UC Berkeley’s flagship institute for social science research

Our purpose is captured in our name: we provide an organizational framework—a “matrix”—that supports cross-disciplinary research pursued by social scientists across the University of California, Berkeley campus and beyond.

New Directions

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Event Date: March 10th, 2026
12:00 PM to 1:30 PM PT

New Directions: Colonial Legacies, Post-Colonial Perspectives

Colonial legacies continue to shape political, social, and intellectual life. While colonialism is often treated as a historical period, its structures and logics persist in contemporary debates around race, territory, knowledge, and power. This panel — part of the Social Science Matrix New Directions series — will bring together UC Berkeley graduate students from anthropology, geography, and sociology to examine how colonial histories are reproduced, contested, and reimagined across different contexts.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published June 10, 2015

Penelope Anthias: “Gas and Land Rights in Bolivia”

In Bolivia, conflicting interests have led to complicated internal struggles over rights, land, and money, says a postdoctoral fellow in UC Berkeley's Department of Geography.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published June 1, 2015

Tribal Tongues

After nearing extinction, California Indian languages are gaining new speakers—and a digital presence—with the help of UC Berkeley’s Linguistics Department.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published May 12, 2015

After the Maidan

UC Berkeley scholars present diverse viewpoints on the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published May 7, 2015

Battling Ebola

A UC Berkeley professor has been part of a network of researchers working to apply local anthropological knowledge in the fight to contain the most deadly Ebola outbreak in history.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published May 7, 2015

Liz Carlisle: “Lentils to the Rescue”

Can lentils save American farms from drought? As California struggles with a water crisis, a UC Berkeley fellow shows how legumes can reduce dependence on irrigation.

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Research Highlights

Article

Published May 5, 2015

Center on the Politics of Development

A UC Berkeley research center advances mixed-methods research on development, envisions public policy solutions, and advocates for sustainable changes to the governance of developing communities.

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