ENGAGEMENT
I consider myself a scholar-teacher-activist. I am actively involved in professional associations and have held various elected positions in the National Women's Studies Association, the Pacific Sociological Association, and Sociologists for Women in Society. At UCR, I am a member of the steering committee and the director of curriculum for UCR's LIFTED Program, which expands access to higher education in prisons. UCR LIFTED graduated our first cohort at the California Rehabilitation Center (CRC) state prison in Norco, CA, in June, 2026. Due to the closure of CRC, LIFTED is relocating to Ironwood State Prison in fall, 2026. I have also been involved in the UCR Guardian Scholars Program, which supports emancipated foster youth who are in college, since its inception in 2008.
In addition to teaching at UCR, I volunteer teaching English language learners (ELLs) through the San Gabriel Valley Literacy Council. My class meetings with students learning English are a highlight of each week.
Since 2012, I have been involved in advocating for animal shelter abolition and helping companion animals without homes find homes. I am a board member and an adoption coordinator for a Los Angeles-area organization that promotes adoption of animals from high-kills shelters, and I have fostered dozens of dogs, mostly pit bulls, without homes until they were adopted.
I support and am involved in a range of connected social movements, including animal abolition, anti-racism, anti-militarism, immigration rights, feminism, and queer justice. I question the inevitability of capitalism and believe a different, better world is possible.
Photo: A photograph taken by me at the Armory Art Show in New York, New York, September, 2025, of a screen print by artist David Shrigley (b. 1968). Shrigley depicts an emperor penguin walking, accompanied by the red block text, "To Hell With Zoos/Free the Penguins First." I love penguins, and have collected them since early childhood.