Work

Encountering Social Inequalities through Productive Unsettling

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: This article draws on a collaboration with the Birmingham Royal Ballet to propose a dancing pedagogy for productive unsettlement. Developed within a sociology of consumption module, we show how art can bridge the sociological and empathic imaginations, encouraging learners to ‘feel themselves away’ from their individual experience and better reflect on the wider social structures that shape it. Ballet, an art form marked by financial, cultural and bodily exclusion, served as a lens through which learners could engage with the experience of being ‘out of place’ in confronting their own vulnerabilities and privileges in relation to structural marketplace inequalities. This fostered a transformative shift we term ‘productive unsettling’, whereby rather than accepting and staying in their place, learners were encouraged to try other places, transform place for themselves and make space for others, finding joy in the process of creating social change.

Source: Sociology

DOI: 10.1177/00380385261416323

Authors: Pilar Rojas-Gaviria, Chloe Preece, Emma Surman

Institutions: Kedge Business School, ESCP Business School, University of Birmingham

Language: English

Topic: Diversity and Impact of Dance

Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology

Field: Psychology

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Reduced inequalities

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $3,900