Class, Race, Gender - Rethinking Intersectional Class Analysis in the 21st Century

Objective

This course emphasizes the multidimensional nature of social issues, particularly at the intersection of class, race and gender. Beginning with a review of the theoretical justifications for categorical and relational approaches to inequality — both of which are integral to intersectional approaches to domination, discrimination, and power relations - , the course then considers the role of mechanisms of wealth accumulation that interweave the dimensions of class, gender, race, place, and generation. The remainder of the course focuses on the concept of intersectionality. Moving away from the polemical debates to which it gives rise in public discourse, the course will endeavor to provide intersectionality with empirical content that can be operationalized using the tools and techniques of statistical analysis and modelling. More specifically, we will examine its application in contemporary research on health and educational inequality.

Planning

Week 1 - Introduction –  From categorical to intersectional approach of inequalities

1.      The case for multidimensional and categorical approach of inequality and power relations

-        Tilly, Charles. "Relational origins of inequality." Anthropological theory 1.3 (2001): 355-372.

-        Massey, Douglas S. “How stratification works?” in Categorically unequal: The American stratification system. Russell Sage Foundation, 2007: 1-27

2.      Operationalizing Intersectionality: Epistemological and Empirical Considerations

3.      Assessment Modalities

a.       Knowledge test (50%)

b.       Empirical application (50%), in groups of 3 or 4 students

                                                               i.      Methods

                                                             ii.      Sources

Week 2 - Theoretical perspectives on intersectionality

-        McCall, Leslie. "The complexity of intersectionality." Signs: Journal of women in culture and society 30.3 (2005): 1771-1800.

-        Clarke, Averil Y., and Leslie McCall. "Intersectionality and social explanation in social science research." Du Bois review: social science research on race 10.2 (2013): 349-363.

-        Collins, Patricia Hill. "Intersectionality's definitional dilemmas." Annual review of sociology 41.1 (2015): 1-20.

Week 3 & 4 - Operationalizing intersectionality (I) health inequalities and the MAIHDA method

-        Evans, Clare R., et al. "A tutorial for conducting intersectional multilevel analysis of individual heterogeneity and discriminatory accuracy (MAIHDA)." SSM-population health (2024): 101664.

-        Wilkes, Rima, and Aryan Karimi. "What does the MAIHDA method explain?." Social Science & Medicine 345 (2024): 116495.

Week 5 & 6 – Operationalizing intersectionality (II) poverty, educational inequalities and the QCA set-analytical method

-        Ragin, Charles C., and Peer C. Fiss. Intersectional inequality: Race, class, test scores, and poverty. University of Chicago Press, 2017.

-        Ragin, Charles C., and Peer C. Fiss. "A set-analytic approach to intersectionality." Social Science Research 120 (2024): 103002.

Week 7 - Inequalities and power. Theoretical perspectives and empirical operationalization of categorical inequalities + progress review for the teamwork application

-        Sørensen, Aage B. "Toward a sounder basis for class analysis." American journal of sociology 105.6 (2000): 1523-1558.

-        Wright, Erik Olin. "Understanding class. Towards an integrated analytical approach." New left review 60 (2009): 101-116.

Week 8 - Rethinking class concept, gender inequalities and racial discrimination in light of contemporary wealth accumulation dynamics.

-        Waitkus, Nora, Mike Savage, and Maren Toft. "Wealth and class analysis: exploitation, closure and exclusion." Sociology 59.1 (2025): 126-143.

-        Adkins, Lisa, Melinda Cooper, and Martijn Konings. "Class in the 21st century: Asset inflation and the new logic of inequality." Environment and planning A: economy and space 53.3 (2021): 548-572.

Week 9 & 10 - Emerging dimensions in the generation of categorical inequalities: Globalization, financialization, digitalization

-        Schor, J.B., Attwood-Charles, W., Cansoy, M. et al. Dependence and precarity in the platform economy. Theor Soc 49, 833–861 (2020)

-        Tomaskovic-Devey, Donald. "The relational generation of workplace inequalities." Social currents 1.1 (2014): 51-73.

-        Milanovic, Branko.  “The Rise of the Global Middle Class and Global Plutocrats” in Global inequality: A new approach for the age of globalization. Harvard University Press, 2016, 10:45.

Week 11 – Class, race, gender and place in digital era. Towards an integrative analysis of categorical inequalities

-        Besbris, Max, John N. Robinson III, and Hillary Angelo. "A sociology of real estate: Polanyi, Du Bois, and the relational study of commodified land in a climate-changed future." Annual Review of Sociology 50 (2024).

-        Desmond, Matthew, and Nathan Wilmers. "Do the poor pay more for housing? Exploitation, profit, and risk in rental markets." American Journal of Sociology 124.4 (2019): 1090-1124.

Week 12 – Restitution of empirical applications