Dear PCI division members, I hope your 2012-13 academic years have productive and stimulating. I was great seeing and meeting you in Denver last year. Here we are again, preparing for the SSSP’s 63rd annual meeting in New York City, August 9 – 11, 2013 at The Westin New York at Times Square. Last year the members put together an exciting roster of sessions that is both timely and relevant. This year sessions reflect both the meeting theme of moving beyond social constructionism, and the current activities of social protest movements locally, nationally and globally. I hope you are all planning to come to New York and support your colleagues and friends as the present their work, both in terms of scholarship and activism. This year we have organized one critical dialogue and two thematic sessions. In addition, the division is co-sponsoring 6 regular sessions with other divisions. Below is a summary of this year’s sessions. Critical Dialogue: Marxist Critique & Prefigurative Politics: New Approaches to Social Problems. Organizer: Shawn Cassiman, University of Dayton. [shawncassiman@gmail.com] Thematic 1: Beyond Social Constructionism: The New Faces of Poverty, Welfare and Inequality. Organizer: Yvonne Luna, Northern Arizona University and Jennifer K. Wesely, University of North Florida. [Yvonne.Luna@hau.edu] Thematic 2: #PussyRiot: Class Consciousness and Social Protest in the 21st Century. Organizer: Eric Turner, Department of Sociology, University of New Mexico. Table in the Round: Theoretical and Methodological Approaches to Studying Health and Inequality. Co-sponsored with: Health, Health Policy and Health Services Organizer: Elizabeth Gage, University of Buffalo and Shannon M. Monnat, University of Nevada Regular Session: Work, Family and Social Class. Co-sponsored with: Family Organizer: E. Brooke Kelly, University of North Carolina at Pembroke. Regular Session: Diminishing Returns: The Impact of Education on Social Mobility. Co-sponsored with: Education Organizer: Autumn Greene, Boston College. [greenau@bc.edu]. Regular Session: Educating for the Poor: Pedagogy, Social Integration and Social Justice. Co-sponsored with: Family & Education Organizer: Tracy Peressini, Renison University College at the University of Waterloo. Regular Session: Housing First: The Promise and Practice of Homeless Service Provision. Co-sponsored with: Sociology and Social Welfare Organizer: Tracy Peressini, Renison University College at the University of Waterloo. Regular Session: Poverty, Class, Inequality and the Social Determinants of Health. Co-sponsored with: Health, Health Policy and Health Services Organizer: Tracy Peressini, Renison University College at the University of Waterloo. Regular Session: Fragile Families: Programs and Services to meet the Social, Health & Educational Needs of Poor Parents and their Children. Co-sponsored: Family & Health, Health Policy and Health Services Organizer: Tracy Peressini, Renison University College at the University of Waterloo. To register for this year’s annual meeting goto: http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm/m/483/fuseaction/ssspconf.portal To renew your SSSP membership goto: http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm/m/253/Membership/ For more information and to obtain a copy of this year’s conference program goto: http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm/m/253/Membership/ Student Paper Award This year we received a record number of submissions. All of the student papers were superb and the committee had a hard time selecting a winner, but they did. Please join me in congratulating Madison Van Oort, a graduate student in the Department of Sociology, University of Minnesota, this year’s student paper award winner. Madison won the award for her submission, “Post-Recession Governmentalities: Neoliberalism, Job Searching and Comparative Control in Minneapolis.” She will be presenting her work at the annual meeting, so please be sure to look for and plan to attend her session. Michael Harrington Award Each year an award is given out to an individual who, an organization, or academic/researcher that, by his/her/its actions advance out understanding of poverty, class and/or inequality, and/or proposes effective and practical ways to attend to the needs of the poor and reduce class inequalities. Please join me in congratulating this year’s award winner, Dr. Julie Andrzejewski, St. Cloud State University. Dr. Andrzejewski has had a long and distinguished career and activism, focussing on equity, social justice and the eradication of poverty, class and inequality. Please join us at the PCI Divisional meeting, where Dr. Andrzejewski will be given her Michael Harrington Award. PCI Election Nominations needed for Chair of PCI and Newsletter Editor! Please send your nominations directly to Michele Koontz (mkoontz3@utk.edu). Once candidates are identified, Lisa East, Graduate Research Associate & Webmaster, will contact the candidates directly and their biographical information. Self nominations are acceptable. ALL ELECTIONS WILL BE CONDUCTED ELECTRONICALLY. New and Notable Basok, T and Suzan Ilcan (2013). Issues in Social Justice: Citizenship and Transnational Struggles. Don Mills, Canada: Oxford University Press. (Pp 202). From the back cover: Issues in Social Justice offers a valuable contribution to the growing debates on what social justice means in our increasingly globalized world. Examining such key topics as modern citizenship, human rights, transformations of the welfare state under neoliberalism, and transnational activism, Tanya Bosok and Suzan Ilcan show that attaining social justice is a complex process of change, one that links local and global struggles for redistribution, recognition and representation. Shout Out: If any member has anything they would like to share regarding their scholarship, research, pedagogical efforts and activism, please send the information on and it will be included in the Spring/Summer volume. Please send a listing and brief description/abstract of any reports, articles, book chapters, books, research or communities activities that you would like to share with PCI members. That’s for now folks. See you in New York! All the best, Tracy Peressini, Ph.D. Chair, Poverty, Class and Inequality Division, SSSP Associate Professor (Sociology & Social Development Studies) Adjunct Associate Professor (Faculty of Planning and Environmental Design) Renison University College at the University of Waterloo 240 Westmount Rd. N., Waterloo, ON N2L 3G4 Telephone: 519-884-4404, x28602; Fax: 519-884-5135 Email: tperessini@uwaterloo.ca