Healthy Outlook Division of Health, Health Policy and Health Services of the Society for the Study of Social Problems Fall 2012 In This Issue Statement from the Co-Chair Graduate Student Paper Awards News of Note Member Publications 2013 Annual Meeting Call for Division Nominations Call for Newsletter Editor Call for Social Problems Editor Statement from the Co-Chair Dear Colleagues and Friends of the Division: I would like to thank the Division for the opportunity to serve as the new chair of the Health, Health Policy, and Health Services Division of SSSP. I appreciate the work of past Division co-chairs in building a strong membership, comprehensive Division webpage, and other social media outlets (Facebook and Twitter!) With her recent election as Chairperson of the Council of the Special Problems Divisions, Shannon Monnat has had to step down as co-chair of the Health Division due to SSSP regulations prohibiting a member from holding two offices. She, however, continues to generously help me learn the ropes! Elizabeth Gage also has been extremely helpful in acquainting me with the activities of the Division. I am deeply grateful to both of them for their past work and for their ongoing involvement. I also would like to announce that our newsletter editor, Christina Barmon, will be continuing this coming year. Her ongoing work in producing a quality newsletter is much appreciated! I was able to meet some other Division members at the meeting this past summer in Denver and I look forward to meeting more of you at the 2013 meeting scheduled for August 9-11 in New York City. Hotel reservation information (for the Westin New York) will be available soonÑwatch for it on http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm/m/502/2013_Annual_Meeting. If you are searching for a roommate or two to help with costs, you can look there but you could also post on the DivisionÕs Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/#!/SSSPHealth?fref=ts). In the aftermath of the election, weÕll hear more about the Affordable Health Care Act (ACHA) since 2013 and 2014 are important years for implementing key features of the legislation. The ongoing public debate, at the national and local levels, will be important for addressing policy issues which affect the entire country as ACHA continues to be implemented. Most division members would probably agree that all individuals, regardless of their income, education, racial/ethnic background, sexual orientation, veteranÕs status, gender identity, residential context, and many other social characteristics, should have opportunities to live long, healthy, and productive lives. While the AHCA does not cover everyone, it is the most all-encompassing health care legislation this country has passed in decades. With the continued bipolarization of the House and Senate, the ACHA will likely receive ongoing scrutiny as the legislation is contested and simultaneously implemented. Members in our division will continue to play important roles as we explore ways in which critical analysis and collective action can re-imagine the health care system and produce meaningful change. Along with others, organizations and individuals in the site of our upcoming 2013 conference, New York City, have been at the forefront of many of these policy issues and initiatives, representing both scholarly and activist concerns. Our division sessions for the 2013 annual meeting have been structured to draw upon a range of activist and policy concerns. Sessions reflect the idea that struggles for health and healthcare are far from being resolved. There are multiple and complex social factors outside of the healthcare system that contribute to making us healthy or unhealthy. In addition, our existing healthcare system is grappling with structural and political challenges in order to meet those needs. Toward that end, the division is sponsoring and co-sponsoring sessions on: implementing health reform; health disparities; health services and health policy; medical normalization of the body; drug diversion and misuse; public health sustainability and ecological justice; and theoretical and methodological approaches to studying inequality and health. While social constructionism remains an important lens for examining health problems, many of these sessions also will reflect the conference theme of Òre-imagining social problems: moving beyond social constructionism.Ó We hope that you will submit your research for presentation at one of our seven division sessions. We also encourage graduate students and their mentors to submit papers to our annual Graduate Student Paper competition. You can read more about this below. Finally, we are soliciting nominations for candidates for Division co-chair for 2013-2015. Please consider nominating yourself or a colleague by emailing me (Deborah.Potter@ louisville.edu). Best wishes for a healthy 2013! ---Debbie Potter Graduate Student Paper Awards Deadline: 1/31/13 The Health, Health Policy, and Health Services Division invites all graduate students to apply for this annual paper award competition. The paper should be related to the broad Division interest, including health and illness, health policy, and health services. Current graduate students and recent graduates (who received their degrees after January 2012) may submit a paper if it was written while a student. Papers based on theses or dissertations are acceptable. Co-authored papers are acceptable as long as all the listed authors were graduate students at the time the paper was written. Double submission to other SSSP award competitions will disqualify the submission. The award recipient will be required to present the winning paper at the 2013 SSSP Annual Meeting in New York, NY. Thus, the paper also should be submitted to any Health Division meeting session organizer or the roundtable organizer by the January 31st deadline. The recipient will receive a monetary prize of $100, student membership to SSSP, SSSP conference registration, and a ticket to the SSSP awards. Send an electronic copy of the paper and a cover letter identifying your graduate program to: Miranda Waggoner, PhD, waggoner@princeton.edu. The paper submission should not exceed 30 double-spaced pages (including references) and should be prepared for anonymous review (with the author specified only on the cover page). News of Note Division member and past president Wendy Simonds was awarded the 2012 Sociologists for Women in Society mentorship award. Division member Gayle Sulik just launched the Breast Cancer Consortium, anÊinternational partnership committed to energizing the scientific and public discourse about breast cancer and to promoting collaborative initiatives among researchers, advocates, health professionals, educators, and others who focus on the system-wide factors that affect breast cancer as an individual experience, a social problem, and a health epidemic.Ê (www.breastcancerconsortium.net) Member Publications ¥ Frank YoungÕs article, ÒPopulation Health as a Fundamental Criterion of Social EcologyÓ has just appeared in Social Indicators Research, online, and will appear in the journal, later. As the title indicates, it nominates an appropriate measure of population health as the universal criterion of how well communities, as small as the household and as large as the nation-state, adapt. It also specifies how communities solve problems of adaptation when confronted with existential threats. That makes it a candidate for core theory in sociology and it brings "social problems" back to its former central place in sociology. ¥ Gayle Sulik's book, ÒPink Ribbon Blues: How Breast Cancer Culture Undermines Women's HealthÓ is now available in a paperback edition that includes a new introduction on recent fundraising controversies and a new 4-page color insert with images of, and reactions to, the pinking of breast cancer (Oxford, 2012). ¥ Elise Paradis has co-authored ÒBody Fat as Metaphor: From Harmful to HelpfulÓ with Ayelet Kuper, and Richard K. Reznick in CMAJ 27:331-343. (available online at: http://www.cmaj.ca/content/early/2012/09/24/cmaj.120100.full.pdf). ¥ Elise Paradis has also co-authored ÒKey Trends in Interprofessional Research: A Macrosociological Analysis from 1970 to 2010 with Scott Reeves in the Journal of Interprofessional Care (available online at: http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/13561820.2012.719943). ¥ Elizabeth A. Gage has authored ÒSocial Networks of Similar Others: Formation, Activation, and Consequences of Network Ties on the Healthcare ExperienceÓ in Social Science and Medicine. Available online August 31, 2012. ¥ Elizabeth A. Gage has also authored ÒThe Dynamics and Processes of Social Support: FamiliesÕ Experiences Coping with a Serious Pediatric IllnessÓ in Sociology of Health and Illness. (Scheduled to appear in March 2013, Volume 35, Issue 3) 2013 Annual Meeting Re-imagining Social Problems: Moving Beyond Social Constructionism August 9-11, 2013 The Westin New York at Times Square Division Sessions Health Disparities as a Social Problem Organizers: Elizabeth Gage & Lucie Kalousova Health Services and Health Policy Organizer: Larry Greil Problems with Implementing Health Care Reform in a Neo-Liberal Era (Thematic Session; Critical Dialogue format) Organizer: Debbie Potter Co-sponsored Sessions Medical Normalization and the Body (co-sponsored with Disabilities; and Sexual Behavior, Politics & Communities) Organizer: Gary Gabriel Costello Health: Big Pharma, Big Consequences: Drug Diversion and Misuse (co-sponsored with Drinking & Drugs) Organizer: Terry Furst Public Health Sustainability, Ecological Justice, and Globalization (co-sponsored with Environment & Technology; and Global) Organizer: Jennifer Reed Theoretical and Methodological Approaches to Studying Health and Inequality ÒIn-the round.Ó (co-sponsored with Poverty, Class & Inequality; and Social Problems Theory) Organizer: Shannon Monnat Poverty, Class and the Social Determinants of Health (Co-sponsored with Poverty, Class and Inequality) Organizer: Sharon Roberts Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security: New Perspectives on the Welfare State (Thematic session; co-sponsored with Youth, Aging, and the Life Course) Organizer: Mary Byrnes Fragile Families: Need Programs and Services to Meet the Social, Health, and Educational Needs of Poor Parents and their Children (Co-Sponsored with Poverty Class & Inequality; Family; and Poverty, Class and Inequality) Organizer: Tracy Peressini Call for Division Nominations We are currently soliciting nominations for the position of Co-Chair for the Health, Health Services and Health Policy Division. Co?Chairs serve overlapping two year terms, and are jointly responsible for: developing the Division program (identifying sessions and organizers) for the annual meeting; running the Division business meeting at the annual meeting; working with the newsletter editor to assure publication of the annual newsletter; and other Division business. Tenure begins at the annual meeting in summer 2013. If you are interested in learning more or in nominating yourself or another individual for this rewarding position, please contact Debbie Potter (mailto:Deborah.potter@louisville.edu) for further information. Chairpersons are elected for two years. No Division chairperson can serve for more than three consecutive years. Self-nominations are acceptable. If you are nominated, the Executive Office will contact you to request your biographical information and statement prior to the elections. Names of nominees must be submitted to the Executive Office no later than June 1, so please contact us soon if you wish to nominate someone, or to nominate yourself. The election process is handled by the Executive Office. Election procedures will insure to all members of the Division an opportunity to vote in the election. A majority of votes cast will be necessary to elect any Division Officer. If there are more nominees for an office and there is not a clear majority, a run-off election will be held between the two candidates receiving the most votes. The same election procedures described above will be followed for the run- -off election. Call for Newsletter Editor Christina Barmon has been serving as newsletter editor for the past year and a half and her tenure will be up this coming August. So the time has come to elect a new Newsletter Editor. This is a terrific opportunity for a graduate student or other new members to get to know the workings of the Division. The Division puts out a newsletter three times per year (Summer, Spring, and Fall). The Editor is responsible for compiling news submitted from the Co-Chairs and other Division members; formatting the newsletter; and ensuring that the newsletter is distributed. Tenure begins at the annual meeting in summer 2013. Besides the reward of contributing to the ongoing work of the Division, a small stipend is available. If you are interested in learning more or in nominating yourself or another individual for this rewarding and essential position, please contact Debbie Potter (mailto:Deborah.potter@louisville.edu) or Christina Barmon (mailto:Cebarmon@gmail.com) for further information. Call for Social Problems Editor Social Problems Editorial Search -- Call for Applications The Editorial and Publications Committee of the Society for the Study of Social Problems is soliciting applications for the position of Editor of the SocietyÕs journal, Social Problems. The EditorÕs three-year term will begin with the operation of the new editorial office at mid-year 2014. The new editor will be responsible for editing Volumes 62-64 (years 2015-2017). Applicants must be members or become members of the SSSP by the time of their application and for the duration of their tenure as editor. The Editor is responsible for managing the peer review process for approximately 300-400 submitted manuscripts per year, and preparing four issues of the journal (approximately 650 printed pages) annually. The editorial office manages the review process using the on-line services of ScholarOne/Manuscript Central and also has responsibility for copy editing and proofreading in accordance with customary publishing standards. The committee seeks editorial candidates with distinguished scholarly records, previous editorial experience (e.g., service as journal editor or associate editor, editor of scholarly editions, etc.), strong organizational and management skills, and the ability to work and communicate well with others. A familiarity with, and commitment to, Social Problems and the SSSP are essential. The SSSP supports the operation of the editorial office with an annual budget and provides a modest stipend and travel expenses for the Editor. Support is also expected from the host institution. This may include office space, utilities, the use of computers and other office equipment, tuition waivers for office personnel (if appropriate), faculty release time, and other basic expenses. Each year the Editor will be expected to submit a budget to the SSSP to cover operating expenses that the host institution does not support. Individuals interested in applying for the editorship should submit their curriculum vitae with a cover letter detailing their relevant experience, a preliminary operating budget, and a letter from their Department Chair, Dean, or other authorized university administrator confirming the institutional support referenced above. Guidance in the preparation of applications is available from the Editorial and Publications Committee Chair as well as the current Social Problems Editor, the Executive Officer, and the Administrative Officer, if necessary. Please direct all questions, inquiries, nominations, expressions of interest, and application materials to: David A. Smith, Chair, SSSP Editorial and Publications Committee, Department of Sociology, University of California-Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697-5100. (949) 824-7292. Email: dasmith@uci.edu. For more information on the position, please see Section V and Section VIII of the SSSP Operations Manual (http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm/m/75/m/30). Deadline for applications is February 1, 2013.