Join us Wednesday, October 3, at 12:30 pm, for a discussion with:

Sujatha Fernandes, Professor of Political Economy and Sociology at the University of Sydney

Out of the Home, Into the House: Storytelling and Philanthropy in Domestic Worker Legislative Campaigns

In the contemporary era we have seen a proliferation of storytelling activities, from the phenomenon of TED talks and Humans of New York to a plethora of story-coaching agencies and consultants. My talk examines this culture of storytelling that presents carefully curated narratives with pre-determined storylines as a tool of philanthropy, statecraft, and advocacy. This talk will focus on the use of testimonies in the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights campaign in New York and the ways that philanthropic foundations shaped the storytelling advocacy approach of the campaign.

Sujatha Fernandes is a Professor of Political Economy and Sociology at the University of Sydney. Previously she was a Professor of Sociology at the City University of New York. Her research combines social theory and political economy with in-depth, engaged ethnography of global social and labor movements. Fernandes is the author of Cuba Represent! Cuban Arts, State Power, and the Making of New Revolutionary Cultures (Duke University Press, 2006), Who Can Stop the Drums? Urban Social Movements in Chávez’s Venezuela (Duke University Press, 2010), and Close to the Edge: In Search of the Global Hip Hop Generation (Verso, 2011). Her latest book entitled, Curated Stories: The Uses and Misuses of Storytelling, was published by Oxford University Press in 2017.

The Chapter 4 of Curated Stories is available here through Oxford Scholarship Online

Join us in  Sociology thesis room – 6112.01, 6th floor.