An international conference to mark Professor Mike Savage’s retirement from ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳'s Department of Sociology.
Since his first published writings in 1982, Mike has contributed to the sociological analysis of inequality, both through interventions in classical debates regarding class and stratification, and also through drawing in innovative inter-disciplinary and multi-dimensional perspectives ranging across history, geography, anthropology, cultural studies, and social policy. He has also sought to bridge academic, campaigning, and public facing activities. Mike retired from the Department of Sociology in September 2024, where he has worked since 2012. He is not retiring from academic research, as he starts a new job as part-time Professorial Research Fellow at the International Inequalities Institute in January 2025.
To mark this transition, the Department of Sociology and the International Inequalities Institute are holding a one day conference, not as a retrospective on Mike’s research, but to stimulate future directions for academic debate and critical investigation. Accordingly, the conference will be organised around four core themes that Mike has engaged with, and which mark energising areas of contemporary discussion. Leading speakers will each introduce their current thinking on these topics, not focusing on Mike’s work per se, but on the broader themes he has worked with.
Conference programme
9.30am: Welcome tea and coffee
9.50am: Welcome, Professor Sam Friedman, Professor of Sociology, ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳
10.00am to 11.30am: ‘British’ Social History, convened by Jon Lawrence, Professor of History at Exeter
Foundational historical work by post-war historians, notably EP Thompson and Eric Hobsbawm, placed the British experience at the heart of development of rich scholarship in social history. Over the past two decades, this tradition has been reworked through the decentring of class, enhanced interests in gender and race, and the recognition that the UK needs to be placed in global and imperial perspective. Mike has variously contributed to this renewal through drawing in sociological theory and methodological repertoires in books such as The Dynamics of Working Class Politics (1987) and Identities and Social Chage (2010).
Confirmed speakers
Prof Peter Mandler, History, Cambridge
Dr Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite, History, UCL
Rob Waters, History, QMUL
11.45am to 1.15pm: Consumption, culture and class, convened by Prof Laurie Hanquinet, Professor of Sociology at ULB, Brussels
In the 1990s, numerous sociologists proclaimed the ‘end of class’ and the rise of individualism and reflexivity. Especially through his role as Director of the University of Manchester’s and the Open University’s Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change, Mike was one of the leading voices who critically engaged with Pi