New Faculty in the Division of Social Sciences
We have 27 new faculty members joining us in the 2019-20 academic year! Meet them virtually in this video, then scroll down to learn a bit about them and their specialties. Follow the links to learn more.
ANTHROPOLOGY
Patrick Keolu Fox
Assistant Professor - Genome Sciences doctorate, 2016, from the University of Washington, Seattle.
Fox addresses the relationship of gene editing and genomics to society, the relationship of indigenous communities to science, and questions of human health. Read more: faculty profile
Rihan Yeh
Assistant Professor - Sociocultural Anthropology doctorate, 2009, from the University of Chicago.
Yeh examines how the border with the United States shapes both public life and personal senses of self in Tijuana, Mexico. Read more: faculty profile
COGNITIVE SCIENCE
Haijun Xia
Assistant Professor (joint with Design Lab) - Computer Science doctorate, expected 2019, University of Toronto.
Xia explores HCI, or human-computer interaction, focused on augmenting our productivity and creativity. Read more: faculty profile
COMMUNICATION
Andrew deWaard
Assistant Professor - Cinema and Media Studies doctorate, 2017, UCLA
DeWaard analyzes media and popular culture with a focus on cultural industries, the political economy of media, media authorship and the digital humanities. Read more: faculty profile
Alexander L. Fattal
Assistant Professor - Anthropology doctorate, 2014, Harvard University.
Fattal explores the representational politics surrounding Colombia’s war and the fitful efforts to forge a less violent future in that country. Read more: faculty profile
Erin T. Hill
Assistant Professor - Film and Television doctorate, 2013, UCLA.
Hill studies historical and contemporary media production in the United States, with particular focus on intersecting issues of gender, race and class in creative labor sectors. Read more: faculty profile
Daniel Martinico
Assistant Teaching Professor - Visual Arts MFA, 2002, UC San Diego.
An artist and filmmaker, Martinico is concerned with the playful reconsideration of the dominant strategies of cinematic structure in his work. Read more: faculty profile
Thomas R. Schmidt
Assistant Professor - Media Studies doctorate, 2017, University of Oregon.
Schmidt explores the changing form of news and journalism, including the history of narrative journalism and the sociotechnical analysis of participatory journalism in a digital world. Read more: faculty profile
ECONOMICS
Titan Alon
Assistant Professor - Economics doctorate, 2018, Northwestern University.
A quantitative macroeconomist, Alon works primarily on issues connected to labor markets and firm dynamics, with implications for educational policy and more. Read more: faculty profile
Xinwei Ma
Assistant Professor - Economics doctorate, 2019, University of Michigan.
Ma is an eonometrician developing statistical methods that are applicable to wide sets of empirical problems faced by economists. Read more: faculty profile
Thomas Vogl
Associate Professor - Economics doctorate, 2011, Harvard University.
A development economist and economic demographer, Vogl is interested in the evolution of the family over the course of economic development. Read more: faculty profile
Ying Zhu
Assistant Professor - Economics doctorate, 2015, UC Berkeley.
Zhu specializes in big data methods, and the statistical theory underlying these, to derive new ways of testing hypotheses and solving problems in social science and business, education and healthcare. Read more: faculty profile
EDUCATION STUDIES
Theresa J. Ambo
Assistant Professor - Education doctorate, 2017, UCLA.
Ambo supports equity for American Indian students and communities in postsecondary institutions, including student retention, experience, outcomes, and campus-community partnerships. Read more: faculty profile
James Antony
Professor and Dean of the UC San Diego Graduate Division - Higher Education and Organizational Change doctorate, 1996, UCLA.
Antony focuses on issues central to the preparation of forward-thinking leaders in college or university settings, with an emphasis on educational innovation. Read more: faculty profile
Amy V. Bintliff
Assistant Teaching Professor - Educational Psychology doctorate, 2019, University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Bintliff researches child and adolescent development, social justice education and service learning. Read more: faculty profile
Amy Eguchi
Assistant Teaching Professor - Education doctorate, 2004, University of Cambridge.
Eguchi designs and enhances students’ STEM+C learning with transdisciplinary approaches using various technologies. Read more: faculty profile
ETHNIC STUDIES
Andrew Jolivette
Professor - Sociology doctorate, 2003, UC Santa Cruz.
Jolivette's research areas include: Native American and Indigenous studies; critical mixed race studies; two-spirit, gender and sexuality studies; medical sociology, public health and HIV; and research justice. Read more: faculty profile
Roy Pérez
Assistant Professor - English doctorate, 2012, New York University.
Pérez focuses on gender, sexuality and race in Latinx literary and visual culture, with special attention to cross-cultural collaborations in Latinx literature, performance, and activism. Read more: faculty profile
Christen Sasaki
Assistant Professor - History doctorate, 2011, UCLA.
Sasaki specializes in Asian American Studies and transnational U.S. history, with a particular focus on Hawaii and the politics of race and empire in the 19th century. Read more: faculty profile
LINGUISTICS
Emily Clem
Assistant Professor - Linguistics doctorate, 2019, UC Berkeley.
Clem investigates understudied and endangered languages in collaboration with diaspora communities from Cameroon and Guatemala in the U.S. and through fieldwork in the Peruvian Amazon. Read more: faculty profile
Michelle Yuan
Assistant Professor - Linguistics doctorate, 2018, MIT.
Yuan specializes in the grammatical structure of the Inuit (Eskimo-Aleut) languages, with particular focus on the varieties spoken in Eastern Canada. Read more: faculty profile
POLITICAL SCIENCE
Kirk Bansak
Assistant Professor - Political Science doctorate, 2019, Stanford University.
Bansak specializes in political methodology with an applied focus on immigration policy, including a data-driven algorithm for the optimal assignment of refugees to resettlement locations. Read more: faculty profile
Jasper Cooper
Assistant Professor - Political Science doctorate, 2018, Columbia University.
Cooper is focused on comparative politics of developing countries, namely in the relationship between state capacity, accountability, corruption, and access to state services by vulnerable groups. Read more: faculty profile
Federica Izzo
Assistant Professor - Political Science doctorate, 2019, London School of Economics.
Izzo analyzes how electoral incentives shape politicians' actions, with a focus on intra-party politics, ideology and electoral competition, and accountability in times of crisis. Read more: faculty profile
PSYCHOLOGY
Judith Fan
Assistant Professor - Cognitive Psychology doctorate, 2016, Princeton University.
Fan is “reverse-engineering” the human cognitive toolkit, especially how people use physical representations of thought to learn, communicate and create. Read more: faculty profile
Michael E. McCullough
Professor - Psychology doctorate, 1995, Virginia Commonwealth University.
An experimental psychologist, McCullough is concerned with the evolutionary and psychological foundations of prosocial behavior, including forgiveness, gratitude, self-control and, critically, empathy. Read more: faculty profile
Celeste Pilegard
Assistant Teaching Professor - Psychological and Brain Sciences doctorate, 2016, UC Santa Barbara.
Pilegard mixes cognitive psychology and educational psychology to learn how we learn and how, as a consequence, we should teach. Read more: faculty profile