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Sociology

Welcome to the Department of Sociology

The Department of Sociology has a long track-record of training undergraduate students for post-college opportunities and graduate students for academic and research careers. Our faculty have national reputations and records of award-winning publications, research grants, and leadership of national and regional sociological associations.

We specialize in the study of social inequality. More specifically, our faculty focus on community and urban, health and medical, race and ethnicity, and gender and family. We encourage prospective graduate students interested in these issues to join us! Our urban location and proximity to six major hospitals make UC an ideal place to study urban and health issues, and Sociologists for Women in Society have consistently awarded us their seal of approval for gender scholarship.

The intellectual hub of the department is the Kunz Center for Social Research, an endowed center located within and designated to support the research mission of the department. It provides research funding for faculty and graduate students, and provides an intellectual commons for faculty and students across the university. Sociology founded The Cincinnati Project, which provides grants to faculty and graduate students to conduct research benefitting disadvantaged Cincinnati communtiies and the agencies that serve them. Sociology also co-founded the Ohio Policy Evaluation Network (OPEN).  OPEN is an interdisciplinary research network that assesses reproductive health equity, access and autonomy in the context of federal and state laws, regulations and policies.

Finally, Sociology is one of 14 departments affiliated with the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center, which provides dissertation fellowships, summer funding, and money for research expenses.

Click here to apply to our graduate programs!
We also have a new PhD brochure. You can check it out here!

Welcome New Fall 2022 Faculty!

Photo of Oneya Okuwobi

Oneya Fennell Okuwobi is an incoming Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology. Her work incorporates the sociology of religion, race, and organizations to interrogate how diversity initiatives in religious and secular organizations affect racial inequality. Her research finds that activities around diversity often become constitutive of experiences of marginalization rather than ameliorative for people of color. Her work has been supported by the Louisville Foundation and the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, and has appeared in American Sociological Review, Sociology of Religion, and Sociology of Race & Ethnicity, among other outlets. Oneya graduated with a Ph.D. in Sociology from The Ohio State University, an M.Div. in Practical Theology from Regent University, and a B.A. in Economics from the University of Virginia. 

Photo of Letisha Brown

Letisha Engracia Cardoso Brown is an incoming Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology.  She is a Black feminist sociologist with a B.A. in Africana Studies from the University of Northern Colorado where she was a Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Scholar. She also holds a M.A. and PhD. in sociology from the University of Texas at Austin where she developed an interest in the study of race, sport, and society. She is currently working on her first book under advanced contract with Rutgers University Press, Say Her Name: Centering Black Feminism and Black Women in Sports. Her public facing work can be found in the digital publication First and Pen. In addition to race, sport, and society, Dr. Brown also studies Black women and girls in education and food studies. She teaches courses on the subjects of social inequality, race and racism, and the sociology of sports. 

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Editorship of Social Problems Journal

The Department of Sociology is excited to begin our second term as editors for Social Problems, the official publication of The Society for the Study of Social Problems. The journal is co-edited by Drs. Annulla Linders, Derrick R. Brooms, and Earl Wright II (Rhodes College).

UC Sociology in the Media

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UC research group assesses area transgender community needs

June 6, 2022

In December 2020, UC College of Arts & Sciences’ research collaborative, The Cincinnati Project (TCP), reached out to a group of sociology students with an idea to create an assessment of the needs of the Cincinnati transgender community. The intent was that the report could be used by local governments and organizations to identify points of weakness and strength of health care, housing and transportation. Stef Murawsky, a Ph.D. student in sociology at UC, was immediately on board. Murawsky, whose research and dissertation are focused on trans healthcare, had interviewed roughly 30 people at the time in the Cincinnati area about their health care experiences before TCP even reached out to them. “It was a very obvious ‘yes’ to the project,” Murawsky says. “But then there was a desperate need for other people.” 

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