dr. R (Roy) Kemmers

Biography

Roy Kemmers is an Assistant Professor in Sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam's Department of Public Administration and Sociology. As a cultural sociologist I am interested in processes of cultural change, as manifested in the (changing) meanings that are attributed to such topics as politics, religion, identity, gender and ethnicity.

In my PhD project I studied contemporary popular discontents about politics by taking a cultural sociological perspective. With this project I aimed to develop a theory about political discontents that emphasizes the importance of ordinary people’s own definitions of the situations they find themselves (and society) in.

After my PhD, I have been active to develop a research agenda into everyday anti-institutionalism. In it, I aim to take anti-institutionalism, a fundamental part of populism, and study it in (seeimingly) non-political domains of society- (ie, everyday life). See my (in Dutch) essay 'Nederlandse instituties op de tocht', available here in pdf, for this argument.

Most of my teaching takes place at Erasmus University College, where I teach Highlights of Sociology, Qualitative Research through Interviewing, A Global View on Migration (minor), and I supervise bachelor's theses. At DPAS I supervise bachelor's and master's theses.

I am chief editor (hoofdredacteur) for the full-colour Dutch quarterly Sociologie Magazine.  [Sociologie Magazine]: http://www.sociologiemagazine.nl