Dr Scott Vrecko

Email:

Extension: 4057

Telephone: 01392 724057

Lecturer

Much of my research examines how politics, subjectivity, science and technology mix together in efforts to understand and manage a range of social problems, from drug use, drunk-driving, gambling, and obesity, to sex offending, eating disorders, teenage pregnancy, and the nonmedical use of prescription drugs.  A key thematic and empirical focus of mine has been addiction and problems of desire, a topic on which I am currently writing a book.  

Beyond my own research activities, I am active in promoting interdisciplinary dialogue and collaboration.  For example, I helped establish the European Neuroscience and Society Network, which is funded by the European Science Foundation; and I have edited two interdisciplinary collections: one on ‘Neuroscience, Power and Culture’ (a 2010 special issue of History of the Human Sciences) and another on ‘Drugs, Addiction and Society’ (a 2010 special issue of BioSocieties, co-edited with Howard Kushner). Within the University of Exeter, I am a board member of the Centre for the Interdisciplinary Study of Sexuality and Gender in Europe.

I welcome inquiries from current and potential students in sociology and anthropology, especially (1) those from non-traditional backgrounds (e.g., those from families with no history of university education), and/or (2) those with interests that intersect with my own: legal and illegal drugs; culture and power; science and technology studies; subjectivity; medicine, psychiatry and neuroscience; crime and deviance; consumption and material culture; globalisation; gender and sexuality; creativity.

Journal Articles (links to PDFs)

2010, 'Global and everyday matters of consumption: on the productive assemblage of pharmaceuticals and obesity', Theory and Society, 39, 5.

2010, 'Birth of a brain disease: science, the state and addiction neuropolitics', History of the Human Sciences, 23, 4: 52-67. 

2010, ‘Civilizing technologies and the control of deviance’, BioSocieties, 5,1.

2010, ‘Neuroscience, power and culture: an introduction’, History of the Human Sciences, 23,1.

2010, ‘Addiction, biology and culture’,  BioSocieties,  5,1. With Deanne Dunbar and Howard Kushner.

2009, ‘Therapeutic justice in drug courts: crime, punishment and societies of control’, Science as Culture, 18, 2.

2008, ‘Capital ventures into biology: biosocial dynamics in the industry and science of gambling’, Economy & Society, 37, 1.

2006, ‘Folk neurology and the remaking of identity’, Molecular Interventions, 6, 6. 

Edited Collections and Book Chapters (links to journal websites)
2010, Neuroscience, Power and Culture. Special issue of History of the Human Sciences.  23, 1.

2010, Drugs, Addiction, and Society. Special issue of BioSocieties. 5, 1.  Co-edited with Howard Kushner