This research applied Bourdieusian field theory to explain the forms of resistance exercised by single mothers exposed to the cultural and economic domination of Australian welfare-to-work policy. The mothers were affected by policy changes that reduced their social security benefit income and brought them into the field of activation policies. Unlike other studies focusing on well-being effects, this

This article draws on recent research (2017–20) into the livelihoods and imagined futures of rural youth in four communities in southern Nigeria. The research involved observations, sex-segregated focus group discussions and individual interviews. Taking up insights from sociologists of education and work, our analysis shows how rural youth simultaneously navigated schooling, farming, low-paid vocational

Sociological research has shown that marketized educational systems favour middle-class families’ self-segregation strategies through school choice and, consequently, the reproduction of their social advantage over poorer families. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu’s concepts of capitals, habitus and strategy, we analyse quantitative and ethnographic data on parents’ school choice from Chile to introduce

Debates about the state of Australian sociology have raged for as long as sociology has existed in Australia. Concerns about the discipline’s future may be inevitable for a critical, reflexive discipline, but to those entering the discipline, it is neither instructive nor productive to be subjected to lingering disciplinary anxieties. After more than fifty years, it is time to take stock of the differing

Self-management is widely promoted in Western health care policies as a way to address the impact of increasing rates of chronic conditions on health care systems. Mostly informed by psychological theories, self-management frameworks and interventions tend to target individual behaviours as demarcated from the many aspects of social life shaping these behaviours. Using Bourdieu’s theory of practice

One of the issues limiting prevention of elder abuse in Australia is lack of a strong evidence base to target social drivers of abuse, particularly ageism. This evidence gap is exacerbated by social discourses that perpetuate negative representations of older age as a time of vulnerability and physical decline, often in opposition to people’s actual experience of ageing. This article presents findings

This article reflects on a research project that has mapped the ways in which social enterprises in regional Australian cities produce wellbeing for their employees. The majority of enterprises in this study offer supported work opportunities to people with a disability while also running commercially viable enterprises delivering goods and services to regional communities. These enterprises demonstrate

This article suggests a new perspective on the political signification of riots, using the 2011 England riots as a case. The sociological literature tends to look for the political signification of riots in the riots themselves. Drawing on Michel Foucault’s notion of the dispositive, the article develops a new approach that analyses the optical grids in which riots are made visible as objects for thought

Community programs designed to train salon workers to address the issue of family violence are becoming increasingly commonplace. This article draws on interviews with trainees of one such program called HaiR-3Rs, run by the Eastern Domestic Violence Service (EDVOS) and launched in January 2018 in Victoria, Australia. HaiR-3Rs trains salon workers in recognising, responding to, and referring clients

In the 1970s, disabled people and other marginalised social groups battled an exclusionary Global North university. Disability Studies emerged from those struggles as epistemologies shaped around a Westernised understanding of disability and inequalities, based on dialectic visions of progress and subjective liberation. Today, the advance of neoliberalism in universities, and its connection with colonial

The arts and creative industries are among those most affected by government measures to contain the Covid-19 pandemic. This article discusses a qualitative survey study, open between August and October 2020, with creative arts workers living in Victoria, Australia. The study explored experiences of disruptions to work and broader impacts on daily lives during the pandemic. In this article, we examine

This article examines the hospitality practices of pro-migrant civil society organisations in Istanbul. Drawing from qualitative interviews, we focus on intersecting gendered, professionalised and faith-based aspects of pro-migrant activities and explore the ways that politically and morally charged ambivalences of hospitality practices are articulated and negotiated. Moreover, by contextualising Turkey’s

This article questions the diverse and, in some cases, contradictory ethical forms present in contemporary neoliberal policy frames. In particular, we analyse the demands of responsibility – as a form of ethical commitment – requested of parents by education policies in the contexts of Chile and Australia. Assuming neoliberalism as a contextualised and multivocal form of governing, we applied a policy

Contrary to approaching work and family as conflictual roles, a shift towards acknowledgement of the positive interaction between work and family has been detected. This research investigated whether married/cohabiting and divorced/separated parents differ in terms of work–family enrichment, considering their gender and relationship status after separation. Data from 3993 married/cohabiting and 1455

This article examines crime prevention practices in the Torres Strait Region (TSR), where relatively low crime rates challenge the association of discrete Indigenous communities with crime ‘problems’ and also test other criminological assumptions around crime. Drawing on 27 interviews with justice professionals and social workers in the TSR, we account for the resilience of a ‘shame culture’ in the

The title of this article is deliberately provocative aiming to trouble the imposition of identity fixations and reductive assumptions on creative endeavours and outputs. This article is based on a research project which investigated the identity negotiations and representational responsibilities of women visual artists of Muslim faith and/or cultural background practising and exhibiting their artwork

Existing commentary rarely systematically acknowledges racism in the Australian aged care field. This article begins to address this gap through a detailed focus on the experiences of 30 African migrant women workers, one of the fastest growing groups employed in aged care across Australia. Drawing on data generated through in-depth, semi-structured interviews, we argue that racist micro-aggressions

This article examines the role of legal frameworks and everyday interaction in the negotiation of religious diversity in Victoria, Australia. We argue that both formal legal frameworks and everyday interactions are significant in encouraging the respectful negotiation of religious difference. Experiences of historical privilege and visibility impact how religious people and groups experience and understand

Until recently, studies of hospitality have been less prominent within the broader context of studies of global mobilities. Yet, both are entangled. In this special section of the Journal of Sociology, we explore the effects of narratives of ‘migration crisis’ or ‘refugee crisis’ in contemporary, intersected global and local politics and studies of hospitality. In doing so, contributors bring hospitality

The Singapore government promulgated the Retirement and Re-employment Act in 2012 to promote extending working life. This article offers insight into the utility of Bourdieu’s conceptual framework of habitus, field and capital in exploring how older employees in Singapore adjust to re-employment. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 re-employed older persons consisting of four

A central tenet of the New Economic Sociology is that trust is a central factor in the sound functioning of markets. Previous research has mainly used a national-scale network approach to argue that personal relations generate trust in market relations. In contrast, this article shows, from a comparative perspective, how political structures influence consumer trust. First, using aggregate data, it

Despite the fact that plants make up 80% of biomass on Earth, sociology rarely examines human–plant relationships. Human societies are inherently dependent on plants, most obviously as the basis of food supply, ecosystems, atmospheric and climate regulation, and water cycles, as well as for sources of oxygen, medicine, fuel, and fibre. Society, or terrestrial animal life for that matter, could not

Existing quantitative research on sexual orientation and life satisfaction uses models with control variables that do not have a clear rationale. With a correct understanding of what control variables do, no controls are necessary to estimate the consequences of sexual orientation on life satisfaction. An analysis constructed from this perspective reveals gay and bisexual men in the UK and Australia

Rural places around the world share common issues related to their positioning outside social, political, and economic centres of power. More than simply tyranny of distance, many issues can be attributed to tyranny at distance: that is, the power of distant decision-makers to direct rural development from afar with little knowledge of rural contexts. In response to the challenge to progress a transformative

A scan of social research about rural New Zealand from the 1980s reveals power divisions which have muted the voices of ‘others’. Listening to these voices could transform how we manage the economy, sustain the environment and promote social well-being in future. Rural sociological attention in New Zealand has focused on the people and communities associated with land and resource-based assets, with

This article highlights a divergence between equivalent cultural practices undertaken by Calabrians in Italy and by individuals originating from Calabria living in Australia. It offers a reflexive framework on identity and authenticity. Previous research on a group of Calabrian-Australian families living in Australia found a widespread feeling among participants that they were ‘more Italian’ than the

This article explores how bushwalking in Tasmania, Australia functions as a performance of ‘everyday resistance’. ‘Everyday resistance’ refers to experiences of relationship with the nonhuman, through which individuals resist alienating and dominating forms of human–nonhuman engagements encouraged by central Western cultural narratives. The work of Tasmanian environmental activists is easily understood

Melbourne’s religious diversity is increasing. This article reveals distinctive new configurations of ethno-religious diversity arising from immigration and residential mobility at a fine spatial level in different parts of one of the world’s most cosmopolitan cities – Melbourne. Using the lens of super-diversity, we see beyond multicultural groups to intersections of diversities, and identify new

This article demonstrates how the availability of music platforms, the guidance of online tutorials and user-friendly affordances of software interfaces have democratised the making of electronic music. Software users traverse new forms of technology as part of their social and cultural selves, the confluence of musical affiliation and specific social media platforms supporting the production and exploration

The future of food and agriculture in Australasia will be defined by multiple social, economic, political and environmental tensions – with climate change and social inequalities playing a central role in the re-imagining of food systems in crisis. This article argues that rural sociology will continue to be well-served by the sociological research into the farming and food industries undertaken by

Australia’s history of negative child protection outcomes for children in state care highlights the sustained, systemic nature of serious harm. Situated in emerging conversations on structural challenges and state violence for parents involved in child protection systems, we trace the resources and barriers to responsive and ‘just’ child protection practice, highlighting how institutions can serve

Conditional welfare policies are frequently underpinned by pejorative representations of those they target. Vulnerable children, under physical or moral threat from their welfare-dependent parents, are a mainstay of these constructions, yet the nuances of this trope have received little focused attention. Through a discourse analysis of parliamentary debates at the introduction of compulsory income

This article sets out a more-than-human framework within which to explore the contribution of non-human matter to social inequality. Applying an approach based in Deleuzian ethology, we extend three invitations: to address the multiplicity and fluidity of dis/advantage, to explore its production in everyday interactions, and to acknowledge non-human as well as human matter in the emergence of dis/advantage

The resettlement of refugees in rural areas is presenting new challenges for healthcare. This article reports on a community-based participatory research project that explored understandings of health and care across the life course in a refugee-background community in regional south-east Australia. Participants identified key challenges, including lack of access to local services that address their

There has been a renewal of interest in the writing of national histories of sociology, with dozens of histories recently published in both the global North and South. Despite this, there has been a dearth of discussion about the methods and methodologies appropriate to such a task. Indeed, few histories of sociology, and fewer still national histories of sociology, explicitly address methodology.

In reflecting on the last two decades of publications by Australian rural studies scholars in three major disciplinary journals, this article argues that the field of Australian rural sociology has failed to address racial inequality and class difference. While we note a burgeoning of feminist rural research challenging the historical emphasis on the white male farmer, this too has tended to occlude

Airbnb is emblematic of a set of business practices commonly known as ‘the sharing economy’. It is a disruptive business model of homestay accommodation that has exploited conditions of growing precarity of work since 2008. Work precarity is particularly evident in regional tourist areas in New Zealand, which historically experience seasonal, part-time work and low wages. Airbnb draws specifically

Suicide prevention occurs within a web of social, moral, and political relations that are acknowledged, yet rarely made explicit. In this work, I analyse these interrelations using concepts of moral and political economy to demonstrate how moral norms and values interconnect with political and economic systems to inform the way suicide prevention is structured, legitimated, and enacted. Suicide prevention

In the last quarter of the 20th century the study of globalisation was refined in many ways and especially in the direction of conceptualising the connections, entanglements and interdependencies of the global. An array of terms arose to capture these complexities, many containing the suggestion of superseding the nation. The terms ‘post-national’ and ‘cosmopolitan’ are two fields that have come to

The term ‘post-national formations’ is a product of some of the recent work of Jürgen Habermas. In using this term, Habermas highlights what he regards as a laudatory trend in social and political research. This is the trend away from an intense focus on the role of nation-states – a role he believes to be unconducive to progressive politics – and towards a focus on the role of new configurations –

With the changing ethnic composition of the Australian population there has been a growing number of patients requiring transfusions of rarer blood types. People from ethnic minority groups are generally less likely to donate blood and this can lead to shortages for some patients from these communities. In this article we report the findings of a qualitative study of ethnic minority blood donors in

Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, all hopes are turned towards science. In this article, we put forward a qualitative analysis of how the French national press covered the issue of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine during the first months, with a focus on the descriptions of the scientific world. We show that during epidemic outbreaks the various tensions existing within the scientific

Using data from a random stratified sample of people over 18 years of age residing in Australia, this article examines participants’ opinions of the Islamic faith independently of their opinions of Muslim people. Earlier studies have not made the nuanced distinction between opinions about Islam as a religion and opinions about Muslims as people. Theoretical approaches suggest that there is a difference

This article is based on ethnographic fieldwork in an Italian reception centre for male ‘unaccompanied minors’. Drawing on the concepts of ‘hostipitality’ (Derrida), the Black Mediterranean, and ‘intimate citizenship’ (Plummer), we examine the political ambivalence of hospitality for young African men as they transition to adulthood and how this is experienced through the intersections of age, gender

Since 2015, the notion of hospitality has been a guiding principle and a key demand for individuals and organisations that provide direct support to refugees in Europe. Through a set of interviews conducted with volunteers active in the Refugees Welcome movement in Britain, France and Italy, this article explores the motivations and experiences of individuals who practise (private) hospitality by hosting

This article examines how hope for a different culture of hospitality has been articulated during the long summer of migration of 2015 in Germany by juxtaposing Angela Merkel’s ‘Wir schaffen das’ speeches with the cross-border migrant March of Hope. The article suggests that while Merkel’s rhetoric opens the horizon to a more hospitable Europe, her policies of humanitarian securitisation ultimately

Social and cultural capital are valuable assets that assist individuals to succeed in work. This article reports on gender segregation in the skilled trades. We use Bourdieu’s theory of capital to illuminate how women are successfully recruited and retained in the skilled trades. Our findings indicate that women with pre-existing forms of capital are advantaged. Notably tradeswomen utilise masculine

Social needs are universal and their fulfilment is considered to be a prerequisite for happiness and well-being. Currently, the assertion that income or revenue alone are insufficient to explain inequality of well-being and happiness in the evaluation of social policies is becoming ever more widespread in the social sciences. Therefore, numerous quantitative metrics mostly based on univariable scales

My goal in this article is to reconsider current ideas of globalisation, and of the relations between nature and society, by looking at two theoretical programmes of the past four decades. I start by reconsidering Ulrich Beck’s theory of risk society and highlight some of its core strengths and weaknesses. I then revisit more recent debates on the Anthropocene and unpack some key dimensions. There

This article interrogates how the concept of critical consciousness applies to racialised subjects’ lived experiences when attempting to resist racialisation and racism within Australian society. We first demonstrate the incongruence between the theoretical conceptualisation of critical consciousness-raising and its practical application for racialised subjects, examined through the concept of the

This article develops a theoretical framework to understand how sexuality can be institutionalised through debates about marriage equality. We first examine 13 Australian sporting organisations concerning their support for marriage equality and sexual minority inclusion before showing they drew cultural capital from supporting episodes of equality exogenous to their organisation, while failing to promote

Victims, criminals, and survivors – these are dominant ways in which the media portrays communities affected by disasters. These portrayals are not benign. They present a deficient form of citizenship that reduces communities to disempowered subjects whose agency can only be realised with humanitarian responses or disciplinary action by the state. In this article, we make a case for portraying disaster-affected

The power of nationalism is evident in how people perceive the world around them as ‘normal’. A national normality is constituted through education and media but also in everyday encounters with the state or state-regulated institutions in the fields of education, welfare provisions, medical care, finance and others. When people migrate between countries, their sense of ‘normality’ can become disturbed

Facebook is the most used social media platform globally, despite frequent and highly publicised criticism of some of its practices. In this article, we bring together perspectives from vital materialism scholarship – and particularly Jane Bennett’s concept of ‘thing-power’ – with our empirical research on Australian Facebook users to identify what they find important and valuable about the platform

Research within literatures on multiculturalism and cosmopolitanism has moved beyond studying the institutional basis and discursive negotiations of differences towards an understanding of the embodied and practical dimensions of everyday social interactions. An emergent literature has also started to consider the role of vibrant material agents, atmosphere, and their environmental contexts in understanding

In this commentary piece, I combine insights gained from the various contributions to this special issue with my own research and understanding to trace the (dis)connections between, on the one hand, (post-)nationalism and its underlying concept of belonging and, on the other hand, cosmopolitanism and its underlying concept of becoming. I pay special attention to the human (im)mobilities mediating

Motherhood can bring joy and enrichment but may also be associated with stress leading to poor health outcomes and low life satisfaction. Young mothers are a group particularly at risk of adverse outcomes, including increased social, economic, and health disadvantage following early entry to motherhood. This article reports results from a mixed-method study examining variations in levels of social

From the perspective of a final year physical education and sport and exercise science undergraduate student, this article explores the relationship between learned and lived experiences related to the body. The research uses an autoethnographic approach that focuses on the educational and social issues that the first author faced as his physical identity changed. The author reflects on the ways in

Academic debate around the need for global cooperation, the anachronism of national borders, and the necessity of nurturing a cosmopolitan ethic of care for all, has strengthened over the last two decades, but it is unclear the extent to which the general population has embraced such ideas. This article explores Australians’ perspectives using data from a series of projects investigating whether Australians

We investigated women’s hiring patterns in academia, bridging the gap between two streams of literature typically not brought in conversation with one another: (1) access to tenured professorship by gender; (2) academic mobility and the disadvantage it can create for women. We studied all recruitments of new permanent associate and full professors by open call from 2007 to 2017 at one faculty of the