Originally from Athens, GA, I attended Kenyon College where I was an English major and an NCAA Div. III Academic All-American swimmer. After college, I taught English as a Second Language in Cape Verde, West Africa, for the Peace Corps. I then went to graduate school to study sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. There I worked at the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS) with Laura Dresser and Joel Rogers, and I studied under Erik Olin Wright and Jamie Peck. 

I came to UB Sociology in 2008. This department specializes in six broad areas of sociology:  family and the life course; health and illness; urban, community, and the environment; social inequalities; crime, law, and social policy; and work, labor, and political economy. My research spans the latter three through analysis of the relationship between work, social inequalities, law, and culture.