Social Inequality & The Politics of Representation
A Global Landscape
- Celine-Marie Pascale - American University, Washington DC, USA
Readers will find a variety of analytical styles including frame analysis, semiotics, poststructural discourse analysis, critical discourse studies, and conversation analysis. Each chapter provides an overview of relevant cultural and historical contexts for an international audience as well as a brief introduction to relevant methodological and theoretical frameworks. Consequently, it is both a richly diverse and easily accessible collection.
"If anyone ever doubted the power of language to make the most egregious inequalities acceptable, natural, and even ordinary, then they should read Pascale's magisterial book, whose fascinating case studies cover the globe. She projects the politics of representation as a critical field that cuts across disciplines and defines new, exciting directions for Sociology."
"This splendid collection will give English-language readers vivid pictures of the way inequalities work across different continents, cultures, and situations. This is the kind of scholarship we urgently need to transform our knowledge, and help transform our world."
"Bringing together critical analysis of representations of inequality by scholars in twenty countries on five continents, this book makes an important contribution to international comparison of production and treatment of inequalities, as well as to placing scholarship from different parts of the world on a more equal footing than we are accustomed to."
"This unique collections presents wide-ranging forms of textual analysis on the articulations of social inequality in a global perspective. It not only addresses in novel ways different forms and locations of inequalities, ranging from class to nation and from China to Mexico, but also provides deep insights on the relationship between language and the social and between representation and the production of truth. The book makes substantial contributions to the fields of Sociology and Cultural Studies and broadly in the domain of theoretically informed empirical research."
One of the most impressive aspects of this collection is its scope and range. It covers inequalities in twenty countries across five continents, and so effectively displaces the usual sociological focus on Europe or North America while also avoiding a centre/periphery approach. [...] The book occupies a fertile place midway between sociology and cultural studies, and places scholarship from around the world on an equal footing. It is in the end this round-the-world scope of the book that remains its most appealing feature, and turns its abundance of topic and treatment into a worthwhile sociological project.
A great text and insight into the representations of inequalities and how these impact on culture and situations.
Excellent for a range of social science and humanities courses especially those on issues of globalsiation and wider contextualising of the local situations facing us today. Students of sociology, politics and social policy can only benifit form this resource.
Although my teaching plans have changed so that I will not be teaching this course this year, I will definitely consider this text in the future! I like its even-handed representation of cases from all over the world.
A useful text recommended reading for BSc in Adult / Mental Heath / Children's and Learning Disability Nursing
This is an excellent book that draws on cross-national empirical observations to give a rich perspective on social inequality and the politics of representation.