“research is formalized curiosity. it is poking and prying with a purpose. it is a seeking that [they] who wish may know the cosmic secrets of the world and they that dwell within”

-Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), p. 143

 
 
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Publications

My academic work has been published in Environmental Sociology, Environmental Politics, Social Currents, Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, Journal of Racial and Ethnic Health Disparities, Aging & Mental Health and The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Medical Sociology.

My first solo-authored publication, “Multiply-Deserted Areas: Environmental Racism and Food, Pharmacy, and Greenspace Deserts in the Urban South” is available here.

My second solo-authored paper, “(Un) Just Deserts: Examining Resource Deserts and the Continued Significance of Racism on Health in the Urban South” is available here.

My latest publication, “Are There Regional Differences in Mental Health Among Black Americans?: An Exploration of Explanatory Mechanisms” is available here.

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Dissertation

My mixed methods dissertation explores how race and class influence the spatial patterning of resources throughout neighborhoods and the health consequences of these patterns. Focusing on urban cities in the American South, I examine material resources in the built environment, namely food destinations, pharmacies, and active greenspace. I conceptualize neighborhoods with compounded, co-occurring resource scarcity as multiply-deserted areas (MDAs). This dissertation has won the 2022 ASA Dissertation Award.

  • The first study examines the race and class patterns of coexisting ‘deserts’ in urban neighborhoods across 17 states/counties in the southeastern US (i.e., AL, AR, DE, FL, GA, KY, LA, MD, MS, NC, OK, SC, TN, TX, VA, WV, and Washington, DC)

  • The second study assesses whether and how living in an MDA shapes mental and physical health outcomes in urban neighborhoods across 15 states/counties in the southeastern US (i,e., AL, AR, DE, FL, GA, KY, LA, MS, NC, OK, SC, TN, TX, VA, and Washington, DC)

  • The third study uses in-depth interviews to explore MDA residents’ perceived access to resources in their neighborhood and how this shapes their attachment to place.

 

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Funding & Presentations

My research has been supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Institute for Minority Health and Health Disparities (NIMHD), National Science Foundation (NSF), NASEM/Ford Foundation, several funding suborganizations within Vanderbilt University, Boston College, and the Northeast Climate Justice Collaborative.

My academic work has been presented at the annual meetings of several professional organizations, including American Sociological Association, Association of Black Sociologists, Southern Sociological Society, Sociologists for Women in Society, Society for the Study of Social Problems, and the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists.