Mini-Series: Activism and Academia

November 14, 2022

EP68: Science Against the People (ft. Charles Schwartz & Sigrid Schmalzer)

The right attacks science, liberals uncritically defend it. But there are other ways to see scientific authority. Scientists have always served capitalism, patriarchy, and empire. So say Science for the People, a radical movement of scientists. So, they are fighting to change it. We tell the story of the groups Vietnam-era origins, and explore why it's having a resurgence today.
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August 12, 2022

EP63: Who Researches the Researchers?

Researchers with the best of intentions still get things wrong. So what does it look like when the old paternalistic ways are dispensed of? We talk to Garth Mullins, who is both researcher and subject in Vancouver's downtown east side and also to Michelle Fine, a leading proponent of critical participatory action research.
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June 19, 2022

EP59: January 6th and the Myth of the Mob (ft. James Jasper and Joy Rohde)

Scholars used discredited crowd theory to explain the events of January 6ths. These are straight from the physician Gustave Le Bon, a bigot who hated the masses. Is it OK to apply reactionary ideas to reactionary movements, out of political expediency? We think no.
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This episode was part of a mini-series we produced on the tensions between activism and academia, which you can find in full here.

The relationship between academics and activists has been an historically fraught one. Early social movement theory pathologized activists and dismissed their demands as irrational. Mid-century liberals supported imperial war efforts, and domestic surveillance campaigns against social movements. Later scholars were more friendly, but perhaps not much better. Social movements routinely complain about their time being wasted by useless academics, while their most interesting ideas are taken, rebranded, and institutionalized—to the benefit of the academics, but not the social movements. Should activists just avoid the academy, then? That does not seem right, since the academy has always been a site of radical theorizing, and radical organizing. What’s more, a new generation of activist-scholars has been searching for new ways of supporting social movements. On this series, we look at collisions and collaborations between social movements and the university.

These episodes received funding from the Social Sciences and Research Council of Canada. Our scholarly leads and advisors were Professors Lesley Wood at York University, and Sigrid Schmalzer at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Sharmeen Khan, Sami McBryer, and Susannah Mulvale provided research support.

Mini-Series: Activism and Academia

EP68: Science Against the People (ft. Charles Schwartz & Sigrid Schmalzer)

EP63: Who Researches the Researchers?

EP59: January 6th and the Myth of the Mob (ft. James Jasper and Joy Rohde)