Alejandro Poga

What are the Effects of Large-scale Violence on Social and Institutional Trust? Using the Civil War Literature to Understand the Case of Mexico, 2006–2012 What is the relationship between drug violence and political attitudes? In this article, we test the relationship between violence and trust using both individual and municipality data for Mexico f...

What are the Effects of Large-scale Violence on Social and Institutional Trust? Using the Civil War Literature to Understand the Case of Mexico, 2006–2012
www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

The Art of the Impersonal Essay, by Zadie Smith In my experience, every kind of writing requires some kind of self-soothing Jedi mind trick, and, when it comes to essay composition, the rectangle is mine.

www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...

What to read about liberalism Five books about one of humanity’s most successful ideas

Liberalism may seem an exhausted ideology with little to offer, but in fact it is most essential when grappling with authoritarian impulses. These books help to explain why

Contributor: The internet made us stupid. AI promises to make it worse As the number of AI users increases, researchers can see the future of critical thinking, and it's not good.

The more dependent on tech for crafting your thoughts, the lower your mental performance
www.latimes.com/opinion/stor...

After several months of work, I have just completed a full draft of our working paper!

Now it is off to my co-authors for feedback and revision.

📑 This paper uses Bourdieu’s concepts of capital to explore how families in the UK manage post-death admin—shaped by social ties & access to resources.

🔗 🔓 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

Differentiating criminal networks in the illegal wildlife trade: organized, corporate and disorganized crime - Trends in Organized Crime Historically, the poaching of wildlife was portrayed as a small-scale local activity in which only small numbers of wildlife would be smuggled illegally by collectors or opportunists. Nowadays, this i...

Differentiating criminal networks in the illegal wildlife trade: organized, corporate and disorganized crime

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Many believe poverty and homelessness are increasing and feel the government has a responsibility to address the issues - AP-NORC The public recognizes there are multiple causes of poverty and homelessness, and many say personal choices are a key contributor.

Americans across party lines see government responsibility for addressing poverty and homelessness, though they disagree on causes, per new UChicago Harris/AP-NORC research: 68% believe poverty increased nationwide, 83% say homelessness increased.

Explore the findings: go.norc.org/4glqd80

One of the things I love about living in HP is that I often find really good, interesting books in great condition out on the street.

Here are some of the ones that now live in my personal library.

In a war in Mexico between cartel factions, influencers become targets Targeting of influencers reflects their alleged role in money laundering – and their place in cartel propaganda

In the midst of a war between factions of the Sinaloa cartel, influencers have become targets

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

Había olvidado que preparar clase siempre exige más tiempo del previsto.

Shades of truth and lies: Interpreting testimonies of war and violence, Lee Ann Fujii
www.jstor.org/stable/25654...

🔍 How should researchers approach truth in interviews amid war or genocide?

📚 Lee Ann Fujii, drawing on work in Rwanda, argued that the value of narratives lies not just in facts but in metadata: rumors, denials, evasions, silences—what people say and choose not to say.

This semester I’m teaching Social Determinants — a course on how systems like education, healthcare, and security shape society.

We’ll engage with academic texts, essays, and news to sharpen our critical reading and writing skills.

Approaches to Focusing on Employability in the Sociology Major - Chadwick L. Menning, Melinda J. Messineo, Mary Scheuer Senter, Colleen E. Wynn, 2025 In this conversation, we argue that undergraduate sociology programs should take career readiness seriously either by developing courses that are explicit in th...

Undergraduate sociology programs should take career readiness seriously either by developing courses that are explicit in their career-related goals or by integrating career exploration and related learning across the curriculum
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Data-Driven Health Improvements Start with Listening | NORC at the University of Chicago Combining data and community voice can drive actionable health care improvements for all individuals in California’s Medi-Cal system.

How do you ground health data in lived experiences?
NORC senior fellow Lisa Shugarman is exploring how combining quantitative analysis with community engagement can improve health care in California's Medi-Cal system.

Find out more: go.norc.org/416BZwG

E-mail Is Making Us Miserable In an attempt to work more effectively, we’ve accidentally deployed an inhumane way to collaborate.

In an attempt to work more effectively, we’ve accidentally deployed an inhumane way to collaborate.

Indeed. That also happen to me when I have to study 🙃

Why Some Conflicts Make Media Headlines and Others Don’t Media coverage often reflects a narrow lens shaped more by geopolitical significance than humanitarian urgency. This analysis examines the interrelationships between peace, conflict, and media attenti...

Conflicts in less economically developed countries like Ethiopia and Burkina Faso received very little coverage even though both had over 20000 recorded civilian deaths

www.visionofhumanity.org/unequal-atte...

Later Procrastination and the limits of rational thinking.

What does procrastination tell us about ourselves?

Sounds great and very relevant. I'm actually considering the Computational Social Science specialization from UC Davis on Coursera

What Is Justice? Reflections on the Criminal Justice System in Brazil This essay explores the possibility of justice for the wretched of the earth. Using escrevivência (writing the experience/existence) and drawing on the theoretical insights and political praxis of th....

What Is Justice? Reflections on the Criminal Justice System in Brazil

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

J. Stacey pointed out that inequality, exploitation and even treason are endemic in ethnographic work

ChatGPT Is Changing the Words We Use in Conversation Words frequently used by ChatGPT, including “delve” and “meticulous,” are getting more common in spoken language, according to an analysis of more than 700,000 hours of videos and podcasts

Words frequently used by ChatGPT are getting more common in spoken language

www.scientificamerican.com/article/chat...

Aunque disfruto mucho de leer papers en PDF 💻, no me molestaría para nada tenerlos en versión impresa 📄📚.

Me falta uno de sociología.

A Du Boisian Sociological Imagination: The Black Radical Tradition, Marxism and Du Boisian Sociology W. E. B. Du Bois is finally recognized as one of the founders of sociology, a social theorist, and a methodological innovator. The recognition of Du Bois' work is accompanied by the emergence of a co....

A Du Boisian Sociological Imagination: The Black Radical Tradition, Marxism and Du Boisian Sociology - Itzigsohn - 2025 - The British Journal of Sociology onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

The Creepy Calculus of Measuring Death Risk Meet micromorts and microlives, statistical units that help mathematicians to calculate risk

www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-...

Chicago: city on the make 🌇

"If two possible events, A and B, are independent, then the probability that both A and B will occur is equal to the product of their individual probabilities"

Las estrellas masivas se calientan hasta llegar a temperaturas altísimas y luego explotan en una supernova que deja atrás neutrones o un agujero negro. Los restos se mezclan con el gas y el polvo que los rodea en la galaxia y se reciclan para formar estrellas y planetas nuevos.