The study will be conducted by a team of sociologists with specializations in the fields of globalization and cosmopolitanism, brands, culture, and consumption, social theory, and citizenship.
Sonia Bookman, PhD Principal Investigator
Dr. Sonia Bookman received her Ph.D. in Sociology from Manchester University, then joined the Department of Sociology and Criminology at the University of Manitoba, where she is currently Associate Professor. Sonia’s research focuses on everyday cosmopolitanisms, consumer cultures, as well as brands and branding, and their intersections with urban life. She has published in several journals, including the Journal of Consumer Culture and Cultural Sociology, and is the author of a book titled Brands and the City: Entanglements and Implications for Urban Life. Sonia teaches courses in the sociology of consumption, media sociology, and urban sociology.
Mark Hudson, PhD Co-Investigator
Dr. Mark Hudson is an Associate Professor in the Sociology & Criminology Department and Coordinator of the Global Political Economy Program at the University of Manitoba. He is most recently co-author of the books Consumption (Polity Press, with Ian Hudson) and Neoliberal Lives: Work, Nature, Politics, and Health in the Contemporary United States (Manchester University Press). In addition to research on banks and cosmopolitanism, his research has explored climate politics, links between fossil fuels and financial capital in Canada, unions in energy transition, consumption and consumerism, and the political economy of wildland fire.
Mara Fridell, PhD Co-Investigator
Dr. Mara Fridell is a member of the University of Manitoba Faculty Association. Dr. Fridell is researching the history of cosmopolitan mobilizations in comparison to recent reconfigurations in the cosmopolitan concept, as well as advising on Stella Pena Sy’s research into international law formation. She contribute to Cosmopolitanism group research into international law’s relationship with cosmopolitanism’s articulation through corporate networks and democratic social movement networks in tension. Dr. Fridell’s research programme is grounded in international and historical-comparative analyses of the institutions and comorbidities of inequality. She has published on the international Fair Trade coalition intervening in commodification and underdevelopment, on comparative immigration politics and policies, and on international feminist social movement. She teaches sociological theory and feminist political economy, and advises on comparative politics and policy research.
Research Assistants:
Andrea McDougall
Andrea McDougall is a graduate student in the Sociology & Criminology Department at the University of Manitoba. Her research interests include inequality and social policy, particularly in relation to housing, and her Master’s thesis will examine changes to housing and housing-related policies and their impacts on non-market housing in Canada and elsewhere. Andrea’s past research has compared the national housing and homelessness strategies of various nations within their respective welfare state contexts, and she is also currently assisting on a project exploring service integrated housing for older low-income adults. On the Cosmopolitanism project, Andrea will be assisting Dr Fridell with her examination of the various iterations of Cosmopolitanism that have emerged and evolved over time.
Shayne St. Denis
I have interests in a variety of topics including, but not limited to, religion, politics, inequality, consumer culture, simpler-living and education. Previous projects I have worked on include the development of a food hub as well as the examination of prison systems in Norway and the United States. I am currently looking at transportation as an important, and oft-neglected, dimension of the welfare state. While my interests and projects have varied significantly, one aspect that holds steady is the better understanding of people in hopes of making positive change.
Benjamin Ayamga
Benjamin Baba Ayamga is currently pursuing an MA in Sociology and Criminology at the Department of Sociology & Criminology, University of Manitoba. His research interests include, social inequalities, rural development, deviance, health issues, climate change, intersectionality and cosmopolitanism. In the past, he has assisted several experts and academic researchers in Ghana, Denmark and Germany carryout cutting-edge research on critical issues that span across his areas of research interest. He is currently assisting Dr. Sonia Bookman with her project on ordinary cosmopolitan cultures intended to explore the connections between global brands, cosmopolitanism and consumption. Specifically, to explore how diverse consumers engage and negotiate the cosmopolitan affordances or “frames of action” (Arvidson, 2006) assembled by global brand.
Keziah Brothers
Keziah is a recent University of Manitoba graduate from the GPE program in the Faculty of Arts. In the last year of her undergrad, Keziah focused her research on poverty and meritocratic ideology, and enjoyed playing for the Bison’s Women’s Basketball team. She is involved in the recruitment and interview process of consumers for the Cosmopolitan Consumption, Culture and Markets Research Project. Keziah will be interviewing consumers of H&M, Amazon, and McDonalds to gather data on the relationship between consumers of these brands and their cosmopolitan experiences and practices.
Tiffany Hall
Tiffany is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Manitoba. Her dissertation research addresses clutter in the home from a consumer culture and materiality perspective, and reframes hoarding disorder as an intersection of practices, affects and discourses . Her research also involves media analysis of reality television shows about hoarding. Tiffany has been involved in the Cosmopolitan Markets project since its inception, and is the co-author of two papers on Cosmopolitan Consumption with her advisor Sonia Bookman.
Paola Rodriguez
Melanie Vincent
Jennifer Setlack
Chantel Nygaard
Chase Harms
Stella Pena Sy
Samuel Giovanelli (MITACs Globalinks Internship)