School of Social and Political Science

Research interests

• comparative/historical sociology
• political sociology, including civil society and social movements
• nationalism and national identity
• comparative politics
• politics and society in Scotland and Québec

My research interests lie broadly in comparative/historical sociology and political sociology. I am keen to explore research questions from a comparative and an historical perspective. In addition, I place a particular emphasis on identifying the key role that the modern state has played and continues to play in shaping societal relations. The themes of classical sociological theory influence this broad, macro-orientated approach.

My more particular interests lie in the sociology of nationalism. Here, I have been concerned with identifying the sociological underpinnings affecting the character of nationalism. Scotland and Québec have been the focus of this and on ongoing research. A second project, funded by the Leverhulme Trust, with Liliana Riga explores the influence of American understandings of race and ethnicity on postwar settlements in East Central Europe through the 20th century.

I am Director of the Centre of Canadian Studies, Past President of the British Association for Canadian Studies (BACS) and a member of the Scientific Council of National Movements and Intermediate Structures in Europe (NISE). I serve on the editorial boards of the British Journal of Canadian Studies (BJCS) and Studies on National Movements (SNM).

I currently supervise Ph.D.s on:

• Consociationalism in Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Music and activism in India
• Devolution debates in the UK and France

I supervised completed Ph.D.s on:

• Lide Shuren: National Literacies and Social Status in a Rural and an Urban High School in China
• The Role of Social Movements and Activist Networks in the Development of Romanian Civil Society 
• That's How We Sound! Re-articulating nation through music performance in La Escena Independiente in Lima, Peru
• Changing Stinking Thinking: A Comparative Case Study of the Enactment, Embodiment, and
  Emplacement of Social Citizenship in the Pacific Northwest
• The Changing Party System in Mexico (1970-1988)
• Religious Practice, Religious Change: Evangelicals and Catholics in Santiago de Chile's Civil Society
• Vetera Novis Augere: Nationalism, Neo-Thomism and Historiography in Québec and Flanders 1900-1945
• The Paradoxes of Social Capital: Mobility and Access in an Appalachian Community
• State Rhetoric, Language and Regional Comparison in Turkey
• Propertied communities: the agrarian emergence and industrial transformation of nationalism in the US and Norway - a propertied rights perspective
• Mediated Voices: Nation/State-Building, NGOs and Survivors of Sexual Violence in Postconflict Rwanda and Bosnia-Herzegovina
• Extending Radical Space: A Comparative Historical Analysis of Sub-state Violent Contention in Quebec and Corsica
• An American Atra? Boundaries of Diasporic Nation-Building amongst Assyrians and Chaldeans in the United States
• Everyday Encounters and Narratives of Nationalism in Turkey
• Multiculturalism Revisited in the Netherlands: towards a shared national membership in a multicultural, democratic nation-state
• Halal Scots: Muslims' Social Identity Negotiation and Integration in Scotland
• The Creation and the Recreation of the Imagined Community of Taiwan: the Critical Analysis of High School History Textbooks (1949 to 2011)
• Legal Histories and Modern Identities: the emergence of nationalism in the historical territories of the Kingdom of Navarre, the Basque Provinces and the state of Spain
• A Study of the Debate on Scottish Home Rule, 1886 to 1914
• Exhibiting Turkishness at a time of flux in Turkey: An Ethnography of the State
• Population Policy, Nationalism and Nation-Building in Québec: Observation and Analyses of the Québec Parental Insurance Plan
• The Return of the State to Development: the State, Donors, and NGOs in post-Soviet Kyrgyzstan
• Pathways to Genocide: the Process of Ideological Radicalisation
• Situating Strangers: Understanding Hindu Community Life in Lusaka, Zambia
• Regional and National Identity Mobilization in Canada and Britain: Nova Scotia and North East England Compared
• Imperial Nationalism: Nationalism and the Empire in late 19th century Scotland and Canada
• The Development of a Discourse Community: the Scottish Constitutional Debate, 1967-1979

Topics interested in supervising

I am keen to supervise research from either a comparative/historical or political sociological perspective. I particularly welcome research proposals on questions of nationalism, civil society or democratization. To date, my supervision has focused around examinations of civil society and nationalism in a range of contexts.

If you are interested in being supervised by James Kennedy, please see the links below (opening in new windows) for more information:

• PhD in Sociology
• MSc (R) Sociology
• MSc (R) Socio-Cultural Studies