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David Maines established himself as one of the premier symbolic interactionists who did not attach himself to any particular interactionist school of thought. In creating an extensive and intensive legacy via his publications, Maines looked into issues that other interactionists, bound to particular schools of thought, either took for granted or neglected to examine. In so doing, Maines resembled Simmel's Stranger not only as one who fits into a community but also as one who remains distant from the community. One of the key areas of investigation that defined Maines' work and that separated him from other interactionists pertained to his interest in social structure and specifically, how people become structurally situated as social-structural interactors. This chapter examines, in detail, Maines' interest in getting structurally situated and uses a television series, Dopesick, to discuss the relationships between institutional actors as a way to substantiate Maines' theoretical interest in social structure and the activities involved in the process of getting structurally situated.

This performance autoethnography may or may not be interpreted as a continuation of a conversation regarding the experiences of those with devalued statuses in academic settings. The authors rely on “strange accounting” to consider their experiences in the academy from various standpoints: before and after promotion, before and after leaving academia. While reflecting on our past experiences, we introduce the concept of “everyday precariousness” as a way of explaining the normalization of instability, insecurity, and negative affect that is part of everyday life for those with devalued statuses in academic settings and beyond. Everyday precariousness is an embodied experience for those in vulnerable positions. Normalized exposure to risks, such as discrimination, harassment, bullying, or structural instability, produces an undercurrent of threat that permeates academic culture. Our stories of everyday precariousness span race, ethnicity, class, academic roles, and gender boundaries (among many others). Analyzing these experiences furthers previous work on the uses of strange accounting as well as the dynamics of status silencing. In the final analysis, unresisted and unabated, everyday precariousness and status silencing can lead to institutional failure and resonance disasters.

The USA has long been known to provide a competitive environment in which religions compete for believers. The data clearly show winners and losers in this marketplace. Major Christian denominations are generally experiencing a decline in membership while religious “nones” are growing in number. Of note, the recent Pew studies of the US Religious Landscape (2008 and 2015a) indicate that measures of spirituality are rising in this environment. This paper empirically investigates how the demand for spirituality in religion may better understand these trends.

This paper applies ordinary least squares to survey data from the 2015 Pew study to empirically investigate how belonging to a major Christian faith and attending religious services impacts feeling of spirituality, while conditioning on a host of other demographic variables, in order to better understand these trends.

The author finds that being a member of a Christian denomination generally reduces the measure of spirituality relative to religious “nones.” However, this effect is almost always offset by a measure of attendance at religious services suggesting spirituality is positively associated with social interaction.

The results have implications for religious leaders concerned about maintaining and growing the church's membership. The results suggest that Church leaders may benefit from de-emphasizing hierarchical top-down rules and emphasizing community.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-05-2022-0342

In August, 2015, Serena Williams, one of the most successful female athletes of all time, was body shamed in a New York Times article. The incident highlights the issue of unequal treatment of male and female athletes – while a muscular frame enhances masculinity for male athletes, a muscular physique invites body shaming for female athletes. In this study, symbolic interactionist theories regarding the generalized other are called into question. While George Mead's theorizing exhibits a nonproblematic role taking of the generalized other in a cooperative manner, this study reports the presence of paradoxical generalized others, and consequently, the incongruent role taking of a latent generalized other by individuals. This study investigates if the issue of body image exists among college female athletes, if college female athletes experience the dilemma of choosing between outstanding performance with a muscular frame or maintaining traditional female appearance. To provide answers to the question, female athletes in a midwest university were invited to fill out a survey. The survey results confirm the existence of a paradox between performance and appearance among some college female athletes.

The purpose of this chapter is to provide a comprehensive analysis of how sentiments may be a part of, or adjacent to, status generalization. We demonstrate why this problem is so difficult to solve definitively, as many resolutions may exist. Sentiments may present the properties of graded status characteristics but may also be disrupted by processes of the self. Sentiments may have status properties enacted within dyadic interactions. However, sentiments may also be status elements during triadic constellations of actors. Finally, we discuss current research that is underway to provide more empirical evidence to offer confirmation or disconfirmation for some of our proposed models.

We provide a synthesis of literatures, including pieces from group processes, neuroscience, psychology, and network scholarship, to address the relation between sentiment and status processes. Accordingly, this is a conceptual chapter.

We attempt to motivate future research by exploring the many complications of examining these issues.

Understanding how social inequalities may emerge during group interaction allows researchers to address their deleterious effects. Positive sentiments (in other words, “liking”) should bring actors closer together to complete tasks successfully. Ironically, when paired with negative sentiments within task groups, inequalities in group opportunities may result. To address these social inequalities, a thorough understanding of how they develop is necessary, so that efficacious interventions can be adopted.

This deep dive into the relation between sentiment and status processes joins the 25-year quest to understand the issues surrounding this relationship.

The introduction in Italy in July 2021 of the “COVID-19 Green Certification”, known as the “Green Pass”, was a particularly important moment in the political and social history of the country. While its use for health reasons is debatable both logically and scientifically, its effects should be measured at the general sociological level. The “Green Pass” allowed Italian social life to be shaped according to a social and political profile that can be traced back to a “society of control”. This paper aims to discuss the aforementioned issue.

This paper, of a theoretical nature, intends to verify such an interpretation through a critical survey of Gilles Deleuze's well-known Post-scriptum sur les sociétés de contrôle (1990) and relating the theories to it from cybernetic science, sociology of social systems and the continental philosophy, specifically Michel Foucault. After a short introduction on the history of the instrument's introduction, the paper, divided into parts reflecting the set-up of Deleuze's text, examines the systemic social effects of the “Green Pass” with regard to its logic, and concludes with a reflection on the program of the instrument's future developments.

The “Green Pass” put into practice a model of a society of control as anticipated by Deleuze, verified with particular reference to some instances of Luhmann's theory of social systems, and in the perspective of a Foucault's “normalizing society” in the process of definition and affirmation.

The “Green Pass” has been a controversial tool that has caused forms of social discrimination and exclusion and has seriously questioned the architecture of the rule of law. The conceptual paper tries to reflect on the premises and implications of this instrument.

The approach to the problem both in a critical key and according to concepts and theories of the sociology of social systems, cybernetics and continental philosophy.