The Goods Yard, Kings Cross, London, UK 10:13PM, December 3rd, 2026 He tapped forlornly at the phone. It had been a while since it last offered a response. Since that comforting weight had pulsated through his hands, offering out a range of haptic possibilities which his body would instinctively know how to grasp for. It […]
In his Imagined Futures, Jens Beckert suggests four ways in which fictional expectations make an impact on the social world: They coordinate actors by providing a common focus to their action They are able to shape the future by conditioning what action happens The freedom involved in fiction means they are not constrained by reality and […]
This looks like it’s going to be a brilliant conference: CALL FOR PAPERS (deadline: 22 April 2019) The third culture? // Literature and Sociology University of Warwick (Coventry) – 14 June 2019 In 1985 Wolf Lepenies argued that sociology should be considered a ‘third culture’ arising between science and literature. Contemporary discourses and research, however, […]
Are you interested in sociological fiction? Did you know there’s a new online home for it at The Sociological Review, edited by Ashleigh Watson? The first few pieces in our new section are online: Who Are Your Friends? Smiling Gives You Wrinkles Oil on canvas See here for guidance about how to contribute to. We […]
An interesting CfP I’m saving for my future reference *Imagining Radical Futures: Anthropological Potentialities?* Princeton Anthropology Graduate Conference October 5th, 2018 Princeton University *“The facts, alone, will not save us. Social change requires novel fictions that reimagine and rework* *all that is taken for granted about the current structure of society” (Benjamin 2016)* Anthropology has […]
I’m once again editing a section on sociological micro-fiction for Ashleigh Watson’s wonderful So Fi zine. See here for full details about how to submit. There’s lots of inspiration to be found in the last issue, collecting a wonderful selection of sociological fiction of 100 words or less.
I admitted defeat this evening, ten days into NaNoWriMo. I fell well behind my target this week, leaving me in a position where I’d have to write 2000 words a day to finish the book. The fact I failed to write anything today means that number has only increased. The last two weeks of this month will […]
In a thought-provoking chapter from 1997, Roger Burrows reflected on cyberpunk as social theory. It’s interesting to read this twenty years later because the analytical concerns of digital sociology remain largely unchanged but the techno-symbolic register within which they’re being articulated couldn’t be more different. Much of this rests on a conception of cyberspace as a parallel […]
Another drabble, based on a scene I witnessed on public transport this weekend: He couldn’t avert his gaze, nor could he stand to watch. The obscenity gripped him, drew him forward and out of himself. Sliding forward on the edge of his seat, he forced his feet flatly onto the floor of the tube. With […]
I encountered the notion of the drabble through reading Rob Kitchin’s fiction blog. These short stories of exactly 100 words can have a strange power to them, as little shards of reality that can be thrown out into the world. This is how Wikipedia describes the origins of the drabble: The concept is said to […]
I think this is come out really well. Get in touch if you’d like to contribute something further: Imagining Futures: From Sociology of the Future to Future Fictions The Future Perfect Writing Fiction and Writing Social Science Life Chances: Co-written re-imagined welfare utopias through a fictional novel Patricia Leavy on Social Fictions Showing, not telling: […]
This looks fantastic. Considering whether to submit a proposal: The newly established Goldsmiths Press will be publishing a collection of essays on the topic of ‘economic science fictions’. The volume will be edited by Will Davies, Co-Director of PERC, and encompass various disciplinary perspectives, writing styles, including fiction and non-fiction. This builds on PERC’s launch […]
Imagining Futures: From Sociology of the Future to Future Fictions The Future Perfect Writing Fiction and Writing Social Science Life Chances: Co-written re-imagined welfare utopias through a fictional novel Patricia Leavy on Social Fictions Showing, not telling: some thoughts on social science and (science) fiction Liars, Damn Liars, and Sociologists You wake up and suddenly, […]
I was a bit hesitant when preparing this talk because of the risk that I just end up talking about a couple of novels that I really liked and explaining why I liked them. So I won’t actually say all that much about Super Sad True Love Story: it depicts a dystopian near future in which credit scores from […]
Design fiction is a term first coined by Julian Bleecker and popularized by SF author Bruce Sterling, who describes it as “the deliberate use of diegetic prototypes to suspend disbelief about change.” and that it “attacks the status quo and suggests clear ways in which life might become different.” Design fiction isn’t science fiction, it’s […]
I was fortunate to meet Tim Maughan at the Digital Sociology conference in New York last month. Along with Sava Saheli Singh, he’s been exploring how design fiction can be used to communicate sociological ideas. This is how Sava and Tim describe design fiction: Design fiction is a term first coined by Julian Bleecker and […]
