Hello from Dr. Sue! I Feel free to explore these pages -- always a work in progress.
L. Susan Williams, Associate Professor of Sociology, specializes in crime, violence, and gender issues and is considered highly qualified in both quantitative and qualitative research methodologies. Dr. Williams’ study of adolescent girls in Connecticut broke ground by empirically documenting the effect of local community characteristics on life decisions of individual girls. She again broke ground in 2011, publishing Women at Work: Tupperware, Passion Parties, and Beyond, elucidating a party plan economy that exploits while also holding transformative potential for relationships among women.
More recently, Dr. Williams’ research focuses on prison as a site of identity transition. Works in progress include "Ghosts of the West Memphis Three" and "With Scenes of Blood and Pain: The Punitive Imagination of the Montana Meth Project."
Better known to her students as Dr. Sue, she teaches several courses on crime, gender, and diversity, and has been awarded a host of teaching awards; most recently, she was recognized as the 2012 national excellence in teaching award by University & Professional Continuing Education Association. She offers several online courses that have gathered considerable attention, including Study of Serial Murder, Death Penalty, and Crime, Media & Culture. Currently, Dr. Williams teaches distance courses BY distance, rotating between locations in Kansas, California, and Texas.
Dr. Williams directs several graduate students on projects such as the Tea Party Vs. Occupy Wall Street; Policing by Place; Stories by Fathers of Gay Sons; Gender and Geography; Relevance of Parenting in Childhood and Future Romantic Relationship Quality; and Prison as Suspended Liminality.
