/Hogan_NIEL_10-29-2008_FINAL.pdf

Congratulations to Aysan Sev’er, Professor of Sociology and General Editor of Women’s Health and Urban Life

The scholarly journal Women’s Health and Urban Life has recently received operating funds from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research. The journal, which circulates twice a year with both a small print run and as an open-access electronic resource, has been publishing high quality social research related to women’s health in urban settings since 2002. As General Editor, Professor Sev’er’s passion, diligence and commitment to excellence were instrumental in establishing the journal and bringing it forward as a new and useful forum for international and interdisciplinary research. http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~womenshealth/contents7.2.html 

Employment Opportunities

Mississauga Campus

Full time tenure stream Assistant Professor - Socio-Legal Studies and/or Criminology

2009 Fall Session Emergency Course Instructor Position

SOC 365H5F - Gender Relations

Emergency Teaching Position 

St. George Campus

Mississauga Campus

SOC 345H5F-Special Topics in Sociology

Scarborough Campus

SOC B05H3 F - Logic of Social Inquiry

Winter 2010

St. George Campus

SOC 204HS Qualitative Methods

SOC 256H1S - Lives and Societies

SOC 303H1S - Family Demography

Soc 382Y1S - Social Issues

Soc 348HS -  Sociology and Emotions

Application Form (PDF)

Click here for How to apply?

Professor Emeritus Raymond Breton named Officer of the Order of Canada

  Congratulations to Professor Emeritus Raymond Breton, named an Officer of the Order of Canada.  The Order of Canada is the centrepiece of Canada’s honours system. The title of Officer recognizes a lifetime of achievement and merit of a high degree, especially in service to Canada or to humanity at large.  Dr. Breton received this honour for his “contributions to the advancement of sociology and to the understanding of the impact of multiculturalism and linguistic diversity on Canadian society”.

Dr. Breton is an expert on the ethnic and linguistic diversity in Canadian society.  He is most known for his work on his work on French-English relations in Canada, examining the social origins of Quebec's Quiet Revolution, the different forms of English-Canadian and Quebec nationalism, the relationship between linguistic and regional divisions, and the dynamics of recurring constitutional crisis. Breton's writings on ethnic relations related to immigration consider the dynamics, political nature, and impact of immigrant ethnic communities and the origins of multiculturalism. He also explores the integration of immigrant ethnic communities across linguistic boundaries and the status of Aboriginal Canadians. Breton has made singular contributions to our understanding of who we are as Canadians, and what forces have shaped our cultural landscape.

Professor Breton was an active member of the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto from his arrival in 1969 until his retirement in 1992.  In addition to his role as a teacher, mentor, and role model to students and colleagues alike, Dr. Breton introduced numerous innovations both for the governance of the discipline and for the structure of graduate and undergraduate training.  In so doing, he has been a true “institution-builder,” recognizing and reinforcing the role played by institutions in structuring and supporting scientific research on social issues.