CSSLRV Director and UG Sociology Professor Myrna Dawson took up the position of President for the Canadian Sociological Association (CSA) today at the CSA Annual General Meeting. The meeting was held on the same day that the CSA hosted the Opening Ceremony for the International Sociological Association XIX World Congress of Sociology in Toronto which runs until July 21. Dawson served as President-Elect during the past year and will serve as President until 2019. One of her first duties in her role was to chair the Opening Ceremony of the Congress which saw about 6,000 delegates attend from 120 countries. The CSA is a professional association that promotes research, publication and teaching in sociology in Canada. Its membership comes mainly from sociology departments in Canadian universities, but there is a notable group from other social science departments, community colleges, from a wide range of non-academic settings (government, NGO, and private sector) and from abroad. In 2016, Dawson established and currently co-chairs the CSA’s Research Cluster in Violence & Society. She has organized the inaugural meeting of an emerging Thematic Group in Violence & Society in the International Sociological Association which occurs this week.