Inequality Expert to Speak at Utah State University
Joachim Singlemann, an internationally known expert on inequality, is a guest on the Utah State University campus Tuesday, Jan. 11.
His presentation, “Race and Place: Determinants of Poverty in the Mississippi Delta and the Texas Borderland,” begins at noon in University Inn, Room 507. All are invited.
The sociology program in USU’s Department of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology invited professor Singlemann to campus for the presentation because of his expertise on the relationships between ethnicity and space, said Eddy Berry, professor of sociology at USU and director of undergraduate sociology.
“Dr. Singlemann brings extensive experience and it is a rare opportunity to attend a presentation by someone of his stature,” Berry said, who cites Singlemann’s experience as a former United Nations population specialist, president of the Rural Sociological Society and as the current director of the Louisiana Population Center.
Singlemann is the David J. Kriskovich Distinguished Professor of Sociology and professor of rural sociology at Louisiana State University.
Berry said Singlemann’s talk will address poverty in two of the highest poverty regions of the United States — the Mississippi Delta and the Texas borderland. In spite of the major social changes that have taken place over the four decades since the war on poverty, rural poverty rates remain substantially higher than those in urban areas, Singlemann’s research shows. Worse, places characterized by the greatest economic distress are in the rural South and Southwest and are home to high proportions of racial and ethnic minorities.
“Forty years after the war on poverty, one in six Americans were poor — even before the recession,” Berry said. “In smaller metropolitan areas and nonmetropolitan places, such as those characteristic of the rural West and Southwest, the percent poor is 17-20 percent, while for the United States as a whole, the percent poor is only 13.5 percent. Yet, the vast majority of the poor would be considered ‘deserving’ — they work, and often work hard.”
Singlemann’s research has shown that the reasons for poverty are very different between different racial and ethnic groups and for two-parent families in comparison to single-parent families. This means that policies for alleviating poverty, perhaps most especially during a recession, require different strategies.
Related links:
USU Department of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology
Source: Department of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology
Contact: E. (Eddy) Helen Berry, professor of sociology, (435) 797-1245, Eddy.Berry@usu.edu
Joachim Singlemann presents a guest lecture at Utah State University Tuesday, Jan. 11, noon, University Inn, Room 507. The public is welcome.
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