Committing Public Sociology

Blogging Bodies, Marginalization and Violence

Abstract

By exploring the sociology of the body in an independent study, we delved further into intersectional feminist and postcolonial theories to question whose bodies matter and why. We engaged in sociological blogging in order to extend our learning experience with the public, thereby making sociological knowledge more accessible to the general public.. The blogs, Embody Sociology and Simply Sociology Blog were created and hosted on Wordpress.com with content published anonymously. As bloggers, we connected relevant course topics such as the relationships between race & place or the discourse of disposable bodies to events in the news, case studies, personal experiences, government law or policy or some combination of the latter to inform our audience of relevant contemporary issues that could relate to them, be it that they feel a sense of marginalization or not. As authors in a critical sociological field, we felt the need to ensure our voices were not speaking on behalf of the marginalized identities with experiences unlike our own, meanwhile emphasizing that our own experiences were not the sole experience in the long run. We were able to find the value in shifting the tones of our writing to a more informal one in the public eye, and found ourselves better able to engage more people into a sociological dialogue. By engaging nearly 400 visitors at our blogs collectively at the end of the semester, this project had undoubtedly left a wider impact in numbers exceeding one that often remains between a student and their instructor.

Discipline: Sociology

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Alissa Overend