The most robust defense system that ASA has is the myth that graduate students need to pay/participate in this organization. Declining membership rates have been a problem to going on a decade now, but the gap year in cohort recruitment across most universities in 2021 will be the catalyst for the floor dropping out. It simultaneously removes a lump sum of student memberships for the next 6-8 years, while also creating an even more problematic reality of a total drop off in full memberships down the line.
Theory: The 2021 pause on graduate cohorts will be ASA’s final undoing
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I would be very interested to see the percentage of the total number of TT professors, adjuncts, and PhD students who are members.
How many members does the ASA have these days?
https://www.asanet.org/academic-professional-resources/data-about-discipline/asa-membership/asa-total-membership-trend -
The bigger issue is going to be the huge drop in birth rates (already hitting academia but will get to dire levels in the student population around 10 years) and the decline of higher education more broadly as the population declines and college becomes too expensive for all but the wealthy.
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The bigger issue is going to be the huge drop in birth rates (already hitting academia but will get to dire levels in the student population around 10 years) and the decline of higher education more broadly as the population declines and college becomes too expensive for all but the wealthy.
ASA will collapse or dramatically restructure well before that is a factor. The organizational bloat is unsustainable given the ongoing decline in memberships and lack of participation over the pandemic.
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I'm sure somebody somewhere was trying to tell you exactly that, and you ignored it...
When sociologists start using the word "theory" for any random prediction, the ASA and sociology are undone
So... what you mean to say is that ASA and sociology were done many decades ago?
I agree. Wish I had known that pre-grad school. -
When sociologists start using the word "theory" for any random prediction, the ASA and sociology are undone
Critical race
Queer
Intersectionality
Sociologists have already really dumbed down what "theory" means.tenured white women talking about intersectionality as if it is theory