Meet Our Faculty & Staff
Faculty
Angela D. Coker
Associate Professor
Office: AL 317 | Phone: (619) 594-1025
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Counselor Education with an emphasis on the intersections of mental health,
gender, and racial identity
Anne Donadey
Interim Chair
Professor
Office: SH 224B | Phone: (619) 594-0815
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Representations of race and gender in literature and film; Francophone
North African women writers; intersectional and postcolonial feminist theories
Marie Draz
Director, LGBTQ+ Studies
Associate Professor
Office: AL-376
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Interests: Feminist Philosophy, Queer Theory, Transgender Studies, Decolonial
Theory, Theories of Race and Gender, Continental Philosophy
Anh Hua
Associate Professor
Office: AL 313
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Cultural studies; postcolonial feminisms; migration and diaspora studies,
literary studies (fiction, poetry, and memoir; film studies; humanities and the arts
Amira Jarmakani
Professor (on Leave)
Office: AL 311
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Critical SWANA studies; Arab American studies, decolonial feminisms, comparative
orientalisms in the Americas, data abolition and feminist surveillance studies, cultural
studies
Priya Kandaswamy
Associate Professor
Office: AL 344
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Women of Color feminisms, Queer of Color critique, US welfare politics,
Prison Abolition, Reproductive Justice, Economic Justice
Christine Knott
Assistant Professor
Office: AL 334
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Feminist environmental/climate justice, labor Sociology, intersectionality,
gender analysis, geography, mobility
Irene Lara
Internship Advisor
Associate Professor
Office: AL 353 | Phone: (619) 594-7151
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Spirituality and healing; sexuality and the body; women of color feminisms;
Chicana/Latina Studies; feminist holistic pedagogies
Kimala Price
Professor (on Sabbatical)
Office: AL 346A | Phone: (619) 594-8442
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Women, law & policy; gender, race and class; reproductive & sexual justice;
feminist activism
Jess Whatcott
Graduate Advisor
Assistant Professor
Office: AL 315 | Phone: (619) 594-2861
Email: [email protected]
Interests: Critical disability studies; critical prison studies; queer studies/queer of color critique; political economy; transformative justice; speculative fiction
Claire Villa
Administrative Coordinator
Email: [email protected]
Office: AL 346 | Phone: (619) 594-2952
Paola Martinez
Undergraduate Advisor
Email: [email protected]
Advising Information
Zamira Abman
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D., History, University of California, Santa Barbara
Interests: state-centered emancipation of Muslim women in the former Soviet Union/Russia
and Middle East
Shogofa Abassi
Email: [email protected]
M.A., Political Science, San Diego State University
Interests: Women: Images and Ideas; Self, Identity, and Society; Sex, Power, and Politics;
Women and Work; Global Cultures, Women’s Lives
Kristi Abrecht
Email: [email protected]
M.A., Women’s Studies, San Diego State University
Interests: Women: Images and Ideas; History of Women and Sexuality in Modern Europe
Amanda Beardsley
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D., Art History, Binghamton University
Interests: Feminist science and technology studies; gender and religion; art history;
technologies of sound and vision
Sonia Brighenti
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D., Romance Languages and Literatures, Harvard University
Interests: Italian transgressive literature, European culture, literature, and pop-culture,
black Italy and the “second generation G2” Italians, feminist and gender studies
Christine Payne
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D., Sociology-Science Studies, University of California San Diego
Interests: Gender, Science, and Technology
Mary Marchan
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D. Candidate, American Studies, University of Minnesota
Interests: LGBTQ+ stdies
Jessica Nare
Email: [email protected]
M.A., Women’s Studies, San Diego State University and Associate Chief Diversity Officer
for Student Engagement
Interests: Women’s Sexuality and the Body; Global Cultures and Women’s Lives
Geneva Robinson Darcuiel
Email: [email protected]
Psy.D. Alliant University
Interests: Psychology of Women
Margaret Slaska
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D Vrije University, Brussels
Interests: Women and Sexuality, Social constructionist and feminist theories of trauma,
intersectionality, and empowerment
Mary Stout
Email: [email protected]
M.A, History, San Diego State University
Interests: Women and History
Cat Thompson
Email: [email protected]
Ph.D., Clinical Psychology (Emphasis in Cultural Psychology), California School of
Professional Psychology
Interests: Psychology of Women
Yazan Zahzah
Email: [email protected]
M.A., Women’s Studies, San Diego State University
Oliva Espin
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Huma Ahmed-Ghosh
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Patricia Huckle
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Kathleen Jones
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Bonnie Kime Scott
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Doreen Mattingly
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Esther Rothblum
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Barbara Watson
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Bonnie Zimmerman
Professor Emerita
Email: [email protected]
Stuart Aiken
Geography: Critical geography; qualitative methods; children, families, communities;
film
Antwanisha Alameen-Shavers
Africana Studies: Gender politics in the Black community, the role of African women
in Ancient African Societies and the role of African American women in Black political
movements.
Sandra Alcosser
English and Comparative Literature: The Art of the Book, International Literary Publication,
Creative writing (poetry,fiction,non-fiction), Feminist and Environmental Poetics.
Michael Borgstrom
English and Comparative Literature: Early American literature, 19th century American
literature with emphasis on sexuality, gender, and race.
Suzanne Bordelon
Rhetoric and Writing Studies: Literary studies, Rhetoric and Composition.
Joanna Brooks
Faculty Advancement & Student Success: American studies--gender, race, religion and
colonialism; critical race theory; Black and Indigenous studies.
Yea-Wen Chen
School of Communication: Intercultural communication, immigrant women faculty in U.S.
academia, communicating cultural identities from the margins, identity-based organizing,
critical pedagogy, Taiwan studies.
Olivia Chilcote
American Indian Studies: Interdisciplinary Native American Studies, Indigenous Feminisms,
federal Indian law and policy, Native American identity, and Native California.
Clarissa Clò
European Studies: Italian and Italian American culture, literature, film, music, popular
culture, postcolonial, migration, diaspora and transnational studies, feminist and
queer studies.
Clare Colquitt
English and Comparative Literature:American Literature 1860-1920; Edith Wharton.
Raechel Dumas
History: Histories of Japanese literature and visual culture; gender and sexuality
in horror, crime fiction, and science fiction; trauma and affect in film and television.
Jill Esbenshade
Sociology: Gender and immigration, labor, global economy, race and ethnicity.
Shawn Flanigan
Public Affairs: Nonprofit organizations/NGOs in health and human service provision;
public admin and social policy; service seeking behavior by vulnerable populations;
gender positionality in international fieldwork; human services and political violence.
Juan Godoy
Spanish and Portuguese: Iberian and Latin American literature.
Charles Goehring
Communications: Rhetorical theory and criticism, visual rhetoric, feminist criticism,
social movements, transgender rights.
Victoria González-Rivera
Chicana and Chicano Studies: Gender and sexuality, feminism, HIV/AIDS, right-wing
politics, race, masculinity, Nicaraguan history, and Chicana/Latin American women's
history.
Y Howard
English and Comparative Literature: 20th and 21st century literary and cultural studies
of gender and sexuality, queer studies, feminist theories of race, contemporary visual,
textual and auditory culture.
María Ibarra
Chicana and Chicano Studies: Mexican immigration, gender, domestic employment, emotional
labor.
Norma Iglesias-Prieto
Chicana and Chicano Studies: U.S.-Mexican border, border cultural production, visual
arts, cinema and gender.
Pascale Joassart-Marcelli
Geography: food (incl. food insecurity, food apartheid, food sovereignty, and urban
food cultures), gentrification, urban labor markets, informal and low-wage work, immigration,
gender, race, and ethnicity.
Sureshi Jayawardene
Africana Studies: African diaspora theory, global iterations of Black power politics,
Africana womanism, and African diasporic spirituality.
David Kahan
Exercise & Nutritional Sciences: Gender issues related to coaching sport; supervision
of student teachers, emphasizing behavior and perspectives of cooperating teachers.
Ranin Kazemi
History: history of women, gender, and sexuality in Islam.
Anna Kim
Public Affairs: Immigrant integration, with a focus on civic engagement, community
health, and refugee resettlement.
Minjeong Kim
Sociology: Gender, family, and international migration, Asian American studies and
the media.
Eve Kornfeld
History: European and American cultural history; gender, childhood, postcolonial and
feminist theory.
Martha M. Lauzen
Theatre, Television, and Film: Representations of women in mass media
Carol Macera
Graduate School of Public Health: Chronic disease, aging, injuries, women's health
effects of physical activity.
Kristen Hill Maher
Political Science: International Migration, U.S Immigration Politics, Public Policy,
cultural and identity politics.
José Mario Martín-Flores
Spanish and Portuguese: Spanish-American/Latin American novel, Mexican contemporary
women writers, cinema and novels of the Mexican Revolution, 19th century prose fiction.
Arianne Miller
Counseling and School Psychology: Multicultural and LGBTQ Psychology, Eating Disorders,
self care
Esme Murdock
American Indian Studies: environmental justice, Indigenous and Afro-descended environmental
ethics, settler colonial theory, and decolonization as land/resource rematriation.
Bill Nericcio
English and Comparative Literature: Cultural studies, Chicano/a studies, Latin American
studies.
Dana Nurge
Public Administration and Urban Studies: Female delinquency, gender and crime, female
gang involvement.
Cheryl O’Brien
Political Science: Women’s rights, transnational feminist networks/ing, violence against
women, women and politics, feminist theory, human security, social/environmental justice,
gender based policy analysis, human rights.
Chuyun Oh
Music and Dance: Identity in dance performance, performance ethnography, and transnational
media and popular culture
Norma Ojeda
Sociology: Demography, Family, reproductive health, gender, and U.S. Mexico Border
Studies.
Shelly Orr
Theatre, Television, and media: Dramaturg and theatre scholar, specializing in 20th
and 21st century theatre
Arzu Ozkal
Art and Design: Interpretations of the body and its relationship to the environment
through dogmas, traditions, laws, and patriarchal value systems.
Walter D. Penrose, Jr.
History: Gender and sexuality in the ancient world; Amazons and female masculinity;
Later Reception of ancient Greek myth and history; LGBTQ+ History.
Ramona Pérez
Latin American Studies and Anthropology: Feminist anthropology, Identity politics,
violence against women/gendered violence, women/gender and development, masculinity,
Mexican Indigenous migrations, post-colonial theory, policing and civilian oversight
in the US, tourism, mixed methods research, Mexico.
Jessica Pressman
English and Comparative Literature: 20th/21st- Century Experimental Narrative, Digital
Poetics, Media Theory, Book History.
Elizabeth Reed
Public Health: Gender-based violence, including intimate partner violence and teen
dating violence; sexual and reproductive health.
Randy Reinholz
Television, Theater, and Film: Indigenous theatre, indigenous representation in media,
and EDI in U. S. cultural institutions.
Nathian Rodriguez
Journalism and Media Studies: Minority representation in media, specifically LGBTQ
and Latinx portrayals and identity negotiation, as well as pop culture, identity,
radio broadcasting, and issues of masculinity.
Elizabeth Pollard
History: Roman history, world history, magic and witchcraft accusations in Greco-Roman
antiquity, witches in comics.
Ronnee Schreiber
Political Science: women and American political institutions; women and public policy.
Emily Schuckman-Matthews
European Studies: Human trafficking in Eastern Europe, gender and sexuality in Eastern
Europe, 20th century Russian culture, literature, and film.
Stacy Sinclair
University Honors Program: Women’s bodies, postmodern feminism, gender and psychology/counseling/therapy,
gender and conflict, popular culture and gender.
Elisa J. Sobo
Anthropology: Alternative approaches to health and wellbeing (including pediatric);
Biomedical & other medical cultures; Rapid/applied ethnographic methods; Vaccination
(including for COVID-19).
Eva Struble
Art and Design: Social practice in art, painting, public art including murals relating
to, San Diego labor and political histories, climate change, public land in the west
and agriculture.
Kate Swanson
Geography: Gender and public space, racialization of indigenous peoples, youth identities
and childhood, urban restructuring and exclusion, migration, informal sector strategies.
Charles Toombs
Africana Studies: African literature (African American, African, and Caribeean,) American
literature, Black Queer Studies, class and urban studies, interdisciplinary studies,
neglected and silenced voices in Africana studies, and expressive culture.
Lianne Urada
School of Social Work: human trafficking/sex trade, homelessness, HIV/AIDS, and historical
community trauma.
Allison Vaughn
Psychology: Stages and varieties of social relationships and health, mental and physical/cardiovascular
health.
Sandra A. Wawrytko
Philosophy: Buddhist and Daoist epistemology and aesthetics; intersection of Buddhism
and neuroscience; Globalizing philosophy; Asian women philosophers (Murasaki Shikibu;
Sun Bu-er); philosophy beyond gender (nondualism).
Megan Welsh
Criminal justice, public administration, social work: The criminalization of poverty,
homelessness/housing insecurity, gendered and racialized experiences of policing and
incarceration.
Mei Zhong
Journalism and Media Studies: Intercultural communication; Chinese communication,
East-West cultural comparisons.
Janet Kohen
Associate Professor Emerita