Sociologists Talking Real Sh*t

In this episode of Sociologist Talking, James welcomes Mike Messner to discuss Mike's new book, 'The High School,' which examines the sociological significance of high school yearbooks from Salinas High School in California, spanning from 1903 to 2024. Mike discusses his inspiration for the book, drawn from his personal connections to the school and his inherited collection of yearbooks. The book analyzes how high school sports, cheerleading, and student activities shape citizenship, identity, and social dynamics, particularly with respect to gender, race, and class. They also delve into the evolution of cheerleading, the suppression and resurgence of girls' sports, and the racial and class dynamics reflected in yearbooks. Additionally, the conversation addresses societal shifts in masculinity, the importance of cultivating revolutionary empathy, and the potential for high schools to foster greater equality and democracy.

Raul Perez drops by to talk about this new book, The Souls of White Jokes: How Racist Humor Fuels White Supremacy.  Raúl Pérez is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of La Verne, and was previously an Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminology at the University of Denver. His scholarship has been awarded and supported by the American Sociological Association, the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the University of California Center for New Racial Studies, the Working Class Studies Association, and the American Humor Studies Association. His research has been published in journals such as American Behavioral Scientist, Discourse and Society, Ethnicities, and Sociological Perspectives. His first book, The Souls of White Joke: How Racist Humor Fuels White Supremacy has been recently published by Stanford University Press. His work has also been featured in various media, including The Washington Post, TIME, NBC, AXIOS, The Grio, Remezcla, Latino Rebels, and Zócalo Public Square.

Join Dr. Leland Saito and I as we discuss his new book "Building Los Angeles; The Politics of Race and Place in Urban America.  It is a tale of displacement, gentrification, race, place, and resistance.  Dr. Leland Saito grew up in Boyle Heights, and then Montebello. Montebello is right next to Monterey Park, and the changes in that city in the 1980s as it went from White to Latino and Asian American, sparked his interest and became his dissertation and first book. He went to East Los Angeles Community College and UC Berkeley for his BA, in sociologyHe then went to Cal State LA for a high school teaching credential, and an MA in sociology, before completing his PhD in Sociology at UCLA.  Currently he is an associate professor in sociology at the university of southern California and is here to discuss his recently published book “Building Downtown Los Angeles: the Politics of race and place in Urban America. His next project is looking at gentrification in the multiracial communities of Leimert Park and USC in South Los Angeles.

Join Dr. Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo and me as we discuss race and space in historic South Central Los Angeles. Don't believe the hype; this is a story of not just pain and desperation but one of love, hope, and cooperation.  Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo is the Florence Everline Professor of Sociology at USC Dornsife, where she has worked for thirty years. As a qualitative sociologist who relies on interviews and ethnography, Los Angeles and Southern California have provided a rich social setting for developing a research trajectory spanning four areas:  Gender and migration; informal sector work in the immigrant city; religion and immigrant integration; and Latina/o sociology. She has published ten books and over fifty journal articles and book chapters on these topics.   Her most recent book, co-authored with Manuel Pastor, is South Central Dreams: Finding Home and Building Community in South L.A. (2021). In 2015, she received the Distinguished Career Award from the American Sociological Association, International Migration Section, and in 2018 she received the Julian Samora Distinguished Career Award from the American Sociological Association, Latina/o Sociology Section.

It's Black History Month; Myron Strong joins me in discussing race in Reality TV, Sci-Fi, comics, and Afrofuturism.  Myron T. Strong is an award-winning sociologist, who is currently an Associate Professor of Sociology at the Community College of Baltimore County in Baltimore, Maryland. He graduated with his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of North Texas in 2014. His research explores Afrofuturism, race, gender and other social factors in modern comics and popular culture. In 2019, he won the Eastern Sociological Society Barbara R. Walters Community College Faculty Award for his article "The Emperor Has New Clothes:​ ​How Outsider Sociology Can Shift the Discipline" published in Sociological Forum. He recently published book chapters; The first examines the construction in modern reality television shows in Race in American Television: Voices and Visions that Shaped a Nation. The second explores the way the Dora Milaje represent a continuation of these traditions and shows how Pan Africanism and collective memory are important to not only understanding Black identity in Afrofuturism and Black Panther: Gender Identity and Re-Making of Blackness.

Join Dr. David Embrick and me as we discuss the Rittenhouse and Ahmaud Abery cases, vigilantes, masculinity, and guns.  In other words, it's an All-American podcast! Dr. David G. Embrick holds a joint position as Associate Professor in the Sociology Department and African Studies Institute at the University of Connecticut. Prior to UConn, he spent a decade at Loyola University Chicago as faculty in the Sociology Department. He received his Ph.D. from Texas A&M University in 2006.  He is a former American Sociological Association Minority Fellow; Past-President of the Southwestern Sociological Association; current Vice President of the Society for the Study of Social Problems; and current President of the Association for Humanist Sociology.  In addition, Dr. Embrick serves as the Founding Co-Editor of Sociology of Race and Ethnicity; Founding Book Series Editor of Sociology of Diversity, with Bristol University Press; and Founding Book Series Co-Editor of Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, with Georgia University Press.Dr. Embrick’s research has centered largely on the impact of contemporary forms of racism on people of color.  While most of his research is one what he has labeled “diversity ideology” and inequalities in the business world, he has published on race and education, racial microaggressions, the impact of schools-welfare-and prisons on people of color, and issues of sex discrimination. Dr. Embrick has published in a number of journals including American Behavioral Scientist, Critical Sociology, Race and Society, Sex Roles, Social Problems, Sociological Forum, and Symbolic Interaction, among others. He has been invited to give talks and workshops on diversity; racism in the workplace; racism and space; racial microaggressions; and various issues of academic professionalism in over 125 venues, both academic and public.

Dana Williams and I discuss "trust." In particular, we discuss the trust of government, science, the vaccine, and each other.  For good measure, we threw in a conversation on anarchy.  Join us! Dana Williams is an associate professor of sociology at California State University, Chico. He is the author of Black Flags and Social Movements: A Sociological Analysis of Movement Anarchism and co-author of Anarchy & Society: Reflections on Anarchist-Sociology, as well as the author or co-author of over 30 research articles and book chapters on topics ranging from aging and longevity in radical movements, attitudes towards police violence, Critical Mass bike rides, municipal-level climate change policy, racial reconciliation coalition-building, Black anarchism, American attitudes about the use of military force, Amazon and technology, Native American mascots and nicknames, and anarchist studies. He has recently completed a new book manuscript entitled In Us We Trust: The Benefits of Solidarity and Anti-authoritarianism.

Join Karen Sabbah and me as we discuss her personal experiences with IVF.  We discussed the meanings of motherhood, costs, and tribulations of In Vitro Fertilization.  Karen Sabbah holds an MA in sociology from Califonia State University Northridge (2015) and has worked as an adjunct in the Los Angeles Community College District and College of the Canyons since 2016. She teaches courses in crime, human sexuality, gender, and race & ethnicity. Her focus in graduate school was on human sexuality and gender. Her thesis was titled "Dare to Derby: A Story of the Discovery of Empowerment through Roller Derby and Community." She is the production editor for the Journal of Positive Sexuality, a peer reviewed academic journal and a huge advocate for racial and gender inequalities. In 2020, while on the scholarship committee at Pierce, she noticed there wasn't a scholarship for single parents, so she established one called "A Single Parent's Journey" and has issued two scholarships per year for the last two years. 

Returning guests Celene Fuller, Tiffany Lanoix, and Rebecca Romo join me to discuss the new anti-abortion law in Texas.    Celene Fuller is a doctoral candidate at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and specializes in the sociological subfields of gender and sexuality and social psychology, emphasizing stigmatized sexual and gender identities. Celene’s dissertation research centers on the experiences of sexual and reproductive health stigma surrounding access to abortion and reproductive healthcare in Nevada. She is currently working with several nonprofit organizations to conduct sociological research that may be used to support and influence policies aimed at increasing access to reproductive healthcare at the state level.Tiffany Lanoix holds an MA in sociology from UC Irvine (2005) and has worked as a tenured sociology professor in the Los Angeles Community College District (LACCD) for over 13 years. Currently, she serves as Associate Professor of Sociology at West Los Angeles College where she teaches courses in racial and ethnic relations, social problems, intersectionality, and related topics. Community activism and social awareness are core to her activities as a scholar and professor. She has facilitated a number of workshops throughout LACCD on the topics of culturally inclusive teaching, decolonizing spaces, and microaggressions.Dr. Rebecca Romo is an Associate Professor at Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California. She earned her doctorate in sociology at the University of Santa Barbara. She is a former Ronald E. McNair Scholar, and fellow in the American Sociological Association Minority Fellowship Program. Her research focuses on the social construction of multiracial identities, and she has published work on Blaxican or Black-Mexican multiraciality and experience.

Jake Alimahomed-Wilson and Julio Tsuha discuss the hesitancy for workers to get back to their jobs, quality of life issues, and a crack in capitalism.    Jake Alimahomed-Wilson is a Professor of Sociology at California State University, Long Beach. His research focuses on race, gender, labor, logistics, and global workers’ struggles. He is the co-editor of The Cost of Free Shipping: Amazon in the Global Economy (Pluto Press, 2020 and co-editor of Choke Points: Logistics Workers Disrupting the Global Supply Chain (Pluto Press, 2018). He is the author of Solidarity Forever? Race, Gender, and Unionism in the Ports of Southern California (Lexington Books, 2016) and co-author of Getting the Goods: Ports, Labor, and the Logistics Revolution (Cornell University Press, 2008). Julio Tsuha is a Professor of Sociology at Los Angeles Pierce College of the LA Community College District. Prior to this, he served as Executive Director of the Dolores Huerta Labor Institute. He decided to get his Ph.D. at UC Riverside after an internship with the AFL-CIO, where his love for labor organizing and social justice activism was forged. He has been a union member and activist for the past 20 years.