NICOLE BROWN
National Center for Supercomputing Applications
1205 W. Clark St.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Urbana, IL 61801
Work Phone: (217) 300-1007
Cell Phone: (872) 216-4216
Email: [email protected]
Alt. Email: [email protected]
EDUCATION
Ph.D.
M.S.Ed.
B.A.
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), Sociology
Illinois State University, College Student Personnel Administration
Illinois Wesleyan University, Business Administration
2015
2007
1999
DISSERTATION
Dissertation Title: “Flawed Consumers: Understanding the Impact of Intersectional Political
Consumerism during the Chicago Welfare Rights Era.”
Committee: Moon-Kie Jung (Chair), Clarence Lang, Bernice McNair Barnett, Ruby Mendenhall
PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS
2016 - Present Visiting Assistant Professor, Illinois Wesleyan University
2015 - 2016
Postdoctoral Researcher, National Center for Supercomputing Applications (UIUC)
PUBLICATIONS
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
Brown, Nicole M. “Bridge Leadership: Gendered Consumerism and Black Women’s Political Power
within Early 20th Century ‘Don’t Buy’ Campaigns.” Sociological Focus (Forthcoming).
Brown, Nicole M., Ruby Mendenhall, Michael Black, Mark Van Moer, Ismini Lourentzou, Assata Zeria
and Karen Flynn. 2016. “Mechanized Margin to Digitized Center: Black Feminism’s
Contributions to Combatting Erasure within the Digital Humanities.” International Journal of
Humanities and Arts Computing 10(1): 110-125.
Brown, Nicole M. 2015. “Freedom’s Stock: Political Consumerism, Transnational Blackness and the
Black Star Line.” Critical Sociology 41(2): 237–248.
Encyclopedia Entries
Brown, Nicole M. 2015. “African Americans and Consumption.” Pp. 1-3 in The Wiley-Blackwell
Encyclopedia of Consumption and Consumer Studies.
Manuscripts in Submission
Brown, Nicole M. “Methodological Cyborg as Black Feminist Technology: Constructing the Social Self
Using Computational Digital Autoethnography and Social Media” Under Review.
Brown CV - 2
Brown, Nicole M. “Intersectional Political Consumerism: Re-examining Consumer Strategies of The
Woodlawn Organization (TWO) and Jobs or Income Now (JOIN) during the Chicago Welfare
Rights Era” Under Review.
ACADEMIC EXPERIENCE
Research Appointments - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC)
2016-Present
Faculty Affiliate, Cline Center for Democracy
2016-Present
Research Faculty Affiliate, National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA)
2013-2015
Research Assistant to Ruby Mendenhall, Associate Professor, Sociology
Teaching Appointments
Illinois Wesleyan University—Departments of Sociology and Business Administration
Fall 2016
Introductory Sociology – Visiting Assistant Professor, 15 students
Sex & Gender – Visiting Assistant Professor, 15 students
Black Feminist Imaginings – Visiting Assistant Professor, 15 students
Fall 2015
History of Social Thought – Adjunct Assistant Professor, 15 students
Spring 2009
Organizational Leadership – Instructor, 12 students
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC)
Fall 2013 Introduction to Sociology (Online Course) – Teaching Assistant, 35-50 students per
Summer 2014 semester
Summer 2013 Black Masculinities – Instructor (Education Justice Project college-in-prison program),
15 students
Fall 2012 Spring 2013
Social Research Methods – Teaching Assistant, 30-45 students per semester
Summer 2012 Black Feminist Theory – Instructor (Education Justice Project college-in-prison
program), 15 students
Spring 2012
Social Perspectives on the Family (Online Course) – Instructor, 25 students
Sociology of Deviance (Online Course) – Teaching Assistant, 30 students
Fall 2010 Spring 2011
Introduction to Sociology – Teaching Assistant, 75-100 students per semester
Brown CV - 3
AWARDS AND GRANTS
2016
Awarded $1,000 NCSA Professional Development Grant, UIUC
2015
Awarded $16,500 grant from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign library to
purchase perpetual licensing to the ProQuest Historical African American newspaper
digital collection
2015
Awarded supercomputing and visualization resources and extended collaborative support
services (ECSS) from NSF-funded Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery
Environment (XSEDE)
2014
Awarded $1,000 Sociology Departmental Dissertation Travel Grant, UIUC
2009-2010
Awarded $20,000 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Graduate College
Fellowship
2006
Awarded $1,000 William L. and Creta B. Sabine Scholarship, Illinois State University
HONORS
2016 North Carolina State University Building Future Faculty Scholar (BFF is a nationally competitive
professional development program)
2015 Graduate College Excellence Award (in recognition of academic excellence and good citizenship
within Sociology Department)
2012-2013 On ‘List of Teachers Ranked Excellent’ by their Students for Sociology Research Methods
2012 Patrick Berry Proposal Writing Award (in recognition of contributions to Education Justice Project
College-in-prison program)
Alpha Kappa Delta International Sociology Honor Society
Kappa Delta Pi Education Honors Society
CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS
Papers Presented
“Methodological Cyborg as Black Feminist Technology: Using Computational Digital Autoethnography
to Understand Social Media as a Cultural Representation of the Quantified Social Self.” Presented
paper at the Digital Blackness Conference at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, 2016
“Intersectional Political Consumerism: Investigating African American Consumerism during the Chicago
Welfare Rights Era.” Presented paper at the annual meeting of the American Sociological
Association, Chicago, IL, 2015
“Ain’t I A Lover?: The Gendered and Raced Dynamics of Discussing Love with Men Who are
Incarcerated.” Presented paper at the National Women’s Studies Association Conference, San
Juan, PR, 2014
Brown CV - 4
“Visualizing Topic Models about African American Women’s Experiences and Standpoints.” National
Center for Supercomputing Applications and Institute for Advanced Computing Applications and
Technology Seminar Series, Champaign, IL, 2014
“Consumerism as African American Tool of Resistance During Welfare Rights Movement.” Presented
paper at Consumer Studies Research Network Conference Doctoral Workshop, Las Vegas, NV,
2011
“The Power of Boycotts: Understanding ‘Don’t Buy Where You Can’t Work’ as a Women’s Movement.”
Presented paper at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, Las Vegas, NV,
2011
“Consumerism and Spirituality: The Cost of Worship at an African-American Midwest Church.”
Presented paper at Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate Research Symposium,
Chicago, IL, 2011
“Applying Simmel’s Theory of Social Identity Formation to Explain the Impact of Academic
Consumerism.” Presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association,
Atlanta, GA, 2010
Discussant/Commentator
Panel Discussant “Consumers and Consumption III: Class and Consuming Identities,” at annual meeting
of the American Sociological Association, Las Vegas, NV, 2011
INVITED TALKS
Guest speaker. “Discussing ‘The New Jim Crow’: Making Sociological Connections Between Education,
Poverty and Mass Incarceration.” Illinois Wesleyan University, 2015
Colloquium speaker. “Freedom’s Stock: Political Consumerism, Transnational Blackness, and the Black
Star Line.” Illinois Wesleyan University, 2013
Guest speaker. “The Wretched of the Academy: Using the Power of Our Discipline to Bring the Margins
to the Center.” Alpha Kappa Delta International Sociology Honor Society Induction Ceremony,
Illinois Wesleyan University, 2013
CAMPUS TALKS
Guest speaker. Data Science Across Disciplines Focal Point Seminar, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, 2015
Guest speaker. “Black Women Big Data: Utilizing Topic Modeling to Understand Black Women’s Lived
Experiences.” Scholarly Commons, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2015
Guest lecturer. Methods of Field Research: Qualitative Methods, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, 2015
Guest speaker. Education Justice Project Spring Convocation, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign, 2013
Brown CV - 5
Guest speaker. “Inequality Now, Educational Justice Later: Making the Case for Education Programs in
Prisons.” University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2011
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
2011-2012
Sociology Undergraduate Academic Advisor - UIUC
Advised Sociology majors and minors related to course offerings and assisted students in
planning their academic schedules to reach their personal and professional goals.
2010-2011
Graduate Counselor – UIUC
Provided peer counseling to undergraduate students related to campus resources. This
position is part of an Office of Minority Student Affairs initiative to retain minority
undergraduate and first generation college students.
2005-2009
Director, Multicultural Affairs – Illinois Wesleyan University, Bloomington, IL
Collaborated with faculty and staff members to advise and support individuals from
diverse backgrounds. Provided formal leadership training and guidance for multicultural
student organizations in conjunction with faculty advisors. Also, I managed $124,000
budget.
2007
Practicum, Project RISE TRiO Program – Heartland Community College,
Normal, IL
Assisted TRiO program with reporting, data analysis and process performance tracking.
Also, I created Student Support Services reporting to evaluate processes and shared with
other area community colleges.
Facilitated Workshops
2015
2009-2015
2011
2005-2007
Workshop Facilitator. Illinois Wesleyan University, Human Rights Conference
StrengthsFinder Facilitator. Illinois Wesleyan University, Summer Enrichment Program
iPrograms Facilitator. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Integrity Program
Diversity Training Facilitator. Illinois Wesleyan University, Accounting Leaders of
Tomorrow Program
PROFESSIONAL SERVICE
Disciplinary Service
Paper Session Reviewer for Consumer Culture Theory Conference, 2011
Departmental Service
Organizer and Moderator for multi-disciplinary panel titled “Making Calculated Moves: The Future of
Mixed Methods in the Age of Computation, Reconsidered”, National Center for Supercomputing
Applications, 2016
University Service
Organizer for campus-wide Combatting Anti-Blackness Initiative, Illinois Wesleyan University 2016
NSF EAGER Germination Grant Project Team, UIUC 2016
Organizer for Computational Social Science Workshop, UIUC, 2016
Brown CV - 6
Tutor and Instructor for Education Justice Project (College-in-prison program), UIUC, 2011-2014
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS
American Sociological Association (Race Gender and Class, Racial and Ethnic Minorities, Consumers
and Consumption), 2010 –
National Women’s Studies Association, 2014 – 2015
Consumer Studies Research Network, 2011-2013
REFERENCES
Dr. Moon-Kie Jung, Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Massachusetts Amherst,
[email protected]
Dr. Clarence Lang, Associate Professor, Departments of African and African American Studies, and
American Studies, University of Kansas, [email protected]
Dr. Ruby Mendenhall, Associate Professor, Departments of Sociology and African American Studies,
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, [email protected]