Analyzing Inequality
how columbia is redefining social difference
PrintFor students perusing the course catalogue, the separations between different departments and disciplines can seem daunting. In spite of these traditional institutional divisions, however, endeavors like the Center for the Critical Analysis of Social Difference showcase the importance of making connections across traditional disciplines, which allows for a better understanding of the overall impact of scholarly work.
The CCASD, which was officially launched last year, is creating a forum that combines five separately existing centers and institutes—the Institute for Research on Women and Gender, the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, the Institute for Research in African-American Studies, the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society, and the Barnard Center for Research on Women.
By keeping an overall focus on the implications of social differences, this collaboration is intended to allot a shared research space for these groups, many of which would otherwise have a primarily curricular focus. Though all of these centers and institutes deal with the issues of social differences independently, the synergy of CCASD provides the opportunity to create a fuller picture of its global effects by crossing traditional academic disciplines.
As can be seen in the course registry, it is not uncommon for the subjects of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality to be divided. Yet, in reality, overlap is inevitable. “You have multiple differences that structure your identity,” CCASD’s director Neferti Tadiar states, explaining that these multiple identities make it insufficient to label individuals with singular descriptors.
With that idea in mind, CCASD is trying to integrate this complexity into its research. An intersectional approach to research also reflects the overall intent of CCASD, which is to examine how the categorization of social difference affects the world, and in particular its inequalities. “People recognize the inequalities in the world, [but] they don’t always connect them to the way we categorize social differences,” says Tadiar.
This desire to shape global solutions to social inequality is apparent in the project “Borders and Boundaries.” As one of four projects CCASD is currently working on, “Borders and Boundaries” focuses on fleshing out the connection between international borders and social divisions within countries.
Currently, the project has institutional bases at both Columbia and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris. In order to broaden its research network and to invite further comparisons, the project is also looking to establish bases in Australia, Turkey, Mexico, and Germany.
As inspiration, CCASD’s Web site, socialdifference.org, cites the current paradoxical relationship between the widespread flow of information across national boundaries, and the simultaneous crystallization of ethnic and racial boundaries.
Its relevance to pressing global issues is apparent. “International immigration is going to be huge over the next decade—it already is,” says Claudio Lomnitz, who, in addition to being the director of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, is currently working with the project.
According to Lomnitz, foreseeable factors such as changes in climate, technology, economics, and tensions over migration management portend not only an increase in migration, but also in migration controversy. “The systems of inclusion that various kinds of nations impose for their citizens and people ... all of those are under stress right now,” Lomnitz cautions, citing the example of anxiety presented by international gangs, who can be seen as loosely tied together by a shared migratory experience.
While CCASD is devoted to research, not policy-making, the center still hopes to “find new ways of addressing these pervasive problems of inequality, both locally and globally,” Tadiar says, by aiming to change the way in which individuals conceptualize social difference in their approach to problem-solving.
CCASD aims to clarify that current social divisions are not benign categorizations, but rather issues that have a dramatic impact on resource distribution and social inequalities. She adds that people “might see it as a purely economic issue, a purely political issue,” and that this “sets limits to how they would respond to those inequalities.” What we need instead, the center argues, is a solution without borders.
2 April 2009
vol. 6, issue 8
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