Sofia Shank | Graduate Center of the City University of New York (original) (raw)

Papers by Sofia Shank

Drafts by Sofia Shank

This is a speculative essay I wrote my first year in graduate school, for a panel back in 2012, a... more This is a speculative essay I wrote my first year in graduate school, for a panel back in 2012, at the AAG's entitled "Translating, crossing and (re)thinking borders: Knowledge-making as journey".

If written today, I don't think there is a single line that would appear the same as it does here. More to the point, perhaps, I find myself in vehement disagreement with several critical points and visions as presented here. And (but of course) the grammar, accumulation of missing words, etc is really quite atrocious, but indeed, here too I left the entire piece as it was.

But alas, this is what I submitted then, and if I begin to edit now, it will never see the light of day...On the off chance if there's something useful (if only the insights of Baldwin & Ballard). Indeed, Allan Ballard reminds us,

"The university is both American and American conscience and is therefore both causative of Black student unrest and capable of indecisive Hamlet-like behavior in response to the uproar” to which he adds instructively, “On the white campus, liberalism is impaled upon itself."

Panel Title: Translating, crossing and (re)thinking borders: Knowledge-making as journey

Description:
This roundtable discussion investigates the possibilities and limitations of working across linguistic, socio-cultural, and north-south borders, and of disciplines and disparately located and/or compartmentalized sites of knowledge production. Researchers who support processes of self determination find that such border crossings within dominant university discourses are often informed by presuppositions that reinforce the very hierarchies challenged by political movements, organizations, and people in struggle. Furthermore, these encounters are quickly framed into hierarchical dualisms that neutralize the disruptive potential of those who refuse to accept their status as objects of inquiry and instead force open an inquiry into the existing structures of the "University" and accepted norms and research methods (theory vs. daily life, university vs. "the field," research vs. activism etc). Without attempting to resolve these divides by simply conflating these various sites, we ask what it might mean to initiate collaborations and to successfully translate across borders and boundaries imposed by our multiple sites so that our work both furthers the interruption of the order of things and strengthens alternative practices of social change as demanded by us and those with whom we share political projects and commitments.

We invite panelists that address the following topics:

How can researchers translate across the divides between the formal knowledge of the university and spaces of resistance, often seen as sites of “politics” or “activism” but not of intellectual production?

How does “the University” delegitimize alternative sites of knowledge production? How can University practices be redirected as resources for these alternative sites?
What challenges do University researchers face to support projects for self-representation and self-determination of marginalized subjects?

How do methods (ethnography, participant observation, discourse analysis, etc.); help us understand alternative sites of knowledges when we often encounter these in their initial moments of gestation?

Organizers: Gabriela Valdivia, Alvaro Reyes
Chairs: Richa Nagar

Participants:
Panelist: Joseph Palis
Panelist: Richa Nagar
Panelist: Joel Wainwright
Panelist: Sofia E Shank
Panelist: Kiran Asher
Panelist: Caitlin Cahill
Panelist: Alvaro Reyes

This is a speculative essay I wrote my first year in graduate school, for a panel back in 2012, a... more This is a speculative essay I wrote my first year in graduate school, for a panel back in 2012, at the AAG's entitled "Translating, crossing and (re)thinking borders: Knowledge-making as journey".

If written today, I don't think there is a single line that would appear the same as it does here. More to the point, perhaps, I find myself in vehement disagreement with several critical points and visions as presented here. And (but of course) the grammar, accumulation of missing words, etc is really quite atrocious, but indeed, here too I left the entire piece as it was.

But alas, this is what I submitted then, and if I begin to edit now, it will never see the light of day...On the off chance if there's something useful (if only the insights of Baldwin & Ballard). Indeed, Allan Ballard reminds us,

"The university is both American and American conscience and is therefore both causative of Black student unrest and capable of indecisive Hamlet-like behavior in response to the uproar” to which he adds instructively, “On the white campus, liberalism is impaled upon itself."

Panel Title: Translating, crossing and (re)thinking borders: Knowledge-making as journey

Description:
This roundtable discussion investigates the possibilities and limitations of working across linguistic, socio-cultural, and north-south borders, and of disciplines and disparately located and/or compartmentalized sites of knowledge production. Researchers who support processes of self determination find that such border crossings within dominant university discourses are often informed by presuppositions that reinforce the very hierarchies challenged by political movements, organizations, and people in struggle. Furthermore, these encounters are quickly framed into hierarchical dualisms that neutralize the disruptive potential of those who refuse to accept their status as objects of inquiry and instead force open an inquiry into the existing structures of the "University" and accepted norms and research methods (theory vs. daily life, university vs. "the field," research vs. activism etc). Without attempting to resolve these divides by simply conflating these various sites, we ask what it might mean to initiate collaborations and to successfully translate across borders and boundaries imposed by our multiple sites so that our work both furthers the interruption of the order of things and strengthens alternative practices of social change as demanded by us and those with whom we share political projects and commitments.

We invite panelists that address the following topics:

How can researchers translate across the divides between the formal knowledge of the university and spaces of resistance, often seen as sites of “politics” or “activism” but not of intellectual production?

How does “the University” delegitimize alternative sites of knowledge production? How can University practices be redirected as resources for these alternative sites?
What challenges do University researchers face to support projects for self-representation and self-determination of marginalized subjects?

How do methods (ethnography, participant observation, discourse analysis, etc.); help us understand alternative sites of knowledges when we often encounter these in their initial moments of gestation?

Organizers: Gabriela Valdivia, Alvaro Reyes
Chairs: Richa Nagar

Participants:
Panelist: Joseph Palis
Panelist: Richa Nagar
Panelist: Joel Wainwright
Panelist: Sofia E Shank
Panelist: Kiran Asher
Panelist: Caitlin Cahill
Panelist: Alvaro Reyes