Politics at Whitman College

Education: Professor Apostolidis received his A.B. (1986) in Politics from Princeton University and his M.A. (1993) and Ph.D. (1996) in Government from Cornell University.

Research interests: Professor Apostolidis’s research interests include Critical Social and Political Theory, Cultural Studies, Feminist Theory, Critical Race Theory, Democratic Theory, Immigration, Labor, Latino Politics, American Social Movements, the American Christian Right, and Critical Media Studies.

Courses taught: Professor Apostolidis teaches “Culture, Ideology, Politics,” “American Political Theory,” “Politics and Religion,” and a two-course sequence (“Community-Based Research as Democratic Practice“ and “Public Communication about Community-Based Research“) in which students conduct independent research in partnership with local and regional organizations for Whitman's ongoing project on The State of the State for Washington Latinos.

Current research:Professor Apostolidis's new book, Breaks in the Chain: Immigrant Workers' Stories of Power in Late-Modern America, is due out in Fall 2010 from the University of Minnesota Press. The book places Gramsci and Foucault's texts in dialogue with the personal life histories of Mexican immigrant meatpackers who recently waged an extraordinary struggle to democratize their union and their workplace. He is also carrying out a study of political orientations and occupational health and safety problems among Latin American day laborers; an analysis of neoliberal tendencies in evangelical mega-pastor Rick Warren’s sermons about global disasters and Christian social action; and co-authoring a forthcoming book on the human-animal nexus and political theory.

Books:

Journal articles and published essays; Professor Apostolidis’s articles on critical social theory, immigrant workers, feminist theory, democratic theory, and the Christian Right have appeared or are forthcoming in Constellations, Theory & Event, Signs, Philosophy & Social Criticism, Historical Reflections/Reflexiones Historique, and Political Research Quarterly. He also is a contributor to the edited volumes Feminist Interpretations of Theodor Adorno (ed. R. Heberle), Political Theory and Cultural Studies (ed. J. Dean), and The Radio Reader (ed. M. Hilmes and J. Loviglio).