Schedule

Internet, Technology, and Digital Sociology Research Cluster

This session highlights new technological developments that are impacting higher education in Canada. Virtual presentations will discuss personalized e-mental health tools for students, usage patterns and student attitudes toward generative AI tools, and the adoption, application, and enforcement of generative AI policies in Canadian universities. Session Organizers: Anabel Quan-Haase, Western University Michael Adorjan, University of Calgary Andrey Kasimov, McMaster University Session Chairs: Andrey Kasimov, McMaster University and Michael Adorjan, University of Calgary

South Asia Research Cluster

Open science practices are essential for promoting transparency, collaboration, and accessibility in research. However, developing countries often face significant equity challenges that hinder their participation in the global research ecosystem. These challenges include capacity gaps, infrastructure disparities, lack of awareness, and digital divides. This session aims to address these barriers by fostering open science practices in underserved communities, ultimately creating a more equitable and interconnected research environment. The goal of this panel is to enhance understanding and cultivate a culture of open science through capacity-building training and strategic outreach activities, focusing on the perspective of developing countries. It has planned to build scholarly communities that empower equitable access to information resources, particularly in South Asian countries. This panel will develop a comprehensive strategy for building scholarly infrastructure through open science utilities (such as FAIR, CAIR, PID, CC licensing, and mandate policies), emphasizing the need for capacity-building, awareness programs, and strategic outreach. Session Organizers and Chairs: Jiban K. Pal, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata Muhammet Damar, University of Toronto

Violence and Society Research Cluster

This session explores the continuum of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in migration, refugee, and global south contexts, emphasizing the diverse and intersectional nature of such violence. This continuum encompasses the different forms and stages of violence experienced by migrant and refugee women across countries of origin, transit, and destination. These forms of violence are shaped by a combination of gender-specific factors, including the socio-economic, political, cultural realities, structural inequities, weak domestic violence laws, and inadequate professional support. Papers explore how SGBV is impacted by multiple intersecting identities and social memberships, such as gender, socio-economic status, and lineage, and how these dynamics influence both the experiences and the societal legitimization of violence. Additionally, papers examine local resistances to SGBV and efforts to address the problem in these contexts. Session Organizers: Evie Tastsoglou, Saint Mary's University Myrna Dawson, University of Guelph A. Pearl Sedziafa, Government of Alberta Jane Freedman, Université Paris 8 Eric Tenkorang, Memorial University

Internet, Technology, and Digital Sociology Research Cluster

As the sociological study of technology continues to progress, many questions remain unanswered regarding the social implications of digital technologies in our everyday lives and on society-at-large. With this in mind, our annual ITDS general session provides a space for digital sociologists to share their diverse research interests and to further foster the growth of this scholarly area. Virtual presentations will cover topics of digital and data governance, social control, and (social) media representations of gender and race-based power relations. Session Organizers: Andrew Nevin, University of Guelph Anabel Quan-Haase, Western University Michael Adorjan, University of Calgary Session Chair: Michael Adorjan, University of Calgary

Relational Sociology Research Cluster

The word ‘radical’ has the same Latin root as ‘radish’ and refers to roots. Radical relationism ‘goes to the root’ in two ways: by reconceptualizing all fixed, fast-frozen “things” as consisting of or constituted by relational processes, and by using relational thinking to critique and challenge social structures in pursuit of radical social equality. Replacing dualisms of subject and object, society and nature, individual and collective with complex heterogeneous tangles of relations/processes, radical relationism explores openings and connections beyond Eurocentrism and anthropocentrism, and towards antiracism, feminism, trans liberation, decolonization, pluriversality, socialism, and other emancipatory projects. Session Organizers: Christopher Powell, Toronto Metropolitan University Mónica Sánchez-Flores, Thompson Rivers University Session Chair: Mónica Sánchez-Flores, Thompson Rivers University

South Asia Research Cluster

The objective of the South Asia Research Cluster is to promote and advance a wide range of scholarly work that focus on South Asia. The cluster aims to instigate conversations among researchers whose work explores issues around South Asian politics, history and culture, to name a few. This meeting is open to current members and those interested in learning more about our cluster activities. Attendees will have an opportunity to network with others working in this field of research and/or teaching. We welcome feedback on our current activities and encourage suggestions for future initiatives. Shreyashi Ganguly, York University

Violence and Society Research Cluster

How do people construct the meanings they attach to violence? A large portion of sociological literature studying violence and culture has looked at the institutional end of this question - from media representations of violence to national narratives of trauma. On the other end, symbolic interactionists and behavioural scientists have looked at how people participate in and enact violence. But how do individuals make sense of experiences and develop ideas about violence? This session aims to advance sociological theories, methods, and empirical explorations of how people come to see various experiences as violent - whether lived, observed or distant. Session Organizers:Lily Ivanova, University of British Columbia Marie Laperrière, University of Manitoba

Migration/Immigration

This session examines the critical challenges facing newcomers in Canada through a sociological lens while proposing evidence-based solutions for positive social change. Drawing on current research and community experiences, we focus on three interconnected barriers that significantly impact newcomer integration and propose practical interventions for meaningful social transformation; Economic Challenges, Social and Cultural Barriers, and Structural Barriers. Through a combination of research presentations, community voices, and interactive discussions, this session will provide participants with insights into effective interventions and establish networks for continued collaboration in addressing newcomer challenges. Session Organizer and Chair: Parizad Bahardoost, Islamic Azad University

Relational Sociology Research Cluster

Relational sociology is a broad family of ontological and epistemological approaches characterized by a common tendency to shift or reconceptualize the objects of sociological analysis from ‘things’ to relations. Relational thinking can be found in a very wide range of theoretical projects — from Marx, Simmel, Elias to Foucault, Derrida, Latour, and Butler, to Dorothy Smith, Harrison White, and Karen Barad. Within sociology, Emirbayer’s “Manifesto for Relational Sociology” as well as recent work by Crossley, Donati, Archer, and Dépelteau has established a conscious relational turn in theoretical and empirical inquiry. Relational sociology has the potential to re-imagine what the social world is made of, how we know it, and how we act within it. Researchers coming from different theoretical backgrounds and studying different empirical objects were therefore invited to engage in a dialog with each other to explore the dynamic, fluid and processual aspects of social life. Session Organizers: Christopher Powell, Toronto Metropolitan University Mónica Sánchez-Flores, Thompson Rivers University Session Chair: Christopher Powell, Toronto Metropolitan University

Violence and Society Research Cluster

Presentations will be given feedback by a discussant during the session in addition to attendee engagement. Session Organizers: Lily Ivanova, University of British Columbia Robert Nonomura, Western University

Student Concerns Subcommittee

This year’s CSA conference theme asks us how we can build partnerships between academia and diverse publics for social impact within Canada and globally, and to do so we need to turn our attention to the work being done outside of academia as well. In this workshop hosted by the CSA Student Concerns Subcommittee, attendees will have the opportunity to engage with sociologists and those in similar fields who have pursued different career options aside from the traditional academic positions. Session Organizer: J Overholser, University of Calgary