Social Science in the Public Sphere: Riots, Class and Impact [Audio]

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Speaker(s): Professor Fiona Devine, Dr Sam Friedman, Professor Tim Newburn | We are delighted to confirm that the Impact of Social Sciences blog will continue to receive financial support from both HEFCE and the LSE for another year. To celebrate, we are hosting an event that will look at the opportunities and challenges of undertaking large-scale public social science projects. The session will look at the ways in ways in which academics are seeking to make their research and disciplines more public, and for their research to be part of public debate on key societal issues. We will also look at how these projects fit within the impact agenda and their challenges to traditional academic dissemination. Professor Tim Newburn will discuss the Reading the Riots project. This project was run jointly with the Guardian and its aim was to produce evidence-based social research that would help explain why the rioting spread across England in the summer of 2011. Professor Fiona Devine and Dr Sam Friedman will discuss the Great British Class Survey. Run jointly with BBC Labs, this project sought to understand whether class was still relevant today and, if so, what Britain's class system really looks like. Fiona Devine is professor of Sociology and Head of the School of Social Sciences (2009-12). Sam Friedman is lecturer in Sociology at City University. Tim Newburn is professor of Criminology and Social Policy and Head of the Social Policy Department, London School of Economics.