I am working at present on constructing a resource of web sites for a book I am working on. Prompted by an article in the Guardian on world gay rights, I checked out these web sites which are really very useful. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/30/gay-rights-world-best-worst-countries So here are a few web sites International Lesbian and Gay Association http://ilga.org/…
Tag: rights
I am not the greatest fan of Pop Idol (more of a Glee person myself!). But I was pleased to find that the winner of Arab Idol this year not just sung and looked great, but also had a message to say:
Mohammed Assaf
” A revolution is not just the one carrying the rifle. It is the paintbrush of an artist, the scalpel of a surgeon, the axe of the farmer. Everyone struggles for their cause in the way they see fit.
He went on to say: Today I represent Palestine and today I am fighting for a cause through my art and the message I send out.
He was the first Palestinian to win it.
A MANIFESTO FOR A CRITICAL HUMANISM
IN
SOCIOLOGY
ON QUESTIONING THE HUMAN SOCIAL WORLD
Ken Plummer
(Emeritus Professor of Sociology, University of Essex, U.K.)
This was First Presented at the VI Congreso Andaluz de Sociologiá, University of Cadiz, November 2012
In June it was published in
Daniel Nehring: Sociology: A Text and Reader ( Pearson, 2013).
This is the first edition; it is now under revision for a 2nd version. Comments are welcome
Contact Ken Plummer at plumk@essex.ac.uk
_________________________________________________
Thou shalt not answer questionnaires
Or quizzes upon World-Affairs,
Nor with compliance
Take any test. Thou shalt not sit
With statisticians nor commit
A social science
– W.H. Auden ‘Under Which Lyre’. 1946
We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom. Leo Tolstoy War and Peace, 1869
These then are my last words to you. Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact. William James: The Will to Believe. 1896
SUMMARY
- Prologue: A very human animal in an all too human world
- On the Human Search for Meaning
- On Sociology
- The Challenge of Humanism
- Righting the Troubles with Humanism
- On Critical Humanism
- The Human Condition: Obdurate Features of the Human World
- On Human Potentials, Capabilities and Rights
- The Challenge of Plural Worlds, Ethnocentrism and Cosmopolitanism
- On Becoming Human: The Process of Humanization
- A Sociology of the People: Being Practical and Pursuing the Wise Society
- We are the Story Telling Animals
- The Politics and ethics of Humanism: Living a Better Life and Making a Better World
- Dark Hope and Dreaming Ahead in Perpetually Troubled Timers: Key Directions For a Future Humanistic Agenda
- Further Reading
Books, Articles & Research, Imagining Better Worlds, Intimate citizenship, Living Humanity, Politics and change, Sociological Imaginations
Some Recent Presentations
Handouts for recent presentations Today I have posted some summary handouts of recent lectures that I have given. The first was given at a lecture for Spanish sociologists. I launched the manifesto for Critical Humanism at that time; and this was the handout I gave them as I lectured to powerpoints.…
Ending India’s War on Women
Posted: 3 January 2013 Damini*, a 23-year-old student from Delhi, didn’t live to see 2013 — she died two days before the new year following a horrific gang rape on a bus in Delhi. Her case has sparked outrage across the world, and if enough of us act now, this tragedy could be the beginning of the end for India’s…
This week I am launching the first draft of
A MANIFESTO FOR A CRITICAL HUMANISM IN
SOCIOLOGY
ON QUESTIONING THE HUMAN SOCIAL WORLD
First Presented at the VI Congreso Andaluz de Sociologiá, University of Cadiz, November 2012
To be published in Daniel Nehring: Sociology: A Text and Reader ( Pearson, 2013).
This is the first edition; it is now under revision for a 2nd version. Comments are welcome
Contact Ken Plummer at plumk@essex.ac.uk
you can find it by clicking here: Manifesto
We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom. Leo Tolstoy War and Peace, 1869
These then are my last words to you. Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact. William James: The Will to Believe. 1896
SUMMARY
- Prologue: A very human animal in an all too human world
- On the Human Search for Meaning
- On Sociology
- The Challenge of Humanism
- Righting the Troubles with Humanism
- On Critical Humanism
- The Human Condition: Obdurate Features of the Human World
- On Human Potentials, Capabilities and Rights
- The Challenge of Plural Worlds, Ethnocentrism and Cosmopolitanism
- On Becoming Human: The Process of Humanization
- A Sociology of the People: Being Practical and Pursuing the Wise Society
- We are the Story Telling Animals
- The Politics and ethics of Humanism: Living a Better Life and Making a Better World
- Dark Hope and Dreaming Ahead in Perpetually Troubled Timers: Key Directions For a Future Humanistic Agenda
- Further Reading
YOU CAN FIND THE FULL MANIFESTO BY CLICKING ON MANIFESTOS
Shit! It’s World Toilet Day
Shit! Monday 19th November is World Toilet Day Today is World Toilet Day. Across the world of some seven billion people, some 2.6 billion people ( 40%) have no access to sanitation. It is the direct cause of much disease and death. The Millennium Development Project wants to halve this by 2015. (click on this)…
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On Cosmopolitanism
Ten Theses on Cosmopolitanism There exists a real humanistic universalism of differences (including sexual differences). Human difference is a sine qua non of human existence. I believe that these differences have to be a key subject for the human studies. There are perpetual conflicts about these differences (including sexual differences), the source of much human…
International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission
International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) is a leading international organization dedicated to human rights advocacy on behalf of people who experience discrimination or abuse on the basis of their actual or perceived sexual orientation, gender identity or expression. Learn more about its work by…