Tag: civics

  • The meaning of civics as the new world struggles to be born

    I’ve blogged regularly over the last few years about what I’ve termed post-neoliberal civics and post-pandemic civics. These terms are conscious placeholders intended to designate a significant change underway in which, to Gramsci put it, “the new world struggles to be born”. It reflects an interest in the significance of education during the transition as […]

  • RIP Mill Road Fox, a fleeting public mourns your death

    RIP Mill Road Fox, a fleeting public mourns your death

    A fox who had been visiting houses on our street was hit by a car early this morning, presumably by someone speeding over a bridge that had only recently been reopened to traffic. I was walking past this evening and found the fox’s death had been commemorated in a way I found really touching.

  • The responsibility of educators in a pandemic

    I thought this was brilliant from Ruha Benjamin, in the forward to Critical Digital Pedagogy, describing the responsibilities of educators. It applies more broadly than our present crisis but it feels even more pertinent against the backdrop of the pandemic: So, what are the responsibilities of educators and educational institutions in a context where this […]

  • What does social media do to the civil sphere?

    I’m reading Jeffrey Alexander’s massive The Civil Sphere in the final stages of my project with Lambros Fatsis on public sociology. The reviewers suggested we need to expand our concept of publicness to take account of the notion of civil sphere, defined by Alexander on pg 3 as “a world of values and institutions that generates the […]

  • Twitter and the structure of polarisation

    Twitter and the structure of polarisation

    A few days ago, I tweeted* a complaint to a public transport operator in frustration at how few people were wearing masks on their services and the seeming lack of enforcement by the operators. I was visiting my parents, who’ve been shielding since March and I was growing increasingly concerned that I was exposing them […]

  • The challenge of post-neoliberal civics

    From The Convivial Society vol 1, no. 1:  At the same time, however, it also seems to me that especially given the scale and scope of our problems, it may be that we need to draw attention again to very basic and fundamental realities. That we must learn again what it means to take responsibility […]