Welcome to the website of the Sociology Department at Stony Brook University. We have 16 full-time faculty, 53 graduate students and about 320 undergraduate majors.

The Sociology Department at Stony Brook was founded in the 1960s and rapidly became an internationally visible center of innovative education and ground-breaking research.  Hanan Selvin was responsible for starting the graduate program and for recruiting the nucleus of an eminent department, including such luminaries as Eugene Weinstein, John Gagnon, Rose Coser and Lewis Coser.  Not only did these department members in turn recruit other outstanding sociologists, but all of them, in particular the Cosers, established a tradition of cooperation through the creation of informal events, like reading groups, that fostered an atmosphere of departmental cordiality.

In the 1990s, the department chose to focus on global phenomena, as well as their connection to national dynamics.  We thus take a leading position in the discipline of sociology and in the university's efforts to become more globally relevant.  We broadly emphasize inequalities, with specific areas of faculty expertise in the environment, gender, health, international development, and racism, among others.  We are a methodologically diverse department that spans both quantitative and qualitative methods.  In sum, we aim to teach students how to use the best methods available to inform the most pressing research questions of our time.
 

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Fall 2019 Newsletter

  January 2020

• • Michael Schwartz, Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus, has received the American Sociological Association's 2020 Distinguished Contributions to Teaching Award.

  December 2019

• • Ivan Chase, Professor Emeritus, and his co-authors Raphael Duoady and Diana K. Padilla were featured in a 12/13/19 New York Times article " Even Hermit Crabs Have Wealth Inequality" which discusses their study, " A comparison of wealth inequality in humans and non-humans", being published in the journal Physica A in January 2020

October 2019

• • Ivan Chase, Professor Emeritus, has received the best paper award in the 2019 Visualization in Data Science section of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers conference for his paper entitled, "PeckVis: A Visual Analytics Tool to Analyze Dominance Hierarchies in Small Groups."  The authors are Darius Coelho, Ivan Chase, and Klaus Mueller.
  • Said Arjomand, (Distinguished Service Professor, Stony Brook University) Sociology Department Book Presentation, October 16th, 5:00 PM, SBS N405, "Revolution: Structure and Meaning in World History".

June  2019

• • Carrie Shandra has been elected Chair of the Disability and Society Section of the American Sociological Association for 2019-2020.

April  2019

• • Catherine Marrone has received the 2019 College of Arts & Sciences Godfrey Excellence in Teaching Award.
  • Jason Jones with colleagues from Ohio State, Michigan, and Cornell Universities is part of a team that was selected to receive data and funding from the Social Science Research Council to study information sharing on Facebook.  For more information see: "Understanding Problematic Sharing Behavior on Facebook"

March 2019

• • Kathleen Fallon has received the 2019 Dean's Award for Excellence in Service by a Graduate Program Director from the Stony Brook Graduate School.
  • Sarah Cowan (New York University), Sociology Department Colloquium Speaker, March 6th, 1:00 - 2:30 PM, SBS N403: "Intergroup Contact and Competing Allegiances in a Complex World."
  • Vered Vinitzky-Seroussi (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Sociology Department Colloquium Speaker, March 27th, 1:00 PM - 2:30 PM, SBS N403:  "We Hereby Neglect: The Israeli Hall of Independence and the Social Construction of Commemoration."

February 2019

• • Jochem Kotthaus (University of Dortmund), Sociology Department Colloquium Speaker, February 6th, 1:00 PM - 2:30 PM, SBS N403:  "The Transformation of Mundane Knowledge.  Reflections on the Globalization of Sport Fans."
  • Nitsan Chorev (Brown University), Sociology Department Colloquium Speaker, February 11th, 1:00 PM - 2:30 PM, SBS N403: "Making Medicines in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda:  Toward a Sociology of Developmental Foreign Aid."
  • Nick Rogers, Ph.D. students will present a Student Seminar at the Institute for Advanced Computational Science, "Using Twitter Bios to Measure Changes in Social Identity:  Are Americans Defining Themselves More Politically Over Time?", Wednesday, February 20, 12:00 - 1:00 PM.

October 2018

• • Yasemin Besen-Cassino (Montclair State University), Sociology Department Colloquium Speaker, October 1st, 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM, SBS N403:  "The Cost of Being a Girl:  Working Teens and the Origins of the Gender Wage Gap"
  • Sociology Brown Bag Series, Monday, October 12th, 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM - Jason Jones, "Stereotypical Gender Associations in Language Have Decreased Over Time."
  • Sociology Brown Bag Series, Thursday, October 15th, 2:30 - 4:00 PM - Arnout van de Rijt (Utrecht University), "Are the Extremely Rich Exceptionally Smart."

September 2018

• • Sociology Brown Bag Series, Monday, September 10th, 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM - Discussion of two papers and the connections between them:  Kevin McElrath, "College Preparation Intensity and Socioeconomic Background: A Mechanism for Equal Access?" and Kristen Shorette, "Degrees of Change: Publicly  Educated Legislators' Support for Higher Education Spending in the US

April  2018

• • Rachel Sherman (The New School), April 16th, 1:00 - 2:30 PM, SBS N403"A Very Expensive Ordinary Life:  Consumption and Moral Legitimacy among New York Elites."

March 2018

• • Stony Brook Alumni Michelle Olakkengil has been selected as Stony Brook's first ever recipient of the prestigious Donald M. Payne International Development Fellowship.  Michelle, who graduated with honors in 2017, received her BS in Psychology and Sociology with a minor in Biology.
  • Michael Kimmel has been named one of the 2018 " Champions of Change" by the Metropolitan NY Chapter of UN Women, the UN organization dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women.
  • Crystal Fleming featured on the Stony Brook University Main Page

February 2018

• • Julian Go (Boston University), Sociology Departmental Colloqium Speaker, February 28, 1-2:30 PM, SBS N403

November 2017

• Brian Powell (Indiana University Bloomington and Russell Sage Foundation), Sociology Departmental Colloqium Speaker, November 29th, 1-2:15 PM, SBS N403
• Crystal Fleming has been selected as one of the inaugural group of faculty to participate in the SBU Leadership Academy Fellows program.
• Jennifer Heerwig has been selected to be a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation for the 2018-2019 Academic Year.
• Carrie Shandra has been selected to be a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation for the 2018-2019 Academic Year.
• Jason Jones and John Shandra have received Stony Brook FAHSS (Faculty in the Arts, Humanities, and lettered Social Sciences) Research and Interdisciplinary Initiatives Awards

 

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Department of Sociology

State University of New York at Stony Brook

Stony Brook, New York 11794-4356
Telephone: (631) 632-7700
Fax: (631) 632-8203

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