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Scholarly Committees as Elite Public Action: The SSRC and the Origins of Sociolinguistics

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Starting in the early 1950s, the SSRC cultivated interdisciplinary research into the role of language in culture and thought through its Committees on Psycholinguistics and Sociolinguistics. Here, Monica Heller examines how the latter committee (1963–1979) helped establish sociolinguistics in the United States, investigating the tensions between language, culture, and inequality. In exploring how the committee shifted focus from the developing world to marginalized groups in the United States, Heller addresses how the research agendas of these scholarly structures are influenced by the political dynamics or ideologies of their time, in this case the Cold War and decolonization.

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September 4, 2018

Remapping Social Science Debates in Latin America: The Role of the SSRC

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Based in part on research in the SSRC’s archives, Jeremy Adelman and Margarita Fajardo chronicle an important moment in both the history of social science and the political economy of Latin America—the Council’s Joint Committee on Latin American Studies' work on the roots of bureaucratic authoritarianism. Through the 1970s, an interdisciplinary network of scholars from across the Americas interrogated the political and economic dimensions of military rule in Latin America. At the same time, insights from Latin American social science both informed the democratic transitions to come and reshaped research agendas in US scholarship.

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December 6, 2016

Basic Research and Its Challenges in East Africa

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Based on a recent talk given to our Next Generation Social Sciences in Africa fellows at a July workshop in Nairobi, Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o provides a wide-ranging and personal reflection on the importance of conducting basic research in East Africa under daunting circumstances. Anyang’ Nyong’o, both a leading African social scientist and a current member of the Kenyan Parliament, makes the case for scholarly independence at a time when demands for relevance can impede critical analysis.

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October 18, 2016

Reflections on the Rise of Educational Nationalism

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Allan Goodman, president of the Institute of International Education, calls attention to a central tension in contemporary higher education. On the one hand, universities around the world seek more and more international students and greater international collaboration for a range of academic and pragmatic reasons. On the other, Goodman notes the recent rise of a kind of “educational nationalism,” in the United States and around the world, that places limits on the flows of people and ideas, and on the forging of partnerships. He calls for a constructive form of nationalism that competes to “globalize curricula, professors, and the student body.”

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September 6, 2016

Corporate Social Science and the Loss of Curiosity

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Peter Taylor reflects on the directions in which social science has moved in the twenty years since the issuing of the Gulbenkian Commission’s report, Open the Social Sciences. While a strong case was made for interdisciplinarity in that report, Taylor, a member of the commission, highlights a different trend: the development of “corporate” social science. While not opposed to interdisciplinary work, this form of social science, argues Taylor, has established a well-resourced world of institutions and processes for the validation and dissemination of social knowledge parallel to universities and shapes social science in ways that serve private agendas rather than public goals or critical perspectives.

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August 2, 2016

An Opening Before There Was an Opening: The Council and Cuba Twenty Years On

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On the occasion of the rapprochement between Cuba and the United States, Eric Hershberg and Stanley Katz reflect on twenty years of the Council’s work in building bridges to the Cuban scholarly community under complex and politically-charged circumstances. From supporting the preservation of Hemingway’s papers at his Cuban residence to helping to bring Cuban economists into a global conversation, SSRC’s Cuba Program helped create the conditions for the current expansion of scholarly ties.

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June 7, 2016
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