My research focuses on how social categories and institutions constitute systems of power, often in the context of the marketplace or the government, and often with an emphasis on how these relationships develop over long periods of time.
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Political Economy Rebooted, an interdisciplinary volume co-edited with Marion Fourcade and Greta Krippner. Forthcoming, Duke University Press.
The Home Equity Project, with UW Sociology Graduate Student Jessica Warren. This is an interview-based study of how older homeowners think about the equity in their homes, and how they plan to use it.
"The Longue Durée of Finance: New Research on Old Financial Markets." With Francisca Gómez Baeza, and Devin Collins. Annual Review of Sociology, 2025.
“Gifts, Grifts, and Gambles: The Social Logics of the Small Business Administration Relief Loan Programs.” In Pandemic Exposures: Economy and Society in the Time of Coronavirus, Didier Fassin and Marion Fourcade (eds). HAU Books, University of Chicago Press.
American Bonds: How Credit Markets Shaped a Nation, Princeton University Press, 2019.
“Defining the State from Within: Boundaries, Schemas, and Associational Policymaking” with Damon Mayrl.
“Beyond the Hidden American State: Rethinking Government Visibility”(with Damon Mayrl). A chapter in The Many Hands of the State: Theorizing Political Authority and Social Control, edited by Ann Orloff and Kimberly Morgan (Cambridge University Press)
“A Modern Financial Tool-kit”: Lessons from Berle for a More Democratic Financial System.” With Mark Igra, and Selen Güler. In Democratizing Finance: Restructuring Credit to Transform Society, Fred Block and Robert Hockett (eds). Verso.
“On the Sociological Approach to Public Finance” Economic Sociology: The European Electronic Newsletter. 21(2): 12-14 (2020)
“When All Social Problems Become Financial Problems.” Law and Political Economy (blog post). Published online November 20, 2020
Interview (with Barbara Kiviat). Accounts: Newsletter for the Economic Sociology Section of the American Sociological Association. Spring/Summer: 8-11.
““The Miracles of Bookkeeping”: How Budget Politics Link Fiscal Policies and Financial Markets" American Journal of Sociology, 2017.
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“Gender, Loss, and the Erosion of Bodily Capital: A Study with Women Diagnosed with Late Stage Breast Cancer.” With Sara McClelland and Lynne Gerber. Women’s Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 51:7, 819-840. Drawing from women diagnosed with late-stage breast cancer, this article considers the gendered experience of body loss and associated forms of social status,
“The Transformation of Morals in Markets: Death, Benefits, and the Exchange of Life Insurance Policies.” American Journal of Sociology, 2008. This article uses content analysis and interviews to show how position within a field influences morality. Reprinted in The Sociology of Economic Life (Granovetter and Swedberg, eds., Third Edition).
“Blue Chip Bodies, Fat Phobia, and the Cultural Economy of Body Size.” With Lynne Gerber. Shows how moralization of body size varies depending on a person's social position and resources; this is illustrated through a comparison of the work of Oprah Winfrey, Morgan Spurlock, and Pat Robertson.
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Illuminating America’s market-heavy social policies, American Bonds illustrates how political institutions became involved in the nation’s lending practices.
You can list to a discussion of the book on Planet Money’s Book Club.
*Winner of the Alice Amsden Best Book Award from the Society of Socio-Economics.
* Winner of the Viviana Zelizer Award for Best Book, Economic Sociology Section of the American Sociological Association.
* Honorable Mention for the Theory Prize, Theory Section of the American Sociological Association.
Read more about the book and place your order here, and learn more about related work and publications here.