Beach view of UCSB

UCSB - Socially engaged and inclusive, global-minded and environmentally aware, open and supportive

Congratulations Class of 2022
Visiting Professor Elisabeth Ayuk-Etang
Liliana Rodriguez giving 2019 commencement address

Sociology Ph.D. Graduate Liliana Rodriguez giving 2019 commencement address

Sociology Faculty at ASA conference 2019

UCSB Sociology professors enjoy the 2019 ASA conference

Sociology Staff

Sociology Department staff enjoying lunch together at Meet Up Chinese Restaurant

COLA Rally at the entrance of UCSB

UCSB students raise awareness around the COLA movement, sociology graduate students among those leading the charge

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Remembering Alicia Cast

Alicia Cast was a gifted sociologist and social psychologist who passed away on February 22, 2024. She will be deeply missed. She was most renowned in sociology for her work on the role of emotions in identity formation, and relationships of identity to attitudes, behaviors, and social outcomes, including mental and physical health and patterns of inequality. She was theoretically sharp, quantitatively sophisticated, and analytically insightful. continuing reading
 
If you wish to share your memories of Alicia, you can do so on this memory board. The department is planning a memorial for Alicia Cast to take place May 23rd from 3:30-5:30, in Loma Pelona.

Message from the Chair

Welcome to the UCSB Sociology Department. Established in 1944, our highly ranked department is among the most diverse nationwide in terms of faculty and students. Our faculty include internationally renowned scholars whose research and teaching have influenced intellectual developments affecting the landscape of the discipline, including intersectional analysis of social phenomena, new approaches to the study of gender and sexualities, social movements as drivers of social and political change, the “cultural turn” in Sociology, and a “reflexive turn” in ethnography. In 2022, the US News and World Report Guide to Graduate Departments ranked USCB Sociology third nationwide in the subfield of Sex and Gender, and tenth in Sociology of Culture. Continued on the research page (click here).

 

Chair's Message

Announcements

Remembering Reg Daniel

With great sadness, we announce the passing of Reg Daniel. He was a friend, colleague, mentor,...

Dana Kornberg
  • Dana Kornberg

Congratulations to Dana Kornberg  who has been awarded the 2025 Joseph W. Elder Prize

Jason Turowetz
  • Jason Turowetz

Praised for his award-winning book, “Autistic Intelligence: Interaction, Individuality, and the Challenges of Diagnosis”

Rethinking autism through the diagnostic process

 

Sarah Thébaud
  • Sarah Thebaud

Inducted into the Sociological Research Association

Kum-Kum Bhavnani

Recipient of the Oliver Johnson Award for Distinguished Leadership in the Academic Senate

Liz Munday
  • Liz Munday

Winner of the 2023-24 Louis H. Towbes Fellowship

Alicia Cast Best Undergraduate Paper Award

2024 Winner, Taryn Ryan

2024 Honorable Mention, Zeena Haitham Hamed
Jason Turowetz
  • Jason Turowetz

Winner of ASA Social Psychology Section's

"Outstanding Recent Contribution in Social Psychology Award."

We acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land upon which the University of California, Santa Barbara, is located, and pay our respects to the Chumash Elders past, present and future. They hold the memories, the traditions, and the culture of this area, which has become a place of learning for people from all over the world.