Best Schools For Race, Sexualityand Gender

[BlkGrlSoc]

What are the best schools for race, sexuality and gender. Please also name professors who are known for this subject. I am interested in the lives of African Americans.

[ohgoodness]

What are the best schools for race, sexuality and gender. Please also name professors who are known for this subject. I am interested in the lives of African Americans.

 

A suggestion would be look at the boards of the most prominent journals within this field and see who is where.   Looking at the main editors usually gives you someone who is well-established in the field and is likely to have created a "clique" at their department.  Another suggestion would look at people well-versed in intersectionality and stratification.   Lastly you could also remove the "race" and look at departments strong in gender and sex/stratification and make sure that they understand that you are bringing a strong interest/profile that will join sexuality and gender and the lives of african americans, which is a subfield to excel in.

 

I said it before but Northwestern is a good place.  Strong in gender and largely connected to social dimensions of Chicago.  Big program with strenghts in all your fields (I have 0 connection to NW but yeah - i'm reppin 24/7..).  I'm not gonna list people since that is rather redudant for such a big field.   In the same vein -  Rice is deeply entrenched in Houston (Kinder Institute, Hobby Center, Houston Survey,) with people who connect these issues.  

 

UCSB has a good rep, clusters on feminist studies and race,ethnicity, nation,  and I always love what I read from Maria Charles. 

 

I could probably go on to list every major program in the states but really - this is such a large subfield where you could go anywhere and develop a niché suitable for your interests.  I would just think about my favorite scholars and see who is connected to them.   Otherwise look here: 

 

http://www.feministeconomics.org/pages/about-feminist-economics/editorial-board/ 

http://www.oxfordjournals.org/our_journals/socpol/editorial_board.html

and then a rankings page: 

http://www.scimagojr.com/journalrank.php?category=3318

Edited January 14, 2013 by cherub

[herbertmarcuse]

I recommend:

 

University of Maryland at College Park.

 

If you can get in, you might consider taking classes with Patricia Hill Collins.

 

 

Cheers,

 

HM

[wmnshlthsoc]

Hmm because this is my field I would suggest Rutgers University, Washington University in St. Louis and Emory University.

[RandomDood]

I remember reading somewhere that UC Santa Cruz has a strong emphasis on Sexuality and Gender.

Maybe I just made it up in my mind, but it might be worth checking.

[jacib]

I remember reading somewhere that UC Santa Cruz has a strong emphasis on Sexuality and Gender.

Maybe I just made it up in my mind, but it might be worth checking.

If I recall correctly, Santa Cruz is pretty much the place for gender theory or queer theory or something along those lines.

Do you want to do qualitative stuff or quantitative stuff (or mixed methods)?  For race, I know the ethnography stuff decently well, and the neighborhood effects stuff/straight up strat stuff a lot less well.  In terms of ethnography and the like, there are of course the "classics" who mainly write about poor blacks (Wacquant at Berkeley, WJW at Harvard, Mitch Duneier at Princeton/CUNY, Eli Anderson at Yale, Sudhir Venkatesh at Columbia).  There are a couple of really awesome younger people who work in the same vein who are are just getting jobs:

• Alice Goffman at Wisconsin, who works on the "ghetto" experience in the age of mass incarceration, especially how young men navigate daily life with warrants out for their arrest; (worked with Duneier at Princeton)
• Matt Desmond at Harvard, I don't know if he's started publishing on it, but has this incredible thing about nuisance ordinances, which sounds so boring but is the most exciting talk I heard that year (worked with Mustafa Emirbayer at Wisconsin, who everyone tells me is the greatest).
• Eric Klinenberg, at NYU, whose last book wasn't about race and who is a little older than the other two (but younger than the "new classics"; he was Wacquant's student, I believe), but whose first book (Heatwave) I loved.  His last two books haven't been about race though.  Klinenberg is taking students, Goffman and Desmond definitely aren't yet, but they could still be on your committee and Harvard and Madison are obviously great places to study race. (He worked with Wacquant at Berkeley, I think).
• Just as a random comparison, Duneier, Venkatesh, and Wacquant all worked with WJW when he was at Chicago.  Eli Anderson got his degree under Howie Becker, wikipedia tells me.  Wow.

But there are also interesting people who are writing about the lives of black-people-who-aren't-poor:

• Karyn Lacy at Michigan, my friend who does race is so excited about her.  Her book Blue Chip Black about the lives of middle class, suburban blacks is supposed to be really good.
• Mary Pattillo at Northwestern.  Her book Black Pickett Fence is also supposed to be good, too.
• Alondra Nelson at Columbia.  I feel like she's a name that's getting more important, does qualitative work, but not ethnography.  Race bridges with science/health, she's written on the Black Panther's healthcare program, and race and genetics.  Glanced at her website, she says she's also interested in gender, but I don't know how it manifests itself in her work.

Of course, if you want to do quant stuff... that's a whole nother long set of people.  Doug Massey at Princeton and Robert Sampson at Harvard are of course the two people whose names pop to my head most quickly, of course.  Anyway, I just listed the race people because 1) I find race more interesting so I know it better 2) you don't necessarily need a single person who does race and  gender.  You can mix and match.  Or do what I do: my adviser does a little religion, but knows the kind of political sociology stuff I'm interested in very well, so  I've been teaching myself the sociology of religion stuff (and getting it from the people in the political science department here, and a little bit in the religion department).  I think the TL;DR is if you name a top program, they're probably going to have someone excellent doing race, but I personally can't think of anyone who does race/sexuality or race/gender.  USNWR has a list of top Sociology Sex and Gender programs.

Edited January 15, 2013 by jacib