I am fascinated by processes of social construction: how do concepts become understood as reflections of external reality, and with what consequences? In my research, I aim to create new methodological and conceptual tools for understanding such production processes and their implications for inequality. My work is in conversation with scholars in the subfields of gender, age, race, environmental studies, social psychology, demography, culture, epistemology, social theory, and methodology. My favorite projects advance social theory. In my empirical work, I use diverse methods, including surveys, experiments, natural language processing, content analyses, and in-depth interviews.
Much of my research is in collaboration with a community of outstanding colleagues, students, and community partners. Research ideas never exist in a vacuum, and I am grateful for my network of advisors, collaborators, and students. If you are a student interested in working with me, please see the For students tab.
For a list of my published papers, please see my CV. I try to publish open-access when possible. However, if you want to read one of my papers and don't have access to it (e.g. it's behind a paywall), please email me. Below is a non-exhaustive description of some key areas of research I am currently working on.
Within milliseconds of meeting a new person, a social actor has classified them across several social categories. They use this information to guide interpersonal interactions. In aggregate, these interactions shape institutions, culture, and individual lives, including through building highly entrenched and embedded systems of inequality. Yet, the specific dimensions across which people classify each other are rather arbitrary: despite feeling like natural features of the world, social categories like those related to race, gender, age, and body size are products of our specific time and culture. One primary focus of my work is to identify and explain processes of the social construction of social categories and systems of inequality.
I have ongoing projects related to age, gender, race, and body size, as well as theoretical work on categorization that cuts across specific axes of difference.
Another primary focus of my research agenda is on developing theoretical and methodological tools for researchers to study systems of inequality. In particular, I am passionate about advancing approaches to social science that are grounded in values of justice and liberation.
I have ongoing projects related to measurement of social categories, statistical frameworks on difference, and feminist methodology.
My third stream of research investigates a cultural phenomenon I call “Naturalness Dogma.” This cultural process refers to the legitimating force of the concepts of nature and naturalness, and the belief that natural things (be they products, behaviors, states, people, or ideas) are better than artificial ones.
I have ongoing projects related to naturalness dogma and politics, advertising, and social category essentialism.