XVIII ISA World Congress of Sociology (July 13-19, 2014)

July 13 - 19, 2014

550

Looking at Inequalities through the Intersectional Prism: Potentialities and Challenges

RC32 Women in Society (host committee)

Language: English

Feminist theories of intersectionality for the last 30 years focused on how categories of oppression such as like race, ethnicity, nationality, class, different abilities, age, sexuality and gender, do intersect (Davis 1983, Crenshaw, 1994, Collins, 1998, Wekker, 2004, Lykke, 2003, 2005, McCall, 2005, Verloo, 2006, Yuval-Davis, 2006, Meekosha 2010). The benefits of intersectional approaches are due to the fact that it can be applied to a broad range of research topics. Integrally connected to the concept of intersectionality is the question of power, Foucault (1973), introduced as procedures of exclusion and inclusion leading to multi-dimensional inequalities. Within the frame of post-colonial theory such a vision of power has been deconstructed as embedded in western domination – as Annibal Quijano pointed out in La colonialidad del poder (1992). In spite of greater analytical and explanatory ability of intersectional approach, there is still a serious dearth of intersectional studies globally to address the complex problems of multifaceted inequalities of our times. This particular session will address issues related to the complexity of intersectionality towards identities in transition; the debate about additive and transversal intersectionality. We’ll try to answer to questions like: how should we make intersectionality more ‘mainstream’? How can we combine intersectional approach and post-colonial ethics and politics? The task of de-colonizing sociology from dominant ideologies proposed by many authors (Mignolo 2011, Connell 2007) are urgent and necessary process for a foundation of global social sciences that do not replicate the center-periphery dichotomy and inequalities within our studies.