Jeffrey Alexander
A seminar and a discussion with Professor Jeffrey Alexander, Lillian Chavenson Saden Professor of Sociology, Yale University. Director of the Yale University Center for Cultural Sociology.
Social Performance
Wednesday December 19, 2007, 4pm-7pm
Monash City Conference Centre
Level 7, 30 Collins Street
MELBOURNE VIC 3000
Phone: 03 9903 8000
Jeffrey Alexander will present an overview of his current work on the role of performance and cultural pragmatics in social action. He will lead a discussion about the fruitful interaction of contemporary cultural sociology and performance studies—and the place of dramaturgy, narrative, audience and performance in social inquiry.
Jeffrey Alexander is the author of The Civil Sphere (2006), Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity (2004 co-author), The Meanings of Social Life: A Cultural Sociology (2003), Neofunctionalism and After (1998), Fin-de-Siècle Social Theory: Relativism, Reduction and the Problem of Reason (1995), Structure and Meaning: Relinking Classical Sociology (1989), Action and Its Environments: Towards a New Synthesis (1988), Twenty Lectures: Sociological Theory Since World War Two, Columbia University Press (1987), Theoretical Logic in Sociology (1982-83)
Today, Alexander is leading a team of researchers at Yale University dedicated to developing a ‘strong program in cultural sociology’. A preliminary version of Alexander’s work on social performance can be found in the volume he recently edited with Bernhard Giesen and Jason Mast, Social Performance: Symbolic Action, Cultural Pragmatics, and Ritual (Cambridge, 2006).
Professor Alexander’s Curriculum Vitae Review of Social Performance: Symbolic Action, Cultural Pragmatics, and Ritual in TDR: The Drama Review (PDF).
Three chapters by Jeffrey Alexander from his forthcoming book on social performance are available for download (Monash staff only):
- Introduction Cultural pragmatics: social performance between ritual and strategy
- Chapter One From the depths of despair: performance, counterperformance, and “September 11”
- Chapter Two Introduction: symbolic action in theory and practice: the cultural pragmatics of symbolic action
The flyer for Professor Alexander’s seminar
Inquiries about Professor Alexander’s lecture should be directed to Peter.Murphy@arts.monash.edu.au.