Position
Academic Background
Sample Courses
Teaching Philosophy
Research & Interests
Notable Academic Appointments & Awards
Publication Highlights
Selected Scholarly Presentations

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Position            

• Assistant Professor of Sociology

Academic Background      

• University of Michigan,  Ph.D. in Sociology, 2004   
• Cambridge University, First-Class, M.Phil. in Social and Political Sciences, 1998
• Yale University, Distinction, B.A. in Sociology, 1996   

Sample Courses Taught at Providence College   

• Sociological Theory
• Introductory Sociology

Teaching Philosophy       

My approach to teaching is three-fold. First, I believe in a rigorous curriculum consisting of primary texts. Students will not read about the leading theorists in sociology - they will read the theorists themselves. Second, like C. Wright Mills, I believe that sociology is meaningless unless it is used to explain the leading challenges of our day. I therefore do my best to link sociological readings to current issues. Third, I believe that sound pedagogy must incorporate "active" or "experiential" learning techniques that encourage students to take ownership of their education and have a hand in teaching themselves. To that end, I do my best to include group exercises, problem-solving sessions, and simulations in the courses I teach. In sum, I stress the fundamental, the contemporary, and the active dimensions of sociology.

Research & Interests               

My research agenda is to bring political parties back into sociology. Sociologists vacated the scholarly terrain of party politics in the late 1960s. After such a long hiatus, and with political parties front and center in the public imagination again, I believe it is high time that sociologists direct their attention toward the unique role that parties play in social change. The central theoretical preoccupation of my research program is to explain how political elites relate to race, class, gender, and religious groups on the ground. Are "the people" the prime movers of social change? Are the elites? Is the answer, "both at the same time," and if so, what then is the relationship between the two? Currently, I address these formidable questions by examining the political origins of liberal democracy in the United States and the isolation of New Orleans immediately prior to Hurricane Katrina. I am also contemplating future research on the impact of party formation on the absence of universal health care in the United States.

Notable Academic Appointments and Awards

• University of Michigan, Chair, Planning Committee for "Learning Civic Engagement," a workshop series and fellowship program exploring the relationship between civic engagement and three forms of experiential learning, 2006
• University of Michigan, Department of Sociology, Postdoctoral Research Support Grant for Field Work in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, 2006
• University of Michigan, Institute for the Humanities, Mary Fair Croushore Residential Graduate Student Fellowship, 2003-2004 

Publication Highlights

Articles and Book Chapters

• Forthcoming "'No Bourgeois Mass Party, No Democracy': The Missing Link in Barrington Moore's American Civil War" in Political Power and Social Theory 19
• Forthcoming  "Class" in the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, 2nd edition, William A. Darity ed., Macmillan

Book Reviews

• Forthcoming "Wobblies on the Waterfront: Interracial Unionism in Progressive-Era Philadelphia" by Peter Cole in Labor History
• 2007  "The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln" by Sean Wilentz in Comparative Studies in Society and History 49 (1): 234-235
• 2006 "The Triangle Fire, the Protocols of Peace, and Industrial Democracy in Progressive Era New York" by Richard A. Greenwald in Contemporary Sociology 35 (4): 398-399

Under Review

• "Vicarious Revolutionaries: Discourse, Command, and the Routinization of American Politics, 1819-1847" at Qualitative Sociology
• "Revisiting Barrington Moore's Old South" at Southern Cultures

Works in Progress

• "The Political Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy in the United States, 1828-1896" (Book Manuscript)
•  "Parties and the Constitution of the Social: a Comparative Analysis of the U.S.,   Turkey, and India" (with Manali Desai and Cihan Tugal)  (Working Paper)

Selected Scholarly Presentations and Activities

• "No Peasant Mass Party, No Slaveocracy: the Anti-Bourgeois Coalition in Barrington Moore's Old South." Paper presented at the Political Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session at the American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 11, New York City, 2007
• "From Organizer to Teacher: Confessions of a Johnny-Come-Lately." Regular Paper Session on "Activism and Academia" at the Pacific Sociological Association Annual Meeting, March 29, Oakland, 2007
• "Bringing Parties Back Into Sociology" (Organizer with Manali Desai). Comparative and Historical Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session at the American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 11, Montreal, 2006
• "'No systematick opposition': Antipartyism and the Making of the American Two-Party System, 1787-1829." Paper presented at the Comparative and Historical Sociology Refereed Roundtable Session on "Bringing Parties Back Into Sociology" at the American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 11, Montreal, 2006
• "No Bourgeois Populist Party, No Democracy: The Missing Link in Barrington Moore's American Civil War." Paper presented at the Paper Session on "Comparative Populism" at the Social Science History Association Annual Meeting, November 3, Portland, 2005
• "Radicals in Our Midst: The American Critique of Capitalism in the Chicago Two-Party System, 1833-1867." Paper presented at the Comparative and Historical Sociology Paper Session on "States, Critical Turning Points, and World History" at the American Sociological Association Annual Meeting, August 16, San Francisco, 2004

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