I have designed and taught undergraduate courses in sociology and queer studies at Princeton, Penn, and Bryn Mawr College. My teaching incorporates scaffolded activities and assignments that allow students to bring their own interests and creativity into the classroom while also honing critical reading, speaking, and research skills through practice.
In 2021, I received the Lynda S. Hart Teaching Award from the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Program at Penn, which recognizes teachers who have cultivated a learning environment that facilitates, encourages, and engages feminist critique and who prioritize inclusive classroom practices.
The Study of Gender in Society
Bryn Mawr College
This course will provide a conceptual and topical introduction to the sociological study of gender. We will investigate what gender is and how it relates to sex and sexuality. We will explore how gender is conceptualized as a thing we do, a belief we internalize, and a social structure that shapes both our individual life chances and our biggest institutions such as school, work, and the family. Gender is not constituted in a vacuum, and we will investigate how gender intersects with other important social locations, such as race, class, sexuality, and nationality. We will assess how gendered norms, values, and identities change over time, and we will consider the future of gender and ask: Can we break the gendered wheel?
Intro to Sexuality Studies and Queer Theory
University of Pennsylvania
This course provides an interdisciplinary grounding in historical and theoretical foundations of sexuality studies and queer theory. A critical interrogation of sex, gender, sexuality, pleasure, and embodiment will provide students with a framework for producing their own queer cultural critique. We will explore LGBTQ history alongside contemporary queer cultural studies. This course will also address the intersections of sexuality and gender with race, class, ability, age, nationality, and religion. We will explore how historical, social, political, and economic systems have shaped and reshaped what it means to be queer or claim queer identity in the United States and abroad. Students will engage with multiple disciplinary approaches that have both shaped queer studies and have been shaped by queer methods.
And the Rest is Drag
Princeton University
RuPaul Charles, host of the popular TV competition series RuPaul’s Drag Race, famously said, “We’re all born naked and the rest is drag.” We generally think of drag as a specific kind of transgression––dressing up as the opposite gender––but how might “drag” describe the myriad choices we make each day to be seen and understood? How do we display who we are to the world, and why do we present the way we do? We begin this Writing Seminar by analyzing gender-bending performances from television and music in light of Erving Goffman’s theory of self-presentation in everyday life. Next, we explore New York City during the 1920s and ’30s “Pansy Craze,” as students engage with a range of scholarship—from urban studies and the history of medicine to sociology, visual studies, literary analysis, and the law—to examine how we draw boundaries between what’s considered “deviant” and “normal.” For the research paper, students investigate an aspect of identity and material culture in a case study of their choosing. Sample topics include the depiction of the villain Ursula in Disney’s The Little Mermaid, the history of the pantsuit in American business and politics, and the use of drag in Princeton Triangle Shows.
Sociology of Deviance
University of Pennsylvania
Sex, drugs, and… corporate malfeasance? Why are some behaviors and identities considered more morally acceptable than others? Who or what decides? How are boundaries of difference enforced? How do these boundaries wax and wane over time? In this course, we will analyze the origins, development, and reactions surrounding deviance in society. We will examine how behaviors are constructed as “deviant” or “normal,” and how people exhibiting these behaviors experience the world. We will examine core theories of deviance and social control and analyze deviant acts and identities through different theoretical lenses. We will consider why deviance is often associated with “low life” in both society and the sociological literature, and we will consider how deviant behaviors exhibited by the wealthy and powerful are treated in society. We will also examine how the social media age shapes deviance. Through this course, we will hone our “sociological imagination” through critical reading, writing, and speaking.
Space, Place, and Queer Geographies
Bryn Mawr College
How do spaces and places shape who we are and how we relate to others? How do different groups create, contest, and transform the environments they inhabit? This course introduces students to the sociology of space and place, with a particular focus on queer geographies. We will begin with foundational theories of space and place, exploring how power, identity, and belonging are negotiated through spatial practices. Next, we will investigate how sexuality and gender identity intersect with spatial experiences-from intimate spaces to neighborhoods to cities to digital environments. We will analyze how race, class, gender, and sexuality intersect to create different experiences of spatial belonging, exclusion, and resistance. Throughout the course, we will consider both the constraints and possibilities that spaces offer for identity formation, community building, and social change.
Society, Culture, and the Individual (Intro to Sociology)
Bryn Mawr College
Sociology is the systematic study of society and social interaction. It involves what C. Wright Mills called the "sociological imagination," a way of seeing the relationship between individuals and the larger forces of society and history. In this course, we will practice using our sociological imaginations to think about the world around us. We will examine how social norms and structures are created and maintained, and we will analyze how these structures shape people's behavior and choices, often without their realizing it. After learning to think sociologically, we will examine the centrality of inequality in society, focusing specifically on the intersecting dimensions of race and ethnicity, gender, and class, and the role of social structures and institutions (such as the family and education) in society. Overall, this course draws our attention toward our own presuppositions-the things we take for granted in our everyday lives-and provides us with a systematic framework within which we can analyze those presuppositions and identify their effects.
Nocturnal Spaces, Nocturnal Selves: The Sociology of Nightlife
Bryn Mawr College
This seminar examines nightlife as a critical site for understanding contemporary social life. Far from mere entertainment, nightlife spaces serve as laboratories for social experimentation, venues for identity work, and stages for the performance of power, status, and belonging. Drawing from classic and contemporary research in sociology, urban planning, and cultural studies, we will examine how diverse nightlife settings-from local underground scenes to global party destinations-are organized, regulated, and contested. Throughout the course, we will pay close attention to how these after-dark social worlds reflect, reproduce, and challenge broader societal inequalities.