Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology

Postdoctoral Fellow in Sociology and Social Demography

The Department of Sociology, University of Oxford is seeking to appoint a Postdoctoral Researcher to work on the project ‘Critical Life Events and the Dynamics of Inequality: Risk, Vulnerability, and Cumulative Disadvantage’. This is a transnational research programme involving four institutions: University of Amsterdam, University of Oxford, Stockholm University and the University of Lausanne. The project will run until 2020 and is funded by a Euro NORFACE DIAL grant.

The project’s main objectives are to understand (1) how job loss and union dissolution contribute to the accumulation of (dis)advantage over life course: (2) what mechanisms explain the (unequal) impact of these events: and (3) which work and family policies are effective in targeting these mechanisms in order to reduce inequality.

Working with Professors Christiaan Monden and Erzsebet Bukodi, the Postdoctoral Researcher will take the lead on analysing the prospective 1958 and 1970 birth cohort studies, and also investigate linkages to study outcomes earlier in life.

The successful candidate will hold or expect to obtain a PhD in sociology, demography, economics, social statistics, social policy or some related discipline. Strong grounding in quantitative research methods (methods for longitudinal data analysis, in particular), demonstrated by published (or accepted) research papers in academic journals, with evaluation judged relative to career stage, and a knowledge of the broadly defined subject area – inequalities over the life-course.

The post is full-time, on a fixed-term contract for 36 months starting as soon as possible.

Applications, including a covering letter, CV and the names of three referees, should be submitted by 12:00 noon on November 3, 2017.

Either Money or Manpower: Gender Inequality and Men’s and Women’s Unpaid Labor Migration in Nepal

“Either Money or Manpower”
Gender Inequality and Men’s and Women’s Unpaid Labor Migration in Nepal
Ande Reisman, Doctoral Candidate, Department of Sociology
November 8, 3:30 PM
CMU 226

Labor migration is a common household survival strategy in developing regions and, as a result, it is increasingly common to have families “left behind” by a migrant. What happens in a context with high gender inequality when men leave? Do customarily male spaces open up to women? What effect does this have on gender equity? This presentation explores the gendered social consequences of male labor migration on the wives of migrants who stay behind through enthographic fieldwork in rural Nepal.

Population Health Initiative: Mobile/Digital Health Networking Event

Population Health Initiative
Mobile/Digital Health Networking Event

Mobile and digital technologies hold great promise for enabling innovative research that is relevant to population health. The Population Health Initiative is therefore hosting a networking event for researchers who have an interest in using or developing mobile and digital technologies to solve pressing problems in health that are influenced by medical, environmental, educational and socioeconomic factors.

You will take part in a facilitated conversation with University of Washington researchers across various disciplines. The goal of the meeting will be to help you find new collaborators, either to enrich an ongoing research project or to develop new avenues of research.

Investigators who have experience in developing mobile and digital technologies as well as those who wish to explore the use of these technologies in their research are welcome to attend.

Date: Thursday, November 9

Time: 1:00-2:30 PM

Location: Suzzallo Library (Smith Room, 3rd floor, Room 324)

Attendance is free, but seating is limited. Please RSVP through the link below if you wish to attend.

https://is.gd/mobile_digital_networking

MAGH Speaker Series: The Trouble with Circles – Monrovia’s Ebola Quarantine and the Future of Armed Humanitarianism

“The Trouble with Circles: Monrovia’s Ebola Quarantine and the Future of Armed Humanitarianism”
Daniel J. Hoffman, Associate Professor of Anthropology, University of Washington
Wednesday, November 1, 2017
3:30-4:50 PM
Kane Hall, Room 110

Abstract: In August 2014, at the height of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, Liberian health and security forces instituted an emergency armed quarantine around West Point, one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods. When West Point residents protested, security forces fought back, killing one person and injuring many others. West Point is an extreme case. But events leading up to the quarantine, and the lessons being drawn from it, point toward a troubling future in which the line between humanitarian intervention and urban warfare is further eroded.

Daniel J. Hoffman is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Washington. His research has focused on the ways young men participate in various networks that offer them work, such as in resource extraction industries or on the battlefield. In his work and teaching, Hoffman uses visual anthropology and literary ethnography to debunk stereotypical representations of violence in West Africa. Hoffman’s work has been published in Cultural Anthropology, Anthropological Quarterly, and African Affairs, among many other journals. In 2011, Duke University Press published his book “The War Machines: Young Men and Violence in Sierra Leone and Liberia.” His second book, “Monrovia Modern: Urban Form and Political Imagination in Monrovia” (Duke University Press), is scheduled for publication in November 2017.

Next speaker: 8 November– Julius Doyle – PhD Candidate, University of Washington

“Dissertation Research: The Health Effects of Resilience among Black American Men in Metropolitan Seattle”

For more information about the MAGH Seminar Series, please contact coordinator Marieke van Eijk (mariev2@uw.edu)

New Developments in American Job Quality: Understanding the Recent Rise of Low-Wage Jobs and Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Call for Articles

RSF: THE RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION JOURNAL OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

Issue on:
New Developments in American Job Quality: Understanding the Recent Rise of Low-Wage Jobs and Nonstandard Work Arrangements

Edited by
David R. Howell, The New School
and
Arne L. Kalleberg, University of North Carolina

The question of job quality has emerged as a key challenge for researchers and policy-makers in the 21st century. The growing realization that the quality, not just the quantity, of jobs is central to addressing a myriad of social and economic problems—such as economic development, family formation and social integration, poverty and inequality, and individual well-being—has put this age-old topic on the front burner for social scientists.

This issue of RSF will focus on two important dimensions of the quality of jobs created in the past three decades in the United States. First, there has been an expansion of low-wage jobs, a phenomenon that has been documented by numerous studies, many of which have been sponsored by the Russell Sage Foundation. This proliferation of low-wage work, especially among younger workers, has contributed to the weakening of the middle class, reversing the dramatic improvements experienced by the middle of the income distribution in the three decades following World War II (Sullivan, Warren and Westbrook 2001; Appelbaum, Bernhardt and Murnane 2006).

Second, there has been a dramatic increase in nonstandard jobs such as temporary help agency workers, on-call workers, contract workers, and independent contractors or freelancers. Many of these jobs are uncertain, unstable and insecure, in which employees bear most of the risks of work (as opposed to businesses or the government) and receive limited social benefits and statutory protections (e.g., Kalleberg 2011). Recent studies document an increased incidence of alternative work arrangements, especially among workers hired through contract firms (Weil 2014; Katz and Krueger 2016). While some nonstandard jobs may be good ones—such as well-paid consultants who have high control over the terms and conditions of work—most such jobs are characterized by low pay, low security, and poor working conditions.

Low-wage and nonstandard jobs are interconnected. In both types, workers typically receive few employment-related benefits. They also often lack statutory protections in the form of labor laws and benefits such as health insurance and pension contributions that some employers provide. Moreover, workers in low-wage and nonstandard jobs often tend to be the most vulnerable members of the labor force such as racial and ethnic minorities, women, immigrants and undocumented workers. While nonstandard jobs often pay low wages, low-wage jobs are also increasingly found in “standard” employment relations. The shifting of risks from employers to workers has reduced protections for standard workers too, leading to declines in their quality.

This journal issue aims to bring together papers that examine three main topics related to job quality in the United States: the causes of the increase in low-wage and nonstandard jobs; their impacts on workers and their families; and policies that are needed to enhance the quality of low-wage and nonstandard jobs.

Michael Esposito and Victoria Sass Present at 3rd Annual Interdisciplinary Population Health Research Conference

CSDE Fellow Michael Esposito and Trainee Victoria Sass presented papers at the 3rd Annual Interdisciplinary Population Health Research Conference “Improving Population Health: Now, Across People’s Lives, and Across Generations to Come,” which took place from October 2-4 in Austin, Texas. Esposito–the recipient of one of CSDE’s four individual Interdisciplinary Association for Population Health Science (IAPHS) memberships–presented the paper “Race, Place and Deaths Involving Suicide,” which he co-authored with affiliate Hedwig Lee and other colleagues. Sass presented the paper “The Effects of Air Pollution on Individual Psychological Distress,” which she co-authored along with affiliates Kyle Crowder and Anjum Hajat, former CSDE Fellow Nicole Kravtiz-Wirtz, and colleagues Steven M. Karceski and David Takeuchi.

Assistant/Associate Professor of Linguistic or Sociocultural Anthropology

The University of California San Diego Department of Anthropology invites applications for a position in linguistic or sociocultural anthropology at the rank of associate or assistant professor with a start date of July 1, 2018. Candidates must have received their PhD in anthropology or a closely related ethnographic field. We strongly prefer that candidates have received their PhD and have at least five years experience teaching or conducting research at the college or university level.

We seek ethnographically grounded and theoretically rigorous scholars whose research examines relations of power. We are particularly interested in a new colleague who focuses on: language use and regimentation; socioeconomic disparity and political ecology; formations of race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, or religion; or colonial/postcolonial relations. Geographic region is open; candidates whose area of expertise is the Middle East, Africa, or their diasporas are especially encouraged to apply. We seek a colleague who will complement and expand our department’s current conceptual, methodological, and regional strengths while communicating across disciplinary and departmental boundaries, including, when pertinent, co-teaching with departmental colleagues.

Applicants should have a robust publication record in established venues, a proven capacity for innovative and effective teaching at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and a demonstrated capability for service in the department, on campus, and to the profession. We particularly welcome candidates whose experience in teaching, research, or community service has prepared them to contribute to our commitment to diversity and excellence.

Assistant Professor of Geography

The Department of Geography at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, Kentucky is searching for a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Geography in the area of health geography to begin August 2018. Our goal is to build upon and strategically expand the Department’s strengths in health and medical geography, critical human geography, environmental studies, and critical mapping. We welcome candidates conducting research across the broad spectrum of health geography including but not limited to critical health geographies; social differentiation of health outcomes; health and illness behaviors; health and the environment; political ecology of health; and global health and disease.

This position is part of a college-wide interdisciplinary cluster hire in health. The successful candidate will also contribute to the College of Arts and Sciences interdisciplinary undergraduate major in Health, Society & Populations, and will be encouraged to seek out broader initiatives across programs, including public health, medicine, Appalachian Studies, and International Studies. A PhD in geography or related discipline is required at time of appointment.

Associate Research Scientist

The Department of Sociomedical Sciences seeks an Associate Research Scientist to carry out daily management and coordination of research activities for projects at the Center for the Psychosocial Study of Health and Illness in the Department of Sociomedical Sciences located at the Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University. Individual must hold a PhD in Sociology, Psychology, Public Health or related science and have training or experience carrying out qualitative research studies, and a record of peer-review publications.

Individual must possess experience in sociomedical sciences or related field and have excellent collaborative skills. Experience doing research with men who have sex with men (MSM) or LGBTQ individuals and with grant writing are desirable. He/she mus have excellent written and verbal communication skills and very good organizational and time-management skills. Knowledge of SPSS, Qualtrics, ATLAS-ti and ZOTERO are also required.

Sociology Speaker Series: Using the Violence Triangle to Understand the Lived Experience of Latino Male Youth in Urban Communities

Using the Violence Triangle to Understand the Lived Experience of Latino Male Youth in Urban Communities
Adrian Huerta, University of Southern California
Thursday, November 2
Savery Hall, Room 409
2:30-4:00 PM

In the US, Latino youth are overexposed to various forms of violence in their daily lives. Although Latino adolescents are often the victims of violence, the dominant narrative is that this group are the perpetrators of violence and are embedded in deviance and crimes. In this presentation, which focuses on the qualitative experiences of 26 Latino male youth from low to middle-income urban communities share their experiences with violence at home, schools, and their local communities.

Adrian Huerta was awarded a Minority Dissertation Fellowship in 2015 by the American Educational Research Association for his work on college access for Latino males in urban schools. His work focuses on the Latino male high school experience, and is currently working on a book based on this re-search. He is continuing research to identify at-risk factors for Latino male students who drop out. During the current academic year, he is a postdoc supported by the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin.