Social Inequality and Human Rights in a Digital World

A special issue of Societies (ISSN 2075-4698).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2020) | Viewed by 25801

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Sociology Faculty, King's University College, London, ON N6A 2M3, Canada
Interests: social inequality; social movements; social justice in post-conflict societies; global health and human trafficking
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Intersectional theorizing has developed into an important method for analyzing multiple sites of oppression or matrixes of domination that occur throughout the world today. With the advent of the Internet, the global information highway has been systematically used by international, national, and regional governmental and educational institutions; corporations; non-governmental organizations; and individuals to inform and misinform millions of its users. This call for papers for a Special Issue of the Societies Journal seeks theoretical and practical submissions that address this important problem. This topic may be viewed from a variety of perspectives, which include the role that institutions, corporations, and individuals play in including or excluding groups or individuals from, for example, housing, employment, migration, health, consumer, and educational opportunities. Authors may also examine the role that social media can play in supporting and/or attacking minority groups, which may include people who are oppressed because of their national, racial, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender, size, disability, and/or sexual orientation.

Dr. Valerie Zawilski
Guest Editor

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Keywords

  • inequality
  • human rights
  • oppression
  • Internet
  • matrix of domination

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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21 pages, 289 KiB  
Article
Before #MeToo: Violence against Women Social Media Work, Bystander Intervention, and Social Change
by Jordan Fairbairn
Societies 2020, 10(3), 51; https://doi.org/10.3390/soc10030051 - 15 Jul 2020
Cited by 29 | Viewed by 18314
Abstract
High-profile, social-media-fueled movements such as #MeToo have captured broader public attention in recent years and sparked widespread discussion of violence against women (VAW). However, online prevention work was underway in the years leading up to #MeToo, as the emergence and proliferation of social [...] Read more.
High-profile, social-media-fueled movements such as #MeToo have captured broader public attention in recent years and sparked widespread discussion of violence against women (VAW). However, online prevention work was underway in the years leading up to #MeToo, as the emergence and proliferation of social media enabled individuals to be increasingly active participants in shaping conversations about VAW. Situated within feminist VAW scholarship and the social–ecological framework of violence prevention, this paper draws from interviews with a cross-section of service providers, public educators, activists, advocates, writers, and researchers to analyze “conversation” as a central theme in VAW prevention work in social media. Results reveal that these conversations take place in three central ways: (1) engaging wider audiences in conversations to raise awareness about VAW; (2) narrative shifts challenging societal norms that support or enable VAW; and (3) mobilization around high-profile news stories. The paper finds that, through these conversations, this work moves beyond individual-level risk factors to target much needed community- and societal-level aspects, primarily harmful social norms that circulate and become reinforced in digital media spaces. Moreover, while bystander intervention has traditionally been approached as an offline pursuit to intervene in face-to-face situations of VAW, this paper argues that we can understand and value these VAW prevention efforts as an online form of bystander intervention. Finally, resource challenges and VAW prevention workers’ experiences of harassment and abuse related to their online work highlights a need to strengthen social and institutional supports for this work. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Social Inequality and Human Rights in a Digital World)

Other

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14 pages, 615 KiB  
Concept Paper
In Biomedicine, Thin Is Still In: Obesity Surveillance among Racialized, (Im)migrant, and Female Bodies
by Iffath Unissa Syed
Societies 2019, 9(3), 59; https://doi.org/10.3390/soc9030059 - 15 Aug 2019
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 6498
Abstract
Currently there is a plethora of research literature which constructs obesity as an alarming new global pandemic associated with a multitude of acute and chronic diseases rooted in lifestyle factors. Although most of these claims related to obesity are well accepted in the [...] Read more.
Currently there is a plethora of research literature which constructs obesity as an alarming new global pandemic associated with a multitude of acute and chronic diseases rooted in lifestyle factors. Although most of these claims related to obesity are well accepted in the research community, some challenges remain. For instance, lifestyle factors only partially explain the risks of developing obesity. In this paper, I have advocated for greater caution in interpreting some of the medical claims of obesity due to the epistemological and methodological assumptions that inform certain groups of obesity researchers. While most of the literature has reported lifestyle factors and behavior modification as the major mechanisms to achieving health and wellbeing, a few scholars have raised issues about structural factors. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Social Inequality and Human Rights in a Digital World)
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