Erin Evans

Erin M. Evans is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at San Diego Mesa College.  She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of California, Irvine in 2016. Erin specializes in social movements, science studies, policy, mass media, and institutionalization. Her recent work on policy reform and mass media outcomes of animal advocacy can be found in Social Movement Studies (2015), Sociological Perspectives (2016), and Society & Animals (2010). Erin’s research is distinct in two ways. First, she examines how activists affect change in institutions that are not explicitly political, like science and mass media. Second, she explores how activists affect institutional change in cross-cultural contexts. Her dissertation, “Taking Root: Animal Advocacy and the Regulation of Science,” uses a combination of in-depth interviews, archival research, and ethnographic observation to explain the long-term effects of animal protection regulation in science. Erin is grateful for research support from the Newkirk Center for the Social Studies of Science, the Animal Welfare Trust, Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research, the Sociology Department at UC Irvine, and the Dean’s and Associate Dean’s offices of the School of the Social Sciences at UC Irvine.