Professor, Department Vice Chair
SSMS 3429
Areas of Specialization:
Gender, Sexualities, Masculinities, Gender Theory, Families, Cultural Sociology, Inequalities, Qualitative Methods
Education:
Ph.D., Sociology, University of Virginia
M.A., Sociology, University of Virginia
B.A., Sociology, Colorado College
Bio:
My research and teaching focus on gender, masculinities, sexualities, and inequality. I am particularly interested in a central paradox in the sociology of gender: while gender is subject to incredible variation and transformation, gender inequality has proven remarkably durable. My theoretical work on “hybrid masculinities” addresses this paradox directly, examining how shifts in the meanings and practices associated with masculinity can simultaneously challenge and reproduce systems of gender and sexual inequality. This work is collected and extended in Exploring Masculinities (co-edited with C.J. Pascoe, Oxford University Press) and A Kaleidoscope of Identities (co-authored with James Messerschmidt, Rowman and Littlefield). I also co-author Gender in World Perspective with Raewyn Connell (Polity Press), a broad global history of and introduction to gender theory, its global dimensions, and its political stakes.
My scholarship has been published in Gender & Society, Signs, Sexualities, Men and Masculinities, Socius, Contexts, among other journals and outlets. In 2026, I am completing my term as Editor of Men and Masculinities, which publishes interdisciplinary feminist scholarship on critical masculinities studies from around the world.
Feminist sociology has shaped not only my scholarship, but my sense of what scholarship is for. I endeavor to pass that conviction on to students, encouraging them to use sociological tools to make sense of their own lives and the inequalities that structure them.
Courses:
Undergraduate
SOC118PC: Sociology of Popular Culture
SOC125P: Sociology of Privilege
SOC154: Sociology of Gender
SOC154A: Sociology of Families
SOC159M: Sociology of Masculinities
SOC185G: Theories of Gender Inequality
Graduate
SOC245A: Sociology of Gender
SOC245D: Sociology of Masculinities
SOC290B: Sociology Professional Development Seminar