Dear Colleagues,

The Society for the Study of Social Problems Annual Conference offers a rich and diverse program that spans a wide range of substantive areas, methodological approaches, theoretical lenses, and professional interests. With so many outstanding sessions taking place throughout the conference, it can be challenging to identify those most closely aligned with your interests.

To assist attendees in planning their conference experience, the Membership and Outreach Committee has prepared a series of Lists of Sessions by Topic Area for the 2026 Annual Conference. These curated lists bring together sessions related to specific themes, making it easier to discover presentations, roundtables, workshops, and special events that may be of particular interest.

These lists are intended as a planning resource rather than a comprehensive guide to every possible connection among sessions. We encourage attendees to use them as a starting point for building a conference schedule that reflects their research interests, teaching priorities, professional development goals, and opportunities for networking. We also encourage participants to explore sessions beyond their primary areas of expertise, as some of the most valuable conference experiences emerge through interdisciplinary conversations and unexpected connections.

We hope these topic area lists help you navigate the conference, discover new ideas, connect with colleagues, and make the most of your time at the 2026 SSSP Annual Conference. We look forward to seeing you throughout the meeting and wish you an engaging and rewarding conference experience.

Sincerely,

Membership and Outreach Committee
The Society for the Study of Social Problems

Abolition & Criminalization Panels/Dialogues

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 006: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Inventing Criminality across the Globe
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 007: Colonial Racial Capitalism Today: Spectacularization, Dispossession, and Resistance
Room: Plymouth

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 022: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching and Engaging with Reparations and Restorative Justice
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 023: Beyond Therapeutic Regimes: Critiquing Traditional Medical and Criminal Legal Responses
Room: Plymouth

Saturday, August 8, 8:30 pm
Session 039: Mass Incarceration and Perpetual Punishment
Room: Plymouth

Saturday, August 8, 12:30 pm
Session 050: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching Social Problems through Experiential Learning
Room: Broadway III

Sunday, August 9, 10:30 am
Session 076: Author Meets Critics: Indefensible Spaces: Policing and the Struggle for Housing by Rahim Kurwa
Room: Broadway II

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 087: Gender and Violence: Structural Issues
Room: Plymouth

Performance and Performativity

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 006: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Inventing Criminality across the Globe
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 019: All the Feels: Emotions as Acts of Resistance
Room: Ambassador II

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
Session 073: Mass Incarceration and Perpetual Punishment III
Room: Plymouth

Sunday, August 9, 10:30 am
Session 077: Rural Spaces and Services I
Room: Broadway III

Emotions

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 019: All the Feels: Emotions as Acts of Resistance
Room: Ambassador II

Saturday, August 8, 8:30 am
Session 035: Disasters and Health
Room: Manhattan

Saturday, August 8, 12:30 pm
Session 048: Law in/as Crisis: Legal Consciousness and Rights Mobilization
Room: Broadway II

Saturday, August 8, 12:30 pm
Session 051: Medicalization as a Social Problem: A Tool of Oppression and Resistance
Room: Manhattan

Saturday, August 8, 2:30 pm
Session 059: The Politics of Disinformation and Gender
Room: Manhattan

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 084: Racial Politics and Resistance in the Midst of Settler Colonialism II
Room: Manhattan

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 087: Gender and Violence: Structural Issues
Room: Plymouth

Body and Embodiment

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Division Meetings: Sport, Leisure, and the Body
Room: Ambassador III

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 019: All the Feels: Emotions as Acts of Resistance
Room: Ambassador II

Saturday, August 8, 8:30 am
Session 036: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Resistance and Joy
Room: Melville

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
Session 075: New Directions in Social Problems Theory
Room: Broadway I

Sunday, August 9, 10:30 am
Session 077: Rural Spaces and Services I
Room: Broadway III

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 083: Rural Spaces and Services II
Room: Broadway III

City and Community

Thursday, August 6, 5:00 pm
Session 001: Opening Plenary: Engaging Lifeworlds as Resistance through Organizing, Activism, and Scholarship – THEMATIC
Room: Ambassador II

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 004: Doing Research in Global/Transnational Contexts with Critical Decolonial Lenses: Tools and Epistemologies
Room: Minskoff

Friday, August 7, 12:10 pm
Session 017: Algorithmic Injustices: Effect of AI on Vulnerable (Marginalized) Communities
Room: Plymouth

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 022: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching and Engaging with Reparations and Restorative Justice
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 026: PAPERS IN THE ROUND: Scholar Café: Building Collective Wisdom through Intergenerational Scholar Sharing (Roundtable #1: AI, Technology, and Education and Pedagogy; Roundtable #2: Media, Technology, and Inequality)
Room: Ambassador III

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 030: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Fighting Global Inequalities: Actions towards Social, Ethnoracial and/or Gender Justice
Room: Pearl

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
THEMATIC Session 069: People Have the Power?: Community Power and Community Decision-making
Room: Broadway III

Sunday, August 9, 10:30 am
Session 077: Rural Spaces and Services I
Room: Broadway III

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
THEMATIC Session 083: Rural Spaces and Services II
Room: Broadway III

Artificial Intelligence

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 017: Algorithmic Injustices: Effect of AI on Vulnerable (Marginalized) Communities
Room: Plymouth

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 027: WORKS IN PROGRESS / RESEARCH FEEDBACK: Media and Technology as Sites of Digital Contestation and Resistance
Room: Ambassador III

Saturday, August 8, 2:30 pm
Session 061: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Labor and Class II
Room: Palace

Organizing, Justice, and Resistance

Thursday, August 6, 5:00 pm
Session 001: Opening Plenary: Engaging Lifeworlds as Resistance through Organizing, Activism, and Scholarship – THEMATIC
Room: Ambassador II

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 003: Advocacy and Change
Room: Ambassador II

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 007: Colonial Racial Capitalism Today: Spectacularization, Dispossession, and Resistance
Room: Plymouth

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 011: On Palestine
Room: Ambassador II

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 016: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Institutional Inequalities: Constraints on Communication, Research, Organizing, and Action
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 019: All the Feels: Emotions as Acts of Resistance
Room: Ambassador II

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 022: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching and Engaging with Reparations and Restorative Justice
Room: Pearl

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 027: WORKS IN PROGRESS / RESEARCH FEEDBACK: Media and Technology as Sites of Digital Contestation and Resistance (Roundtable #2: Media, Technology, and Inequality)
Room: Ambassador III

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 030: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Fighting Global Inequalities: Actions towards Social, Ethnoracial and/or Gender Justice
Room: Pearl

Saturday, August 8, 8:30 am
Session 038: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Under Siege: Power, Resistance, and Solidarity in Higher Education
Room: Pearl

Saturday, August 8, 10:30 am
Session 046: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Right to Resist: Counter-Hegemonic Agency and Emancipatory Anticolonial Political Praxis
Room: Pearl

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
THEMATIC Session 067: Resisting Colonization of the Family
Room: Broadway I

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
Session 070: Racial Politics and Resistance in the Midst of Settler Colonialism I
Room: Manhattan

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
THEMATIC Session 081: Community Approaches to Mental Health: Educators, Policy-Makers, Activists, and Social Identities
Room: Belasco

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 084: Racial Politics and Resistance in the Midst of Settler Colonialism II
Room: Manhattan

Palestine

Friday, August 7, 8:30 am
Session 007: Colonial Racial Capitalism Today: Spectacularization, Dispossession, and Resistance
Room: Plymouth

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 011: On Palestine
Room: Ambassador II

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
Session 070: Racial Politics and Resistance in the Midst of Settler Colonialism I
Room: Manhattan

Professional Development

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 015: Building Community at SSSP
Room: Palace

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 021: Navigating Graduate School: Stress, Support, and Student Well-Being
Room: Palace

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 026: PAPERS IN THE ROUND: Scholar Café: Building Collective Wisdom through Intergenerational Scholar Sharing
Room: Ambassador III

Friday, August 7, 4:30 pm
Session 028: The Problem Pipeline: How Social Problems Become Research Agendas – Special Issue of Global Discourse
Room: Minskoff

Saturday, August 8, 10:30 am
Session 040: Academic Freedom in the Current Climate: A Conversation with the Scholars at Risk Network
Room: Broadway I

Saturday, August 8, 10:30 am
Session 041: PAPERS IN THE ROUND: Building Collective Wisdom through Intergenerational Scholar Sharing
Room: Majestic Ballroom

Saturday, August 8, 2:30 pm
Session 058: Publishing Tips from the Editors of Social Problems
Room: Broadway III

Teaching

Friday, August 7, 12:30 pm
Session 014: Teaching Research Methods and Sociology Fundamentals: A Workshop for Learning about Open-Access Resources and Crowdsourcing Tips for Teaching
Room: Minskoff

Friday, August 7, 2:30 pm
Session 022: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching and Engaging with Reparations and Restorative Justice
Room: Pearl

Saturday, August 8, 8:30 am
Session 037: Teaching Hope, Joy, and Justice: Reclamation of Lifeworlds
Room: Palace

Saturday, August 8, 12:30 pm
Session 050: CRITICAL DIALOGUE: Teaching Social Problems through Experiential Learning
Room: Broadway III

Sunday, August 9, 8:30 am
Session 072: Colonization, Inequality, and the Changing Classroom
Room: Palace

Sunday, August 9, 12:30 pm
Session 086: WORKS IN PROGRESS: “Bring Your Own Brilliance”: Sharing Our Ideas That Have Been Successful in Teaching
Room: Palace