Introduction to Popular Culture has one of the “8 Awesome Electives”

The Center for Theory‘s flagship class (Introduction to Popular Culture – SOCI 1310) made the 8 Awesome Electives to Take This Fall list on UTA’s Social Blog. This class is a core curriculum class that fulfills the Language, Philosophy & Culture requirement at UTA. We’re offering it online this Fall and Summer.

This course goes well with a brand new class in Sociology: Social Theory through Popular Culture (SOCI 3373). Students in this course will be reading social theory and then watching/listening/playing movies, shows, albums, songs, and video games that directly address the theories read (including Black Panther, Black Mirror, Parks & Recreation to name a few). Sign-up for one or both courses!

Fall 2019 Flyer - 3373

Introduction to Popular Culture has one of the “8 Awesome Electives”

Social Theory Through Popular Culture

The Sociology program at the University of Texas at Arlington will offer a new theory course this Fall (2019) entitled “Social Theory Through Popular Culture.” The course is open to all UTA students. Sociology students can take this in lieu of Sociological Theory (but students can take both theory classes, too!). The idea is to read original theorists (from Marx to Judith Butler) and interpret them through films, TV, music and video games (from Star Wars to Grand Theft Auto V). This is an exciting opportunity for students to understand the everyday world around us. Contact Dr. David Arditi for more information.Fall 2019 Flyer - 3373

Social Theory Through Popular Culture

Fast Capitalism 1.1 on New Site

An important part of UTA’s Center for Theory is the administration of Fast Capitalism. After hosting the journal on an HTML website since 2005, we are making a big move. We partnered with the UTA Library to develop the website on the Open Journal System (OJS) platform. OJS allows us to bring the journal in-line with other online journal platforms. This helps the editors on the back-end, but it will also help you search, cite, and share articles with others.

Check-out Issue 1.1, which is now online.

cover_image 1.1


Fast Capitalism is an academic journal with a political intent. We publish reviewed scholarship and essays about the impact of rapid information and communication technologies on self, society and culture in the 21st century. We do not pretend an absolute objectivity; the work we publish is written from the vantages of viewpoint. Our authors examine how heretofore distinct social institutions, such as work and family, education and entertainment, have blurred to the point of near identity in an accelerated, post-Fordist stage of capitalism. This makes it difficult for people to shield themselves from subordination and surveillance. The working day has expanded; there is little down time anymore. People can ‘office’ anywhere, using laptops and cells to stay in touch. But these invasive technologies that tether us to capital and control can also help us resist these tendencies. People use the Internet as a public sphere in which they express and enlighten themselves and organize others; women, especially, manage their families and nurture children from the job site and on the road, perhaps even ‘familizing’ traditionally patriarchal and bureaucratic work relations; information technologies afford connection, mitigate isolation, and even make way for social movements. We are convinced that the best way to study an accelerated media culture and its various political economies and existential meanings is dialectically, with nuance, avoiding sheer condemnation and ebullient celebration. We seek to shape these new technologies and social structures in democratic ways.
Fast Capitalism 1.1 on New Site

Dr. Timothy Richardson Colloquium

Dr. Timothy Richardson, associate professor of English at UTA, the University of Texas at Arlington presents “A Haunting Tune: Music, Nostalgia, and Ordinary Psychosis.” The Center of Theory will host the event in University Hall 432 at Noon on April 17. The event is free and open to everyone. Visit the Facebook event page here.

Richardson Colloquium

Dr. Timothy Richardson Colloquium

English professor gives final talk before retirement at Center for Theory Colloquium

On Monday, March 25, Dr. Ken Roemer presented at the Center for Theory’s Colloquium. This was his last presentation on campus before his retirement this Spring. It was our pleasure to host the event, and Dr. Roemer will be sorely missed.

The Shorthorn wrote a great article about the event.

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