Weekly News, February 24, 2025

Posted on

Our beloved colleague, Michael Burawoy, was killed the evening of February 3, 2025 when he was hit by a car while walking near his home in Oakland. Michael was a pillar of our community for decades, an intellectual giant, a dedicated mentor and educator, and a dear friend. Indeed, he played a central role in defining who we are as an intellectual and human community. The Sociology Department will host a Memorial Gathering on the Berkeley Campus for Professor Michael Burawoy on Saturday, August 23, 2025 at Alumni House. Please provide your email address in this google form if you would like further information about attending. In lieu of flowers, we ask for contributions to the Burawoy Chair’s Endowment for Sociology, which supports the graduate and undergraduate students to whom Michael was always dedicated. Read more about Professor Burawoy’s life and legacy as well as the memories and tribes from his students and colleagues.

GPAC is working daily to advocate for the importance of population research and for the Federal government agencies that directly and indirectly support the population sciences. Here are the letters we’ve been part of so far this week:

Join us this week for our next Brownbag Seminar of the semester on Wednesday, February 26th, 12pm, with Kathleen Beegle, Lead Economist in the Poverty, Inequality, and Human Development Team of the World Bank’s Development Research Group.  The title of Dr. Beegle’s talk is “Women at work: Evidence from a randomized experiment in urban Djibouti.” This is an in-person talk, Room 310, Social Sciences Building. Zoom option: Meeting ID: 985 2901 0198  Password: DEMOG_BB  See the full event details here. Our YouTube channel is here. Visit our Brown Bag event page for both past and upcoming talks here.

You are invited to the 8th annual Workshop on Determinants of Adult Mortality, Morbidity, and Healthy Aging in LMICs, to be held on Friday, March 7, 2025. This is a virtual workshop co-sponsored by our NIA-funded UC Berkeley Center on the Economics and Demography of Aging (CEDA) and the USC/UCLA Center for Biodemography and Population Health (CBPH). It is designed to share leading research methods and findings on comparative patterns and determinants of adult mortality, morbidity, and healthy aging in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). The program is attached.  Please register through the following link to receive Zoom information.

We’re now accepting applications to attend our 11th Annual Berkeley Workshop on Formal Demography, to be held Jun 2-6, 2025. This year’s workshop will cover classic topics in formal demography including the analysis of fertility and mortality as well as population dynamics. In addition, this year’s special emphasis topic will be on the demography of fertility and reproduction, including the determinants and consequences of recent fertility changes in low fertility populations. Travel and accommodations will be provided for accepted applicants. This workshop is made possible with funding from the NICHD (R25HD083136). The deadline to apply is March 10, 2025. Learn more and apply.

As part of the PAA 2025 Annual Meeting, members who are registered to vote in the U.S. can participate in Advocacy Day — a day when population scientists have the opportunity to meet with their congressional delegation. Share examples of population research advances and express support for the Federal government agencies that support the population sciences. We need your help now more than ever. Sign up by Friday, February 28. See details.

Featured affiliate research of the week: Pragmatism and Medical Sociology: Three Precepts. Social Science & Medicine. 2024 March 345. Eliza Brown and Iddo Tavory.

**************

See further announcements and opportunities below.

EVENTS

February 24  | 2-3:30pm | UC Berkeley Sociology | Claire Laurier Decoteau, Professor of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “Emergency: COVID-19 and the Uneven Valuation of Life.” 402 Social Sciences Building. Zoom link here.

February 26 | 12-1pm |  UC Berkeley Demography Seminar |  Kathleen Beegle, Lead Economist in the Poverty, Inequality, and Human Development Team of the World Bank’s Development Research Group. “Women at work: Evidence from a randomized experiment in urban Djibouti.” Room 310, Social Sciences Building. Zoom option: Meeting ID: 985 2901 0198  Password: DEMOG_BB  See the full event details here. 

February 27 | 10-11am PST | COSSA | Understanding the Latest White House and Congressional Actions. Join on February 27 for the next Headlines Webinar. This month, COSSA will be providing updates on Congressional actions, recent Trump Administration efforts, and other new developments of the last few weeks, including what COSSA members can do in response. Come join the conversation. RSVP Here.

February 28 |  12-1pm EST | CAPS Seminar – How did the COVID Pause in Medicaid Administrative Burdens Change Enrollment Rates and Experiences by Race and Ethnicity. Join us for a CAPS seminar with Elaine Hernandez, Associate Professor of Sociology at Indiana University – Bloomington. See the attached flyer or more information.

OPPORTUNITIES 

The American Sociological Association’s Sociology of Population section is accepting nominations for the best student paper in the sociology of population. This award consists of a certificate and $500 award. The paper must use a sociological perspective to address an issue of relevance to contemporary demography, broadly construed; purely technical papers are not eligible. The paper can be published or unpublished and should be article-length (approximately 40 pages including tables and figures). Papers can be sole-authored or have multiple student authors. Nominations and a copy of the article should be emailed to all committee members by March 1, 2025. Membership in the Sociology of Population Section of the ASA is not a requirement for the award but is encouraged.

Committee members:

Karen Benjamin Guzzo (Chair), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, karen.guzzo@unc.edu

Zoya Gubernskaya, University at Albany, zgubernskaya@albany.edu

Ohjae Gowen, Singapore Management University, ohjaegowen@smu.edu.sg

Sophia Chae, University of Montreal, sophia.chae@umontreal.ca

Won-tak Ju, University of Florida, wjoo@ufl.edu

FUNDING

The NIA-funded Interdisciplinary Network on Rural Population Health and Aging (INRPHA) invites proposals for pilot research projects related to US rural population health and aging trends & disparities. Proposals are due by 5:00 PM CT on May 1. More information is here. 

CONFERENCES

Demographic and Health Consequences of Violence and Armed Conflict
Rostock, Germany, 1-2 July 2025

Deadline for submissions: 14 March 2025 (23:59 CET).

Organized by:

Scope:
Armed conflict and organized violence profoundly disrupt population structures, health trends, and mobility patterns. Moreover, the tumultuous events of war can make data collection prohibitive, presenting critical challenges for demographic research. Understanding the population and health consequences of violence and armed conflict requires nuanced theoretical frameworks, robust methodological approaches, and benefits greatly from multidisciplinary collaborations and novel statistical methods.

This two-day symposium invites scholars across disciplines, including demography, public health, sociology, political science, and economics, to submit original research examining the short- and long-term impacts of armed conflict and violence on mortality, migration, fertility, the environment, and population health. By fostering dialogue among global experts, this event symposium aims to advance research and provide insights into populations at risk.

We invite contributions that address topics including:

  • Health and demographic impacts of violence and displacement
  • Short-term disruptions and long-term population consequences
  • Methodological innovations for studying populations in conflict settings
  • Migration and forced displacement trends and their demographic implications
  • Population and health consequences of conflict-related environmental damage
  • Intersectional approaches to understanding vulnerable populations in conflict zones

Submission Guidelines:
Please use the submission website to submit extended abstracts (2–4 pages) or full papers and a short abstract (250 words) by March 14, 2025 (23:59 CET). Include the paper title, author(s) name(s), affiliation(s), and the contact information of the presenting author. Selected papers will be invited for an oral or poster presentation at the conference.

There are no fees to attend, but participants are expected to cover their travel costs and accommodations. Financial support may be available for presenting students or early career scientists with high-quality submissions and no funding available. Please indicate your request for funding on the submission website.

For inquiries and further information, please contact COVACconference2025@demogr.mpg.de

Important Dates:

    •    Submission Deadline: March 14, 2025 (23:59 CET)
    •    Notification of Paper Acceptance: mid-April, 2025
    •    Symposium Dates: July 1–2, 2025

Organizing Committee:
The organizing committee includes the following individuals from the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR), the Population, Health and Armed Conflict (PHAC) Network, and the IUSSP Panel on Population Dynamics under Global Conflict and Climate Change: Diego Alburez-Gutierrez (MPIDR and PHAC), Stephanie Koning (PHAC), Kim Korinek (PHAC), Ebru Sanlitürk (MPIDR), Nathalie Williams (PHAC), Yvette Young (MPIDR and PHAC), Emilio Zagheni (MPIDR and IUSSP).

See the full online call here.

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Gateway to Global Aging Data and Social Science & Medicine invite submissions for a conference and special issue dedicated to interdisciplinary research studying how education influences health and ageing globally. Submissions of extended abstracts are due March 31, 2025, and the conference will take place in Boston, Massachusetts from September 4-5, 2025. For the detailed call for submissions, please see here.

Posted in Newsletter.