The BSA Race Forum: the group and its activities

The BSA Race Forum is an analytical social hub for challenging racialised formations. The forum intervenes in public and academic debates on ´race´ and ethnicity. Our activities aim to pool together researchers and practitioners from different fields. Annual conferences, seminars and workshops are forged through collaborations across institutions and disciplines. We are particularly keen to build on our existing links with international groups and networks. The Race Forum also acts in an advisory capacity to the BSA on race and equality issues.

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To subscribe to the announcement list of the Race Forum and Study Group related events, send an email to JISCMAIL with the following information:

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SUBSCRIBE BSA-RACE-ETHNICITY-ANNOUNCE Firstname Surname

You will receive a welcome message confirming your subscription within one hour. If you don't receive anything check your spam/junk filters. If you have any queries or difficulties joining the list, email Sanjay Sharma.

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For further information and debate, visit the Race & Ethnicity Group Section on the BSA Discussion Forum.

Forthcoming Events

5 April 2008
Launch Event - For the Record: the social life of Indian vinyl in Southall

1.30pm at the Small Mansion of Gunnersbury Park Museum

The launch of an archive produced for Gunnersbury Park museum. The archive contains in-depth audio interviews and a film (directed by Kuldip Powar, 2008). Broadcasters, musicians, sellers, buyers and listeners have discussed how they have handled, listened to and remembered vinyl, at length. Often conducted across multiple sittings and languages, the interviews offer several layers of the intimate and international nature of the social life of Indian vinyl in Southall.

Please RSVP.

First Screening: 2.00pm.

Presentations by: Chaman Lal Chaman, Zaighem Ali, Jasvinder Kumar (Heera), Parminder Chadha

Location: Gunnersbury Park Popes Lane London W3 8LQ (Tel:020 8992 1612)

Travel:

Tube: Turn left from Acton Town Piccadilly Line and walk for 10 mins into Entrance.
Bus: E3.
Car: Off North Circular A406 north of Chiswick roundabout (free parking).

Download the 'For the Record booklet' (PDF).

Response to Commission on Integration & Cohesion

In December 2005 the Commission on Integration and Cohesion - which was set up under the new Department for Communities and Local Government - issued a consultation document. This set out some issues and questions of concern to the Commission and invited responses.

Members of the BSA Race Forum discussed this by email and a few of us met in early January to draft a response. This has been sent to the Commission. Please see the version available at this link.

Our response covers four main themes or issues, all of which relate to the Commission's first question about the meaning of integration and cohesion.

The political context of race and multicultural issues in the UK today.
The importance of socio-economic inequalities and life chances on social cohesion.
The need to consider both material and symbolic forms of inclusion and exclusion.
The importance of the local settlement and local definition of cohesion and integration.

Comments are welcome - please discuss on the Race & Ethnicity Group Section of the BSA Discussion Forum.

Past Activities

Phenomenology, Photography, Politics, Perception
Pierre Bourdieu in Algeria: testimonies of Uprooting (2nd ESRC Seminar)

23 March 2007 - University of East London

In Algeria, Bourdieu knew that he was trying to describe a society which was in the process of becoming an independent nation state. By asserting the primacy of perception over cognition, phenomenology provided the stimulus for presuppositionless observation, operationalised non-verbally in photographs, which could ensure that descriptions were not predetermined by the discourses of Western European social and political sciences.

Stuart Sim, Professor of Critical Theory at the University of Sunderland, author of Lyotard and the Inhuman, (2001), will talk on "The Limits of Marxism: Lyotard and Algeria".
Derek Robbins, University of East London, author of On Bourdieu, education and society (2006) will give "Some notes on the French response to Husserl: 1940-1955"
Lahouari Addi, Professor in the Institute of Political Science at the Université de Lyon 2, author of Sociologie et anthropologie chez Pierre Bourdieu (2002) will speak on "Bourdieu and Algeria: sociology and politics"
Louis Pinto, Centre de Sociologie Européenne, Paris, author of Pierre Bourdieu et la théorie du monde social (1998) will talk about the space of political/intellectual possibilities in the years 1955-60.

For further details and the programme please click here.

PIERRE BOURDIEU IN ALGERIA: TESTIMONIES OF UPROOTING

9 November 2006 - Goldsmiths, University of London

A launch of a photographic exhibition as part of the ESRC Seminar Series on 'Thinking With Pierre Bourdieu in Algeria', organised by Nirmal Puwar (Goldsmiths, BSA Race Forum), Les Back (Goldsmiths, BSA Race Forum), Azzedine Haddour (UCL) and Derek Robbins (UEL).

3.30-6.00pm Screening of Sociology as a Combat Sport (2001, 146 min.) A documentary film by Director Pierre Carles, following the life of Pierre Bourdieu over three years. Location: RHB 137.

After 7/7 - A Panel Discussion

15 February 2006 - Goldsmiths College, University of London.

The BSA Race Forum in collaboration with the new Xenos research initiative (Dept of Sociology, Goldsmiths College) organised a panel of leading thinkers to consider the aftermath of the July 7 2005 bombings in London. The panelists were:

S Sayyid, University of Leeds
Suresh Grover, The Monitoring Group, London
Nira Yuval-Davis, University of East London
Chetan Bhatt, Goldsmiths College, University of London
Avtar Brah, Birkbeck College, University of London (Chair)

Jean Rouch: ETHICS/ETHNOGRAPHY
7 September 2005 - The Photographers´ Gallery, London

A joint panel on ´Creating Collectivities/Doing Transnational Politics´ was held at the European Social Forum (ESF) in London 2004. Our co-participants were Feminist Review, Scovenga (Italy), Torino Samba Bank (Italy) and NextGenderation (London).

Our annual conferences have been on the following themes:

´Racist Futures´ was organised by Ian Law and Bobby Sayyid at Leeds University (2004). The main speakers incuded David Goldberg, Max Silverman, Michael Keith, Rowena Arshad, Barnor Hesse and John Solomos.
´Memory, Representation and Performance: Gendering the south Asian Diaspora´ was organised by Nirmal Puwar in collaboration with Avtar Brah at Birkbeck College (2003). The speakers were Rajeshwari Sunder Rajan, Parita Mukta, Nandi Bhatia, Teresa Hubel, Fauzia Ahmad, Saminia Zahir, Rani Kawale and Parminder Sekhon. Over ninety people attended this event which also saw the launch of the edited collection Gender and the South Asian Diaspora (Berg, 2003). A report on this conference appeared in the spring 2003 edition of Network.
´Race, Nation, Sport´ was organised by Ben Carrington (2002). The speakers were Jon Garland, Tim Crabbe, Colin King, Grant Fared, Kath Woodward, Brett St Louis and Jennifer Hargreaves. The papers were published as a special issue of the journal Leisure Studies: Race/Nation/Sport, 23(1).