Dariusz Gafijczuk

I joined Newcastle University as Lecturer in Sociology in September 2013. Previously I held positions at University College London, Trinity College Dublin and a Newton Fellowship at Lancaster University.

My work is situated in three main areas of investigation:

-Sociological Theory (classics & the diverse corpus of contemporary social thought);

-History (turn of the twentieth century Central Europe, especially the cultural and artistic avant-garde movements; philosophy of history, with a focus on the theories of temporality and the changing relationship between past, present, and future; the interaction between sociology and history as a mode of inquiry);

-Contemporary identities under the condition of hyper-insecurity - social, cultural, and political.

y work examines individual and collective social life through the bi-focal lens of theory and history.

This inquiry is underpinned by several areas of concentration, such as the detailed study of the cultural edifices at the turn of the 20th century in the region of Central Europe, especially the relationship between aesthetics and the construction of collective identities; a rigorous analysis of cultural forms, such as the artistic avant-gardes (both visual and acoustic) and their connection to social and political spaces; the changing nature of time, especially the past as a type of collective, social communication.

In addition, I am interested in epistemology and the nature of sociological inquiry. My most recent work grapples with the notion of sociological inquiry through the concept of 'vividness' as a type of sociological imagination.

I am currently in the process of developing a new research path, loosely entitled The Histories of Refuge. This is a culmination and an extension of the work I have undertaken until now. Its aim will be to create a historically informed and theoretically ground-breaking approach to how the notion of refuge can serve as the basis for building cohesive and more importantly, empathetic societies.