Academic Staff: Inanna Hamati-Ataya

Dr Inanna Hamati-Ataya, BA, MA, PhD (Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne)

Lecturer

Telephone: +44 (0)114 222 1662
Fax: +44 (0)114 222 1717

Email: i.hamati-ataya@sheffield.ac.uk

Profile

Inanna Hamati-Ataya graduated from the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, France, where she was awarded a PhD in Political Science in October 2006. Before joining the Department of Politics at Sheffield in September 2011, she was an Assistant Professor at the American University of Beirut, Lebanon (2007-2011), where she also served as Head of the Department of Political Studies and Public Administration.

Inanna’s research focuses on the philosophical and socio-political foundations of knowledge-production in the social sciences, more specifically in International Relations (IR) and Social/Political Theory. She is particularly interested in the socio-political underpinnings of epistemic, ontological, and deontological debates in these disciplines, such as those pertaining to objectivity, representation and values. As such, part of her work is meta-theoretical and addresses political and IR theory as a social construct, from a sociology-of-knowledge and politics-of-knowledge perspective. This, in turn, informs her research as a theorist engaging political reality within a post-foundationalist, reflexive framework. This research agenda was first shaped by her PhD thesis on the place and role of values in the epistemic postulates of Realism in IR theory, and has since developed into a more general commitment to reflexivism as an alternative perspective on knowledge and scholarly praxis.

Teaching

POL3125 Dissident Perspectives on World Politics: This new module explores key post-positivist theories of world politics and approaches to world order, including critiques of IR itself. It examines their core assumptions by focusing on their epistemic/ontological stances, methodologies, and thematics, as well as their political and deontological commitments. These dissident perspectives include Critical Theory, Critical Constructivism, Critical Feminism, Post-Colonialism, Post-Structuralism/Postmodernism, and Reflexive IR. The module is anchored in a historical-sociological understanding of the evolution of IR theory, which provides students with the means to not only assess the content, validity, or explanatory power of specific worldviews, but also appreciate their historicity, socio-political meaningfulness, and normative dimensions. Students will explore a range of post-positivist methodologies, assumptions, and theories by reading primary texts in philosophy and social theory in addition to IR theory. In seminar discussions, presentations, and assignments, they will engage this literature and reflect on its analytical, empirical, and ethical strengths and weaknesses, by addressing specific problems and issues of world politics, including those pertaining to our knowledge of the international. This module gives students who are interested in IR and IR theory the opportunity to strongly develop their reading, research and writing skills, as well as their argumentative and critical skills (submission of two assessed essays). POL3126 is the project-based module associated with POL3125 for students who wish to further develop these skills and engage more thoroughly the material covered in this module.

POL6970 Theory and Practice of International Relations: This seminar is the core module for the MA in International Studies. Students are first introduced to IR Theory and its main traditions (Realism, Liberalism, English School, Post-positivist IR, and Cosmopolitanism) and then address specific aspects of international practice (use of force, terrorism, media and communication, etc.). They are evaluated on the basis of two essays, covering both halves of the module. In the first half, they are expected to engage the core texts of IR Theory, and discuss/contrast their different epistemic, ontological, and deontological assumptions, their explanatory power and validity as representations of world politics, but also their hidden ideological and cultural underpinnings. One of my key commitments in teaching IR Theory at the postgraduate level is to combine an analytical, meta-theoretical understanding of the theories themselves, with a sociological reflection on their cultural and political context of emergence, which includes the academic/intellectual condition of their authors and the discipline as a whole. This provides students with the means to critically assess, not only the validity of these theories, but also their meaning as social constructs and as historical representations of the world.

New MA Module for 2013-14:
Theories of Ideology
Ideology is one of the key concepts of modern and contemporary political thought. This module introduces students to the history and genealogy of Ideology Theory, and examines different theoretical approaches to Ideology, focusing specifically on its origin, nature, and social function, as well as its relation to power, language, knowledge, and the construction and reproduction of political order. The different analytical frameworks and methodologies that support the investigation of these thematics are then illustrated through empirical case studies of specific domestic and international manifestations of ideological structures, discourses, and practices.

Current Research

I am currently working on two different research projects. The first one draws on my current research on reflexivity in IR/Social Theory, and is a book project tentatively titled “Reflexivist International Relations Scholarship: Knowledge and Praxis in a Post-Foundationalist Era.” This is an opportunity for me to complete and finalise my work on a coherent reflexivist approach to the study of world politics, that provides a consistent perspective on the cognitive and praxical/deontological dilemmas of IR Scholarship.

The second project is related to my interest in the social construction of specific concepts and deontological values – including the notions of objectivity, value-freedom, neutrality, and political engagement – and the way they shape social agents’ dispositions and practices, both within their professional field and in the public sphere more generally. I am particularly interested in two social groups that share common characteristics: academics (more specifically scholars in the field of International Relations) and journalists. The first phase of this project is a 4-year EU-funded research on IR scholars and scholarship in the UK. This will be an in-depth sociological investigation of the social, institutional and agential factors and processes governing the production and transmission of knowledge in the discipline, with a specific focus on the practices, dispositions, and values of IR scholars and their PhD students.

Key Publications

• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (Forthcoming) Transcending Objectivism, Subjectivism, and the Knowledge In-Between: The Subject in/of “Strong Reflexivity”. Review of International Studies.
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (2012) Reflectivity, Reflexivity, Reflexivism: IR’s “Reflexive Turn’ – and Beyond. European Journal of International Relations. DOI: 10.1177/1354066112437770
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (Forthcoming 2012) IR Theory as International Practice/Agency: A Clinical-Cynical Bourdieusian Perspective, Millennium: Journal of the International Studies 40(3):625-646.
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (2012) Beyond (Post)Positivism: The Missed Promises of Systemic Pragmatism. International Studies Quarterly 56(2):291-305.
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (2011) Contemporary “Dissidence” in American International Relations: The New Structure of Anti-Mainstream Scholarship? International Studies Perspectives 12(4): 362-398.
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (2011) The “Problem of Values” and International Relations Scholarship: From Applied Reflexivity to Reflexivism. International Studies Review 13(2): 259-287.
• Hamati-Ataya, Inanna (2010) Knowing and Judging in International Relations Theory: Realism and the Reflexive Challenge. Review of International Studies. 36(4):1079-1101.

View Dr Hamati-Ataya's full list of publications

PhD Supervision

I am currently a first supervisor on the PhD theses of Claire Nicolaou (Paternalism and British Military Interventionism) and Hicham Tohme (Media-Power Nexus), and a second supervisor on the PhD theses of Joe Turner, Xavier Mathieu, Janosch Prinz, and Ramón Miranda.

I welcome students passionate about any of the following areas of research:

• International Relations Theory and Metatheory: Philosophical, sociological or historical investigations of specific paradigms, traditions, theories, concepts, or debates in IR; IR theory as practice; original contributions to IR theory through empirical investigation of international phenomena.
• Social and Political Theory and Metatheory: Contending approaches to power; contending approaches to the political; the knowledge-power nexus; ideology and ideologies (cognitive and political, including within specific social sciences, especially Economics); Post-Positivist approaches to specific political phenomena (broadly construed), especially through an engagement with Critical Theory, (Post/Neo)Marxism, Constructivism, Pragmatism, or authors such as Bourdieu or Foucault.
• Political Philosophy: critical studies of core political philosophy concepts; Continental philosophical approaches to power; post-modern readings of Hobbesian thought.
• Politics of Knowledge: sociology of political thought/science/concepts; sociology of IR; sociology of academic and non-academic representations of the political; sociology of political scientists; but also political sociology of the production of knowledge in physical/natural sciences.
• Sociology of values, deontologies, and praxis: socio-political underpinnings of specific professional practices (journalists, lawmakers, academics, artists, businessmen, etc.).