Third ISA Forum of Sociology (July 10-14, 2016)

317

Discourse in Practice: Microsociology of Social Exclusion and Control

RC25 Language and Society (host committee)

Language: English

Over the past decades, a growing body of research has focused on the processes of social exclusion and control within institutional discourses and practices. Theoretically and methodologically, the sociology of language has developed critical tools well suited to challenge hegemonic discourses legitimating social and spatial segregation from a macroscopic perspective, as well as to confront negative representations and categorizations of the “deviant other” within human service practices at the street level. 
An analysis that incorporates a microscopic perspective to examine how institutional discourses exercise power, thereby influencing daily routines and long-term collective lives, links to the general conference theme in that it adds to broader global debates relating to the struggles for a better world. 
The session theme encourages critical reflection about the asymmetrical, often hidden power relations and mechanisms of exclusion and control within institutional settings, and calls attention to their consequences (whether intended or inadvertent) for marginalized groups, in terms of stigmatization, inequality and segregation. 
This session invites papers investigating situated talk and interaction in a variety of institutional practices and settings, including the academic research community, where knowledge on social exclusion and control is created and disseminated. Submissions may incorporate a number of methodologies, including but not limited to discourse analysis, ethnomethodology, narrative analysis or conversation analysis. Papers based on theoretically informed empirical studies on resistance, defence strategies and counter-discourses developed by clients/users/participants are especially welcome. Posters: