ASOB16016U Cancelled - Critical Reading and Re-analysis

The course provides a critical reading and re-analysis of the award-winning ethnography, In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio, by Philippe Bourgois. It will be used to 1) explore contemporary issues surrounding immigration, including social marginalization and stigmatization, 2) to understand how social theory helps us make sense of our world, and  3)  to deepen our understanding of the relationship between theory, methodology, and data.

We will journey into an American urban ghetto known as Spanish Harlem to witness the lives of Puerto Rican migrants in the United States. We will learn about the drug dealers, their families, friends and customers.  We will learn the details of their lives as children, their time at school, at home, their love, anger and work. We hear about how they feel about their lives. We become witnesses of the violence they do to themselves, and the violence that the community and society does to them.  Through all of these layers, we will see their humanity.

This journey, along with the supplemental theory that we will read, provides an understanding of how gender, class and race operate to shape social marginality, stigmatization and alienation. We step back and look at how these processes unfold differently across national context. Social theory is used to make sense of related pressing issues facing societies across the world, including Denmark. This includes topics such as immigrant integration and control, inclusion and exclusion, the making of “ghettos”, and the role of the state (and economy) in shaping marginality.