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SPSSI 2020 Summer Conference
SPSSI's 2020 Program Acknowledgements Booklet is now available for download. This booklet was created in an effort to recognize the outstanding work that went into this year's planning and varied submissions to the program of our ultimately cancelled annual event. We acknowledge the breadth and depth of research this year's important theme generated. Please take a moment to peruse the accepted works of our community that would have been presented in Denver, CO this summer. We thank the many members of our organization and staff that worked toward these plans and look forward to the next time we are able to safely meet together.
2020 Program Theme: Making the Invisible Visible: Transformative Research and Social Action
During times of social and political upheaval, the most vulnerable members of society are often silenced and rendered invisible. At this very moment, Indigenous communities are standing strong to defend their lands and traditional ways of life; historically oppressed groups (e.g., black, brown, women, trans, religious minorities) are confronting violence, hate crimes, police brutality, and institutionalized discrimination. We, as scientists, activists, and policymakers, cannot be complacent. We have a responsibility to make space for these voices and to work with these communities to build healthy, thriving societies. This year’s SPSSI conference aims to make visible the social, cultural, and political structures that threaten to dehumanize and, in some cases, erase the futures of vulnerable populations. We invite contributions that range from traditional empirical and policy approaches to those that problematize and push the boundaries of research to undo injustice and transform society.
Free Special Journal Issue Download until September 30: Making the Invisible Visible: Transformative Research and Social Action
SPSSI Editors Drs. Chris Aberson, Naomi Ellemers, Jolanda Jetten, and Carey Ryan have collated a special issue virtual journal to honor the theme of this year's ultimately cancelled conference. Content will be made freely available for a full month. SPSSI members may login at any time to the Wiley interface to access these articles beyond one month.
Introduction Co-authors and 2020 Conference Program Co-Chairs:
Arianne E. Eason and Laura Brady
When we reflect on the year 2020, we will certainly remember how the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted daily life and created immense health, social, psychological, and economic hardship across the globe. At the same time, however, we will remember this as a year of social awakening, a time when people began to see and acknowledge injustices that have been downplayed or ignored for decades and even centuries, particularly by those in power. Perhaps the most vivid examples of this awakening are the large-scale protests that emerged in response to the killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and countless other Black and Brown Americans, often at the hands of police. In cities across the U.S., Black and Brown Americans and their allies have taken to the streets to demand police reform and an end to racial violence and discrimination (Sanchez, 2020). A majority of Americans - including a majority of White Americans - now support the Black Lives Matter movement (Parker, Horowitz, & Anderson, 2020), which has spent much of the last decade drawing attention to the reality of life-threatening violence that Black, Native, and Latinx Americans continue to face. Beyond the U.S., however, protests have emerged in many countries around the world, demonstrating that this is not simply an American awakening, but a global awakening (Kirby, 2020; Maqbool, 2020). Read the full introduction here.
2020 Summer Conference Cancellation Notice
Special thanks to our 2020 Conference Co-Chairs:
Laura Brady, University of Michigan
Arianne Eason, University of California, Berkeley
Looking for information on our previous conferences? Visit our SPSSI Conference Archive.