Seminar (GlobaLS): "Political Sociology of Perception and Feminist Styles of Attention"

Program

Summary

This presentation addresses the relevance of perception in contemporary sociology. Specifically, it discusses the political implications of what we perceive and what falls outside the realm of perception and attention. The session has a dual objective: firstly, to analyze the scope of contemporary sociology of perception, with an emphasis on a proposal for its political sociology; secondly, to offer insights into the notion of feminist attention within these discussions. Drawing on recent work by the presenter (Sabido Ramos, 2024), which supports the idea of feminist attention, the analytical proposal of Zerubavel (2015) is revisited. Zerubavel suggests the existence of political forms that attempt to reverse hegemonic attentional patterns and "subversively direct our attention" towards what is conventionally neglected. A common denominator of the plurality of contemporary feminisms is the subversive directing of attention to the suffering of individuals (and other non-human entities) with greater conditions of vulnerability, in the face of the indifference of hegemonic attentional patterns. Therefore, examples will be provided with authors such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Simone Weil, and Rosario Castellanos, whose styles of feminist attention are refreshingly pertinent to some contemporary discussions.

Olga Sabido Ramos

Sociologist. PhD in Political and Social Sciences with a specialization in Sociology from UNAM. She is a full-time professor-researcher at UAM-Azcapotzalco. Her research lines include: Relational sociological theories; Sociology of emotions and affective turn; Sensorial turn and sociology of the senses; and Feminist epistemologies. She has various publications on these topics, including the book “The Body as a Resource of Meaning in the Construction of the Other. A Sociological Perspective” (2012). She is the coordinator of “Georg Simmel. A Contemporary Review” (2007); “The Senses of the Body: A Sensorial Turn in Social Research and Gender Studies” (2019), among others. She is currently participating in a research project in collaboration with the University of Brighton (UK) and UAM (Mexico) entitled “Transforming Transnational Landscapes of Gender-Based Violence through Trans-Sensory Narratives” with Dr. Paula Soto. She is also the sole responsible for the project “Suffering on the Margins of the Canon. Review of Some Pioneers of Sociology and Social Thought”. She is a member of the National System of Researchers Level 3.