Papers by Gregory Duff Morton
Trajectories: Newsletter of the ASA Comparative and Historical Sociology Section , 2019
Landless activist Márcio Matos was killed on January 24th, 2018. This occurred the same evening t... more Landless activist Márcio Matos was killed on January 24th, 2018. This occurred the same evening that Lula da Silva, ex-president, was convicted of bribery. What lesson do the two events teach about justice and democracy in contemporary Brazil?
At the core of his political rhetoric, Donald Trump speaks about work: the experience of laboring... more At the core of his political rhetoric, Donald Trump speaks about work: the experience of laboring, the agonies of the labor market, and the future of employment. This article considers how the anthropology of work can contribute to an analysis of the political moment. Many commentators, including Trump himself, have interpreted a vote for Trump as an act of labor nostalgia, a gesture of yearning for an industrial past. Such commentary describes Trump voters by describing the jobs that many of them once did—manufacturing jobs. But what if, instead, we considered the jobs that many Trump voters now do, that is, service jobs? What if Trump's discourse, with its themes of domination and submission, offers an incisive response to the intimacies of power as lived by restaurant workers and customer service representatives? Could the election come into focus as an uprising in the service sector? This article takes two steps. First, it engages with literature from sociology and economics in order to point towards a crucial transformation in the US workplace since the 2008 financial crisis: the ascendancy of monopolistic corporations that defy the neoliberal model. Second, the article explores new developments in the service sector by assessing the work experience of Uber drivers. Trump's rhetoric can be interpreted as a response to the 2008 crisis and the novel modes of service work that the crisis made possible—including Uber. As it faces the political consequences of today's toil, the anthropology of work gains a new research agenda.
Social Service Review, 2016
n the democratic cosmology of Brazil’s MST landless
movement, a meeting must occur before a deci... more n the democratic cosmology of Brazil’s MST landless
movement, a meeting must occur before a decision
can be reached—even if the decision was set before
the meeting. I examine MST speech habits in an
effort to understand the meeting as a
symptomatically modern method for producing
authoritative discourse. I identify four properties of
MST meeting speech: (1) a lexicon that highlights
verbs of speech, (2) the enforcement of tight
semantic linkages between utterances, (3) the equal
availability of one speech act to all participants, and
(4) the generation of a distinctive species of
collective voicing. By virtue of these properties, the
meeting becomes a crucial site for the construction
of equality and participation as political values. It is
these values that are ultimately in play when a
speaker mobilizes other people’s words to make—or
prevent—a decision.
Article examining the political content of a May 2013 panic in the distribution of Bolsa Família ... more Article examining the political content of a May 2013 panic in the distribution of Bolsa Família payments. Points towards analysis of the transient nature of conditional cash transfers. Article similar to "O verdadeiro culpado do boato sobre o Bolsa Família."
Artigo publicado na imprensa popular analisando o conteudo politico de tumultos sobre o Bosla Fam... more Artigo publicado na imprensa popular analisando o conteudo politico de tumultos sobre o Bosla Família, destacando a impermanencia do benificio e os efeitos nos beneficiados. Artigo semlhante a "Protest Before the Protests."
Em domicílios rurais que recebem Bolsa Família no sertão da Bahia, observamos uma relação: as mul... more Em domicílios rurais que recebem Bolsa Família no sertão da Bahia, observamos uma relação: as mulheres mais
pobres associam o dinheiro com a família e o marido, e as mulheres relativamente prósperas associam o benefício
com um discurso de autonomia pessoal. De onde vem essa diferença? Uma análise etnográfica da “casa sertaneja”
demostra que só as famílias de renda relativamente próspera costumam dividir o orçamento doméstico em gastos
individuais da mulher e do homem. Por meio da divisão, mulheres e homens nessas famílias conseguem acumular,
separadamente, bens de valor em longo prazo, assim construindo formas de permanência que ficam fora do alcance
dos mais pobres. A influência que o programa exerce sobre as relações de gênero em domicílios mais abastados,
portanto, é o inverso de sua influência entre os mais pobres. Essa diferença pode mudar as políticas públicas que
buscam transformar a interseção de gênero e pobreza
Bolsa Família, the world’s largest conditional cash transfer, provides welfare paymentsto 13 mill... more Bolsa Família, the world’s largest conditional cash transfer, provides welfare paymentsto 13 million Brazilian households – and creates dilemmas for Brazil’s rural landless movement, the MST. Through ethnographic analysis in two villages, this paper explores the daily practices and political conceptions of the program’s beneficiaries.
Bolsa Família does not, as is often believed, produce a de-radicalizing sense of contentment. Instead, the program produces a temporality that makes the benefit feel unreliable to beneficiaries. These beneficiaries must mediate the tension between ‘citizen’ and ‘manager’ identities, the latter being a salient subject-position produced by Bolsa Família. The precarity of this position helps explain why Bolsa Família has not inspired significant mobilization by social movements.
Artigo publicado na imprensa popular analisando a transformacao na consciencia de direitos sociai... more Artigo publicado na imprensa popular analisando a transformacao na consciencia de direitos sociais durante o periodo Lula.
Review of Lamia Karim's book. Takes Karim's text as evidence of a broader "micro turn" in social ... more Review of Lamia Karim's book. Takes Karim's text as evidence of a broader "micro turn" in social policy analysis.
Thesis Chapters by Gregory Duff Morton
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Papers by Gregory Duff Morton
movement, a meeting must occur before a decision
can be reached—even if the decision was set before
the meeting. I examine MST speech habits in an
effort to understand the meeting as a
symptomatically modern method for producing
authoritative discourse. I identify four properties of
MST meeting speech: (1) a lexicon that highlights
verbs of speech, (2) the enforcement of tight
semantic linkages between utterances, (3) the equal
availability of one speech act to all participants, and
(4) the generation of a distinctive species of
collective voicing. By virtue of these properties, the
meeting becomes a crucial site for the construction
of equality and participation as political values. It is
these values that are ultimately in play when a
speaker mobilizes other people’s words to make—or
prevent—a decision.
pobres associam o dinheiro com a família e o marido, e as mulheres relativamente prósperas associam o benefício
com um discurso de autonomia pessoal. De onde vem essa diferença? Uma análise etnográfica da “casa sertaneja”
demostra que só as famílias de renda relativamente próspera costumam dividir o orçamento doméstico em gastos
individuais da mulher e do homem. Por meio da divisão, mulheres e homens nessas famílias conseguem acumular,
separadamente, bens de valor em longo prazo, assim construindo formas de permanência que ficam fora do alcance
dos mais pobres. A influência que o programa exerce sobre as relações de gênero em domicílios mais abastados,
portanto, é o inverso de sua influência entre os mais pobres. Essa diferença pode mudar as políticas públicas que
buscam transformar a interseção de gênero e pobreza
Bolsa Família does not, as is often believed, produce a de-radicalizing sense of contentment. Instead, the program produces a temporality that makes the benefit feel unreliable to beneficiaries. These beneficiaries must mediate the tension between ‘citizen’ and ‘manager’ identities, the latter being a salient subject-position produced by Bolsa Família. The precarity of this position helps explain why Bolsa Família has not inspired significant mobilization by social movements.
Thesis Chapters by Gregory Duff Morton
movement, a meeting must occur before a decision
can be reached—even if the decision was set before
the meeting. I examine MST speech habits in an
effort to understand the meeting as a
symptomatically modern method for producing
authoritative discourse. I identify four properties of
MST meeting speech: (1) a lexicon that highlights
verbs of speech, (2) the enforcement of tight
semantic linkages between utterances, (3) the equal
availability of one speech act to all participants, and
(4) the generation of a distinctive species of
collective voicing. By virtue of these properties, the
meeting becomes a crucial site for the construction
of equality and participation as political values. It is
these values that are ultimately in play when a
speaker mobilizes other people’s words to make—or
prevent—a decision.
pobres associam o dinheiro com a família e o marido, e as mulheres relativamente prósperas associam o benefício
com um discurso de autonomia pessoal. De onde vem essa diferença? Uma análise etnográfica da “casa sertaneja”
demostra que só as famílias de renda relativamente próspera costumam dividir o orçamento doméstico em gastos
individuais da mulher e do homem. Por meio da divisão, mulheres e homens nessas famílias conseguem acumular,
separadamente, bens de valor em longo prazo, assim construindo formas de permanência que ficam fora do alcance
dos mais pobres. A influência que o programa exerce sobre as relações de gênero em domicílios mais abastados,
portanto, é o inverso de sua influência entre os mais pobres. Essa diferença pode mudar as políticas públicas que
buscam transformar a interseção de gênero e pobreza
Bolsa Família does not, as is often believed, produce a de-radicalizing sense of contentment. Instead, the program produces a temporality that makes the benefit feel unreliable to beneficiaries. These beneficiaries must mediate the tension between ‘citizen’ and ‘manager’ identities, the latter being a salient subject-position produced by Bolsa Família. The precarity of this position helps explain why Bolsa Família has not inspired significant mobilization by social movements.