Michael E. Gellert Professor of Sociology at The New School for Social Research

Education

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere IV

Concluding Remarks

August 29, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

It has been an eventful summer. As my dear friend and colleague Robin Wagner-Pacifici would put it, a restless eventful summer: “The world seems out of whack, and everyday routines are, at the least, disrupted. People … experience a vertiginous sensation that a new reality or era may be in the ...

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere IV

Education

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere III

Truth, Politics and the Bifurcated Sphere of Publics

August 21, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

As I have been reporting on the Wroclaw seminar’s progress, in the shadow of the collapse of democracy in Poland, I have been dumbfounded by events in the U.S. since I got back from Poland. President Trump has threatened nuclear war with North Korea, disregarding all expert opinion about the appropriate ...

Education

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere II

The Sphere of Publics and its Bifurcation

August 19, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

As our seminar on authoritarianism and public life progressed, we focused on the work of Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz, and Joshua Meyrowitz to develop an understanding of mediated public life. Their sociology of media is a sociology of mediated interactions, rather than studies of the media, i.e. major newspapers, ...

Education

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere I

Reviewing the work of Jurgen Habermas and Hannah Arendt with an assist from Nancy Fraser

August 18, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

It’s been two weeks since my return from Wroclaw. I am getting over the shock of teaching about the rise of the new authoritarianism, as the Polish parliament, The Sejm, seemed to be hammering the final nails into the coffin of Polish democracy. It turned out to be a little ...

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere I

Education

Media, the New Authoritarianism, and Its Alternatives Update

Teaching in Wroclaw, as liberal democracy is collapsing in Poland and beyond

August 1, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

I am exhausted. Conducting the seminar “Media, Publics and the New Authoritarianism” at this time, and in Poland, was intense, exciting, illuminating, and depressing. Coping with a combination of illumination and despair, I did not have the time or the constitution to properly digest what we were exploring together, and ...

Media, the New Authoritarianism, and Its Alternatives Update

Education

Our Dark Times

Setting the Intellectual and Political Context for the Investigation of Media, The New Authoritarianism and Its Alternatives

July 7, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

This seminar has a long history, predating the Democracy and Diversity Institute, and born as an oppositionist activity in the good old bad days of previously existing socialism. Adam Michnik first imagined it, after he received an honorary doctorate from The New School in a clandestine award ceremony in 1984 in ...

Education

The Media, the New Authoritarianism and Its Alternatives

On Teaching, Once Again, in the Democracy and Diversity Institute in Poland, syllabus included

July 3, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

This is the 26th year of The New School’s Democracy and Diversity Institute. I have participated in just about all of them. One year, my father was gravely ill and I had to bug out. Recently, I have missed a few years, as I have been following a promise to ...

The Media, the New Authoritarianism and Its Alternatives

Feature

Peter Berger’s Last Visit to The New School for Social Research

Revisiting The Social Construction of Reality

July 1, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

Although circumstances did not permit Peter Berger to attend in person The New School’s conference commemorating the upcoming fiftieth anniversary of the publication of The Social Construction of Reality, it was wonderful to have him with us via Skype (nicely captured with me in the accompanying surreal photo). ...

Peter Berger’s Last Visit to The New School for Social Research

Feature

Happy Birthday, Mr. President!

How I Can’t Stop Worrying About the Bomb and the Threat to Democracy in America

June 14, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

So it’s Donald Trump’s birthday today. Too bad Marilyn Monroe isn’t around. Nothing less than her famous greeting to John F. Kennedy would satisfy his outsized ego. His needs are profoundly disturbing, as indicated by the spectacle of the first meeting of his full cabinet. I strongly recommend that you view this ...

Reviews

Solidarity, and the Rise and Fall of the Public Sphere

A Review of Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz’s Media Events

April 18, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

Twenty-five years after its publication, Dayan and Katz’s classic study of ceremonial television, Media Events, has continued relevance for understanding the politics of media. With the proliferation of cable television and digital media explosion, television is no longer the hegemonic media form it once was, and the media events they ...

Solidarity, and the Rise and Fall of the Public Sphere

Feature

What Do You Mean When You Use the Term Neoliberalism?

A Question to My American Friends, Colleagues, Students and Comrades on the Academic Left

April 7, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

The term “neoliberalism” drives me crazy, specifically when used in the U.S.. It explains too much with too little, concealing crucial distinctions, as it frustrates crucial coalitions against the clear and present danger of the new authoritarianism of Trump, Le Pen, Orban, Kaczynski, et al.. Further, it’s meaningless for much ...

What Do You Mean When You Use the Term Neoliberalism?

Feature

Provoking Informed Discussion By Any Means Necessary

No new posts on Tuesday and Wednesday

April 4, 2017 • by Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

We, the editors and staff of Public Seminar, are working hard all the time to cultivate an offering of posts that “provoke critical and informed discussion by any means necessary,” responding to the pressing problems of our times and address enduring problems of the human condition, as we put it ...

Jeffrey C. Goldfarb

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere IV

Concluding Remarks

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere III

Truth, Politics and the Bifurcated Sphere of Publics

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere II

The Sphere of Publics and its Bifurcation

The New Authoritarianism and the Structural Transformation of the Mediated Public Sphere I

Reviewing the work of Jurgen Habermas and Hannah Arendt with an assist from Nancy Fraser

Media, the New Authoritarianism, and Its Alternatives Update

Teaching in Wroclaw, as liberal democracy is collapsing in Poland and beyond

Our Dark Times

Setting the Intellectual and Political Context for the Investigation of Media, The New Authoritarianism and Its Alternatives

The Media, the New Authoritarianism and Its Alternatives

On Teaching, Once Again, in the Democracy and Diversity Institute in Poland, syllabus included

Peter Berger’s Last Visit to The New School for Social Research

Revisiting The Social Construction of Reality

Happy Birthday, Mr. President!

How I Can’t Stop Worrying About the Bomb and the Threat to Democracy in America

Solidarity, and the Rise and Fall of the Public Sphere

A Review of Daniel Dayan and Elihu Katz’s Media Events

What Do You Mean When You Use the Term Neoliberalism?

A Question to My American Friends, Colleagues, Students and Comrades on the Academic Left

Provoking Informed Discussion By Any Means Necessary

No new posts on Tuesday and Wednesday

Newsletter

Connect With Us