Sociology Department Undergraduate Group
Overview | A.B. Concentration | Sc.B. Concentration | Advising & Mentoring | Opportunities | Transfer Credits | Department Undergraduate Group (DUG)
Josh Biber
The Sociology DUG is a group dedicated to building a supportive community while raising awareness of the concentration in Sociology at Brown University. Each year the Sociology DUG organizes a broad range of events: from intellectually stimulating alumni panels and guest speakers, to events like pumpkin carving and movie nights that build community through taking part and having fun. Through these events the Sociology DUG hopes to create a supportive network that will both add to the experience of undergraduate students at Brown and endure beyond graduation day: keeping students connected with the Sociology Department at Brown and with each other.
This year's DUG leaders are:
Eva Lindpaintner (
Eva_Lindpaintner@brown.edu )
Sarah Lu (
Sarah_Lu@brown.edu )
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Congratulations Senior Sociology Class of 2012!
Look out world! Here comes the Sociology Department's Graduating Class of 2012! We are very proud of you all and wish you well as you embark on this next step in your careers, your evolution as scholars and your unique life journeys. Go well!
Congratulations Sociology Honors Class 2012!
Anthony, Maria, Jessica L., Sam and Jessica B. we are proud of you! Thank you to all who came to see these impressive presentations last night and congratulations again to the Sociology Honors Class of 2012. For those of you who could not make it Samuel Karshenboym was awarded the Samuel L.C. Lamport Prize for Best Honors Thesis and excellence in conducting sociological writing and research; Jessica Lake was awarded the Sociological Methods Prize for excellence in mastering and applying sociological research methods; and Maria Kinkina was awarded the Service to the Concentration Prize for outstanding service and dedication to the undergraduate concentration in sociology. If you were not there you really missed out!
May 8, 2012: Senior Honors Thesis Presentations!
Please join us for the Sociology Department’s Senior Honors Thesis presentations on Tuesday, May 8 at 4:00 p.m. in Zimmer Lounge. Five of our senior Sociology concentrators have been working very hard on this major piece of work and we are very proud of them. Come and support them as they present their work and answer your questions. Light refreshments will be provided.
Our Senior Honors Thesis Writers 2012:
“’See I abducted you, so I tell ya what to do’: An Examination of the Way Pop Song Lyrics Do Gender”
Jessica Biesel
“Does Television Change Attitudes?: A Breaking Bad and Weeds Study”
Sam Karshenboym
“Network Activation in Nonprofit Boards of Directors: A Case Study of an Animal Shelter”
Maria Kinkina
“Examining Self-Confidence as a Function of Gender and Socioeconomic Status”
Jessica Lake
“Poder, Fé, e Consciência (Power, Faith, and Awareness): An Analysis of Contemporary NGO Activism and the Brazilian National AIDS Control Program in Rio de Janeiro”
Anthony Urena
May 4, 2012: Sophomore Welcome & Ice Cream Social Event!
Thank you to everyone who attended the Sophomore Welcome & Ice Cream Social Event. It was great to meet all of our newly declared concentrators and have some fun getting to know them. As you can see we are a tight knit bunch here in Sociology. We look forward to working with you and supporting you over the years ahead.
April 17, 2012: DUG Sociology Department Research Fair!
The Sociology D.U.G. is holding a Sociology Department Research Fair on Tuesday, April 17 from 4:45 - 6:30 p.m. in Petteruti Lounge, Faunce House. Sociology Department faculty will be on hand to discuss their current research with you and answer questions you might have about opportunities to get involved in research being done in the fields of study and major issues that are important to you. Faculty will briefly introduce their work (so arrive on time if you'd like to get an overview and sense of the scope of the research being done) and will then man stations to allow you to visit them and ask questions one-on-one. This is a wonderful opportunity to meet our faculty and find out about their work directly from them. There will be coffee/tea, light snacks and, as always at a Sociology DUG event, there will be chances to win prizes. We are very grateful for the support of our faculty and their willingness to share their time in this way and we hope that you will support this event and make the most of this wonderful opportunity. We send a special invite out to our newly declared Sophomores who we are very excited to meet and welcome into the Sociology Department!
April 14, 2012: Jessica Biesel 12' Recipient of 2012 Joslin Award!
Senior Sociology concentrator Jessica Biesel was recently named a 2012 Joslin Award recipient.
The Joslin Awards recognize a small group of seniors who have contributed in a very significant way to the quality of student life at Brown. Award winners generally demonstrate a wide breadth of involvement during their campus years as well as substantial depth in one or more areas. Through their leadership and involvement they have not only enhanced their own liberal education, they have also provided services, programs and other opportunities for involvement to their peers, thus enhancing the learning environment for all students. This is wonderful award and we congratulate Jessica on this very significant achievement. You can find out more about the Joslin Awards here.
April 13, 2012: Jonah David '13' Best Documentary Short "Cómodo" Screening
This Friday April 13 at 2:00 p.m. the Cable Car Cinema (for the SENE film music & arts festival) will be screening our own Jonah David's "Cómodo" followed by a Q&A. See the story from earlier in the year below. If you can't make this, it's playing again the same day at 4:30 p.m. at the Granoff Center for the IVY film festival.
April 2, 2012: Julia Ellis-Kahana is 2012-2013 Royce Fellowship winner!
UPDATE April 4, 2012: Julia has also been selected as the 2012 Alice Rowan Swanson Fellow. This fellowship fund is through the SIT World Learning Program and Julia's award money will be spent on her project in Amsterdam this summer with Women on Waves. (See below).
Julia Ellis-Kahana ‘13 has been selected for the 2012-2013 class of Royce Fellows and will be working on her project Reproductive Health Education in Morocco with Women on Waves. Julia will work for Women on Waves, an international non-governmental organization committed to promoting access to women's reproductive healthcare in the developing world. While Women on Waves has worked extensively in European and Latin American countries, it is now expanding its focus to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Under the mentorship of Rebecca Gomperts, MD, MPP, founder and director of the group, Julia will expand the existing training materials and develop a new educational training program for reproductive health in Morocco, with particular attention paid to the cultural and political climate of this country.
Sponsor: Rebecca Allen
March 19, 2012: Hao Tran '14 Receives 2012 Brown International Scholars Program Fellowship!
Sixteen undergraduates, including Sociology concentrator Hao Tran '14, who received 2012 Brown International Scholars Program (BISP) fellowships were honored in an awards ceremony March 19. 2012, at the Hope Club. The students, who were each awarded up to $5,000, will spend the summer pursuing independent projects linking their academic interest with international experiences. Hao's project is called Olympism in Action: Understanding its Legacy for an Underprivileged Population of London and you can read the full story here! Congratulations Hao!
February 16, 2012: Welcome Back Luncheon
Thank you to everyone who came by today and made our Sociology DUG 'NAME BINGO' a great success and a lot of fun. Congratulations to all of those who won prizes! Enjoy them well. Don't forget to say a personal thank you to your DUG Leaders when you see them. They are the ones who come up with those prizes and they continue to set a very high standard for those who will follow them next year. Could it be you? If you are interested please let us know. Look out for our Brown Degree Days alumni panel, coming in March. See some of the images from today's event below.
Jonah David '13' Best Documentary Short' at the Second Annual Williamsburg Independent Film Festival.
Sociology concentrator Jonah David's
documentary, A Moment in San Juan Del Sur, Nicaragua, screened in the Second Annual Williamsburg Independent Film Festival in November 2011 and... won 'Best Documentay Short'! Congratulations to Jonah. We are very proud of you and your work. Jonah is the Winter 2011 AT&T New Media Fellow and you can check out some of his work on the Watson Institute for International Studies website here.
Emma LeBlanc '11 Named 2012 Rhodes Scholar
On Friday, November 18, 2011 Sociology concentrator Emma LeBlanc, AB, 2011, was one of four Brown grads awarded a Rhodes Scholarship! See the story on Brown's homepage. Congratulations Emma! We are all very proud of you.
Emma graduated from Brown in June with a degree in sociology. She is pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in fiction at Southern New Hampshire University, where she is writing a novel. She now lives near Damascus, Syria, researching the area’s marginalized Bedouin community. LeBlanc will pursue a doctorate in social and cultural anthropology at Oxford University. (Latest story).
November 21, 2011: Movie Night "Inside Job"
Come and join us on Monday, November 21 at 6:00 p.m. in Maxcy Hall, room 108 for a screening of Inside Job (http://www.sonyclassics.com/insidejob/), the 2010 Academy Award winner for Best Documentary Feature. (Location TBA) Refreshments will be served and an informal discussion will follow. See out the semester with the Sociology Department DUG! Two copies of the DVD will be given away as prizes so be in to win! Check out the Study Guide and impress the heck out of everyone during the discussion! In addition, Professor Mark Suchman - who will be leading the discussion - recommends Lounsbury, Michael, and Paul M. Hirsch. 2010. Markets on Trial: The Economic Sociology of the U.S. Financial Crisis: Emerald Group Publishing; and
this review of recent journalistic and academic books.
Inside Job - Synopsis:
From Academy Award® nominated filmmaker, Charles Ferguson (“No End In Sight”), comes INSIDE JOB, the first film to expose the shocking truth behind the economic crisis of 2008. The global financial meltdown, at a cost of over $20 trillion, resulted in millions of people losing their homes and jobs. Through extensive research and interviews with major financial insiders, politicians and journalists, INSIDE JOB traces the rise of a rogue industry and unveils the corrosive relationships which have corrupted politics, regulation and academia.
Narrated by Academy Award® winner Matt Damon, INSIDE JOB was made on location in the United States, Iceland, England, France, Singapore, and China.
October 28, 2011: Pumpkin Carving
October 27, 2011: Sophomore Concentration Fair
Thanks to everyone who stopped by the Sociology Department table at the Sophomore Concentration Fair in Sayles Hall last night! It was a great success and we have added a lot of new names to our DUG list. If you would like to be on the Sociology Department DUG list and hear about all of our upcoming events just send Karl Dominey, Student Affairs Coordinator, an email at Karl_Dominey@brown.edu. If you would like to learn more about a concentration in Sociology generally please email Professor Nancy Luke, Undergraduate Concentration Adviser (pictured above) at Nancy_Luke@brown.edu or visit her in her office hours, Wednesdays from 4:00 - 5:00 p.m. and Fridays from 11:00 - 12:30 p.m.
D.U.G. Leader Profiles
Maria Kinkina - Class of 2012
I love Sociology. I am a senior at Brown and I am excited to be writing an Honors Thesis on the social capital of managers of non-profits. My areas of focus in Sociology are Organizational Studies and Economic Sociology. I also study International Relations with a focus on political and economic development. It has been a great experience figuring out development as a Sociologist and making up my mind about capitalism.
I grew up in Sofia, Bulgaria, and I also spent a semester abroad learning to tango, drinking wine, and talking about Argentinean Sociology in Buenos Aires. At Brown, I live in the co-op Finlandia, where I share a home with 12 people and have dinner with 30. Of course, I don’t miss the opportunity to investigate the co-op from a sociological point of view, which has proven very interesting!
Sarah Lu - Class of 2012.5
I am a second-semester junior concentrating in sociology. Originally from France, I took last semester off alternating between time spent in my home country and traveling to different parts of Europe, and ended my semester with a summer teaching public speaking to middle school students in Hong Kong. I came to Brown with my heart set on concentrating in Visual Arts, but after taking SOC0020 Perspectives on Social Interactions with Prof. Elliott in the Fall of my sophomore year, I realized concentrating in sociology was exactly what I was looking for. It enabled me to explore a wide range of topics including globalization, the impact of socioeconomic status on higher education and classical sociological theory.
Caroline Sholem - Class of 2012
I am a senior Sociology concentrator, and recently picked up an Economics concentration too. I just returned from a semester in Prague, Czech Republic, where I studied art history, Czech language, economics and sociology. I am originally from Champaign, Illinois, but have spent the past two summers interning in New York in the non-profit, private equity, and retail sectors. At Brown, I am a Meiklejohn academic peer advisor, coordinator for Adopt A Grandparent, and Zumba instructor. I am happy to be a part of the Sociology DUG and encourage anyone possibly interested in sociology to attend DUG events!
October 12, 2011: Sociology Department "Speed Dating"
Sociology 'Speed Dating' was a huge success and a lot of fun! Thank you to everyone who attended and made it such a wonderful evening. Seated in pairs undergraduates, graduate students, faculty and staff went through 15 rounds of meeting each other. If anything, it was hard to stop them talking once they began! We will definitely do this again. Click on the image below to see a slide show.
Past Events: 2010 - 2011 Academic year
February 23rd, 2011
Brown Degree Days - Executive Director of Teach for America, Greater Boston, Josh Biber '04
Josh Biber is the founding executive director of the Greater Boston region, where he also served as director of new site development, laying the groundwork to establish the region. Biber first joined Teach For America staff in 2006 as a recruitment director, garnering 20 percent growth at his portfolio of universities, including Harvard University, Brown University, the University of Rhode Island, and Providence College, and 50 percent portfolio growth in 2007. A 2004 Phoenix corps member, he was the regional recipient and national semi-finalist for the Sue Lehmann Excellence in Teaching Award after he led his fifth graders to two years of reading growth and more than 80 percent mastery of math content in each year of teaching. He graduated with honors from Brown University in 2004 and then earned a M.Ed. from Arizona State University.
Josh met with students and talked about his time at Brown, his choice to become a sociology concentrator, his experiences in the Department and his fascinating journey beyond Brown. Josh talked about Brown being one of the few places that encourages and nurtures the desire to 'change the world' and how that is still the impulse that drives him. It also drove a stimulating conversation with current sociology concentrators over dinner! Thank you to Josh and to those who attended for making this a great event.
February 10, 2011
Thank you to everyone who attended our 'Welcome Back' event and took part in our discussion on course names. Prizes were won, fun was had, pizza was devoured and we got some valuable insight into what our students think can make a good or bad course name. We hope to see you at our next event later this month (see above).