Alex van Venrooij

About Me

Sociologist interested in culture & classifications

Publications

• Wilderom, B. R., & van Venrooij, A. T. (2025). The dance of markets and movements: The emergence and development of dance genres in the US, UK, and the Netherlands, 1985–2005. Poetics, 109, Article 101970
• van Venrooij, A., & Wilderom, R. (2023). The dynamics of dance: An early history of electronic dance music. In A. Bennett (Ed.), The Bloomsbury Handbook of Popular Music and Youth Culture (pp. 257-280). (Bloomsbury Handbooks). Bloomsbury Academic.
• van Venrooij, A., Miller, C., & Schmutz, V. (2022). Race and Genre Ambiguity in the Critical Reception of Popular Music. Sociological Inquiry, 92(2), 568-596
• Punt, M. B., & van Venrooij, A. (2021). Signals in the Waves of Surf: Category Development and Signals in Surf Music. Sociological Perspectives, 64(3), 387-410.
• Schmutz, V., & van Venrooij, A. (2021). Harmonizing Forms of Legitimacy in the Consecration of Popular Music. American Behavioral Scientist, 65(1), 83-98.
• van Venrooij, A. (2021). Book Review: “Measuring Culture”: [Review of: J.W. Mohr, C. Bail, M. Fryre, J. Lena, O. Lizardo, T. McDonnell, A. Mische, I. Tavory & F. Wherry (2020) Measuring Culture]. ASA Sociology Culture Section Newsletter, 35(5), 13-15.
• Wilderom, R., & van Venrooij, A. (2019). Intersecting fields: The influence of proximate field dynamics on the development of electronic/dance music in the US and UK. Poetics, 77, Article 101389
• van Venrooij, A. (2018). The French Alternative to Bourdieu? Hennion, Actor-Network Theory, and the Sociology of Mediation. Contemporary Sociology, 47(4), 408-412.
• Schmutz, V., & van Venrooij, A. (2018). Concurrence, consensus et consécration dans la musique populaire. In L. Ellena, P. Humeau, & F. Renard (Eds.), La reconnaissance à l’oeuvre: Luttes de classement artistique, processus, ambivalence (pp. 145-162). (Sociologie et sciences sociales). Pulim
• van Venrooij, A., & Schmutz, V. (2018). Categorical ambiguity in cultural fields: The effects of genre fuzziness in popular music. Poetics, 66, 1-18.
• van Venrooij, A., & Schmutz, V. (2015). Classifications in popular music. In J. D. Wright (Ed.), International encyclopedia of the social & behavioral sciences (2 ed., Vol. 3, pp. 799-804). Elsevier.
• van Venrooij, A. (2015). A community ecology of genres: Explaining the emergence of new genres in the UK field of electronic/dance music, 1985-1999. Poetics, 52, 104-123.
• van Venrooij, A., & Deinema, M. (2013). Het Nederlandse kunstveld ontleed. In J. W. Duyvendak, C. Bouw, K. Gërxhani, & O. Velthuis (Eds.), Sociale kaart van Nederland: over instituties en organisaties. - 2e, geheel herz. dr. (pp. 207-221). Boom Lemma.
• Bachmayer, T., Wilterdink, N., & van Venrooij, A. (2014). Taste differentiation and hierarchization within popular culture: the case of salsa music. Poetics, 47, 60-82.
• van Venrooij, A. (2014). Over het ontstaan van culturele soorten: een ecologische analyse van het ontstaan van nieuwe genres in de elektronische dansmuziek. Sociologie, 10(2), 93-123.
• van Venrooij, A., & Schmutz, V. (2013). De categorische imperatief in de populaire muziek. Sociologie, 9(1), 73-96.
• van Venrooij, A., & Schmutz, V. (2013). De consequenties van categorieën: een analyse van grensoverschrijdende genre-identiteit in de populaire muziek. Tijdschrift voor Sociologie, 34(3), 364-389.
• van Venrooij, A. (2013). And the winner is... In F. Wekker, R. Voss, S. Holla, J. Pach, J. Kesic, & C. de Olde (Eds.), Verleider & verlichter: columns voor Bart van Heerikhuizen (pp. 62-63). Diemen: AMB.
• van Venrooij, A. (2012). Dance in de VS en Europa. #kijkSW, 2012(4 (dec.))
• van Venrooij, A. (2011). Classifying popular music in the United States and the Netherlands. American Behavioral Scientist, 55(5), 609-623.
• Schmutz, V., van Venrooij, A., Janssen, S., & Verboord, M. (2010). Change and continuity in newspaper coverage of popular music since 1955: evidence from the United States, France, Germany and the Netherlands. Popular music and society, 33(4), 501-515.
• Sengers, F., Raven, R. P. J. M., & van Venrooij, A. (2010). From riches to rags: biofuels, media discourses and resistance to sustainable energy technologies. Energy Policy, 38(9), 5013-5027.
• van Venrooij, A., & Schmutz, V. (2010). The evaluation of popular music in the United States, Germany and the Netherlands: a comparison of the use of high art and popular aesthetic criteria. Cultural Sociology, 4(3), 395-421.
• van Venrooij, A. (2009). Classifications in popular music: discourses and meaning structures in American, Dutch and German popular music reviews. Rotterdam: Erasmus Research Centre for Media, Communication and Culture.
• van Venrooij, A. (2009). The aesthetic discourse space of popular music: 1985-86 and 2004-05. Poetics, 37(4), 315-332
• van Venrooij, A. (2008). Cultuursociologie studeren in de Verenigde Staten. Sociologie, 4(2-3), 225-228

Courses

• Measuring Meaning
• Sociological Theory 4