Between 2016 and 2019, I taught (supervised) at the University of Cambridge. Supervision (the ‘Oxbridge model’) is small-group teaching focusing on discussion of ideas, literature, and students’ written work.
Below is a selection of some of the content I taught. Feel free to use as inspiration/borrow but make sure you credit if you copy any of the content wholesale – or, even better, invite me to give a guest talk!
Social Theory (Soc 2) at the Department of Sociology (2016-20)
Variable content, but includes Arendt, Existentialism (Sartre and de Beauvoir), Actor-Network Theory (Latour), feminist epistemology and philosophy of science (Harding, Haraway, Anderson, Martín Alcoff), falsificationism and philosophy of science (Popper, Kuhn, Lakatos, Feyerabend), Critical Theory and the Frankfurt School (Adorno, Horkheimer, Marcuse, Habermas), Foucault and Bourdieu.
Advanced social theory (Soc 6) at the Department of Sociology (2019-20)
For this paper, I developed a session on Knowing differently: feminist, indigenous, and decolonial theory
This session will present some of the distinctive challenges to the Eurocentrism of social theory that have emerged in the course of the 20th and at the beginning of the 21st century. Some of these challenges have come from feminist theory and epistemology; some from Black, Latinx, and minority ethnic scholarship; some from queer studies; some from decolonial and postcolonial theory. Without aspiring to do full justice to any of these (and many other) perspectives, the session focuses on the implications of their ontological and epistemological critique for how we think about our research subjects (those we do research with), our research ‘objects’ (concepts we use in researching society), and ourselves as researchers or knowers. What does it mean to do, know, and practice theory differently? What are the implications of these critiques for academic knowledge production?
The readings provide an overview of the historical origins of these discussions in sociology and other disciplines, as well as some of the most recent debates concerning the practices of ‘knowing otherwise’ in the context of decolonizing the curriculum. They connect and overlap, in particular, with Topics 3, 5, 6 and 9, but also to the broader issues of identity and social justice, ‘truth’ and epistemic authority, and scientific knowledge practices.
Required reading:
Bhambra, G. (2014). Connected Sociologies. London: Bloomsbury. Chapter 4: Global sociology: Indigenous, Subversive, Autonomous? (pp. 81–96); Chapter 5: Global sociology: Multiple, Southern, Provincial? (pp. 107– 114.)
Connell, R.W. (1997). ‘Why is classical theory classical?’ American Journal of Sociology 102(6): 1511–57.
Haraway, D. (1991). “Situated Knowledges,” In Simians, Cyborgs, and Women. New York:Routledge. (note: also in recommended reading for Topic 3)
Hill Collins, P. (2015). Intersectionality’s Definitional Dilemmas. Annual Review of Sociology 41 (1), 1–20. (see also Recommended Reading for Topic 4, Bhambra, G. K. (2015). Black thought matters: Patricia Hill Collins and the long tradition of African American sociology, and
Collins, P. H. (1986). Learning from the Outsider Within: The Sociological Significance of Black Feminist Thought)
Mignolo, W. D. (2009). Epistemic Disobedience, Independent Thought and Decolonial Freedom. Theory, Culture & Society, 26(7–8), 159–181. https://doi.org/10.1177/0263276409349275
TallBear, K. (2015). Dossier: Theorizing Queer Inhumanisms: An Indigenous Reflection on Working Beyond the Human/Not Human. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies, Vol. 21(2-3), 230–235.
Recommended reading:
Connell, R. (2007). Southern Theory. Cambridge: Polity. In particular Chapter 1, ‘Empire and the creation of a social science’ (pp. 3-26), and Chapter 2, ‘Modern social theory and its hidden assumptions’ (pp. 27-47).
Connell, R. (2014). Using southern theory: Decolonizing social thought in theory, researchand application. Planning Theory, 13(2), 210–223.https://doi.org/10.1177/1473095213499216
Dotson, K. (2012). A Cautionary Tale: On Limiting Epistemic Oppression. Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, Vol. 33, No. 1, pp. 24-47.
Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
McKinnon, R. (2016). Epistemic Injustice. Philosophy Compass 11/8: 437–446, 10.1111/phc3.12336.
Savransky, M. (2017). A Decolonial Imagination: Sociology, Anthropology and the Politics of Reality. Sociology, 51(1), 11–26. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038516656983
Todd, Z. (2016). An Indigenous Feminist’s Take on the Ontological Turn: ‘Ontology’ is just another word for colonialism. Journal of Historical Sociology 29(1): 4-22.
Essay questions:
- How do you understand the relationship between the historical constitution of sociology as a ‘metropolitan’ science and knowledge from ‘the periphery’?
- Is epistemic pluralism irreconcilable with the concept of ‘truth’?
- What does it mean to know ‘differently’ in the context of Western academia?
Modern societies (Soc1) – Department of Sociology (2016-20)
This is a first-year paper (course/module) that introduces students to the range of topics and theories in sociology. My teaching used to focus on Marx, Weber, class and inequality, ethicity/race and racism, gender and sexuality, and power and ideology (including neoliberalism).
Philosophy of economics (Econ8) – Faculty of Economics (2018-present)
This paper, mandatory for economics and elective for a range of other social science students, introduces the elements of different philosophical approaches to questions such as measurement, value, utility, and rationality. I teach on the part of the paper known as Social Ontology, which focuses on how things such as ‘money’ or ‘firm’ exist in the world, but I have also supervised other topics, from behavioural economics to theories of rational choice. I still occasionally supervise students on this paper, so get in touch if you have questions.
Jana Bacevic 