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Professor, Women’s Studies, Psychology, and Afroamerican & African Studies; Chair, Women’s Studies Department

• Fields of Study

  • Intersectionality
  • Qualitative methods
  • Femininity
  • Relationship between political attitudes and behaviors, particularly among African Americans and all women

• About

  My scholarship examines the social construction of categories such as gender, race, and social class through a combination of theoretical and empirical work employing both qualitative and quantitative methods. In my empirical work, I aim to develop historically specific and culturally grounded conceptualizations of race and gender to understand group differences and similarities, with special attention to the ways these social categories depend on one another for meaning and are jointly associated with outcomes. 
  
  Current projects in my research group focus on 1) diverse women’s perceptions of femininity, their bodies and sexuality; and 2) the use of essentialist rhetoric to justify discrimination against both racial and sexual minorities in public debates over marriage law.

• Education

  • Ph.D. Psychology (Personality), University of Michigan