Cuttack, Dec. 26: A workshop for young sociologists titled “Sociology in Action” was held over the weekend at Ravenshaw University’s Heritage Hall ahead of the 36th All India Sociological Conference, which starts tomorrow.

Around 150 scholars, teachers and researchers (under the age of 35) participated in the workshop, which ended this afternoon. The focus was on capacity building and application of sociological concepts and tools in analysing real life situations.

The workshop was divided into five sessions and was moderated by resource persons from reputed institutes. They spoke about burning social issues of contemporary times and new trends in research methodology.

Gaurang Sahay, professor of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) held the session titled “Applications of Sociology for Socio-economic Development in India”. He stressed on major issues such as displacement in the face of development, the Maoist problem and people’s movement.

N. Jayaram, professor of TISS, Mumbai, spoke on sociological theories and empirical research. He encouraged students to concentrate on the country’s social reality instead of concentrating only on European sociological works. He also guided the participants during the session on ‘academic writing’.

“The objective is to familiarise the younger generation with the current issues in sociology and encourage them to think out of the box. Youngsters can help in generating new ideas about society, which is in a constant flux,” said Jayaram.

Speaking on the topic “Emerging Avenues for Sociology and Sociologists”, professor of Burdwan University, Biswajit Ghosh, discussed about emerging career opportunities for students of sociology, not just in educational institutes and NGOs but also in media and corporate sector. Partha N. Mukherji and Anand Kumar, sociology professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Delhi also addressed the gathering.

A young delegate and ex-student of JNU, Dev Nath Pathak, said, “The dominance of older, established people in social science fields has to be broken and the work of young scholars should get due recognition.”

P. K. B. Nayar, chairman of Centre for Gerontological Studies, Trivandrum and former president of the Indian Sociological Society conceived the workshop. The Indian Sociological Society is organising the three-day conference tomorrow.