Beverly Yuen Thompson, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor in Women's Studies
Texas Woman's University

PDF of CV

Currently, I am an Assistant Professor of Women's Studies at Texas Woman's University. I teach Intro and a graduate seminar entitled US Women of Colors 5463.

Previously, as a Visiting Professor in Women's Studies at Florida International University, I taught Intro to Women's Studies 3015, Women's Studies Internship 4940, Social Movements, Gender and Justice 4930, and Feminist Theory 4720.

My teaching interests include: critical race/gender/sexuality studies, Asian American/mixed race theory, ethnographic methodology, social movements, urban studies, marginalized cultures and deviance.

My teaching philosophy is based upon developing critical thinking skills, strengthening comprehension, and promoting applied, community involvement. I require my Women's Studies students to participate in an extracurricular activity related to feminist issues. My students have attended such functions as: a women's artist exhibit, clinic defense at a women's health center, a protest against hate speech on campus, a discussion group on sexuality, a speech by Cindy Sheehan, movies about women in Latin America, the Vagina Monologues play, a Planned Parenthood teach in, and so on. I encourage a multimedia learning environment, class discussion and group work, and provide student support outside of the classroom.

I have begun to incorporate digital video into my ethnographic field work so that I can both produce written, scholarly work as well as accessible documentary videos that can be utilized with the wider public and in the classrooms. I have recently completed a documentary entitled Defending A Choice for Women. This 23 minute documentary chronicles the activities of Miami Clinic Access Project (MCAP), an organization developed to defend women's reproductive health clinics that are under attack by religious, pro-life protesters. This movie is based upon six months of field work at the clinic, aptly named A Choice for Women. Through street protest footage and interviews, this movie shows the ways in which women's reproductive rights are being defended in the grassroots. This movie is being distributed by AK Press and Radicaljack.com. It has been accepted to four film festivals : Siren Nation, a women's film festival in Portland, OR in November 1-4, 2007, the 5th Annual Global Peace Film Festival in Orlando, FL in September 26-30, 2007, the 4th Annual GiRL FeST film festival in Honolulu, Hawaii, November 9th-18th 2007, and the Ava Gardner Film Festival in Smithfield, North Carolina, September 28-30, 2007. The documentary was also shown on public access channels in Seattle and New York through the Indymedia Presents series (#267).

Some of the first video I ever shot was of the immigrant rights marches of April 10th and May Day 2006 in Las Vegas. Those two clips were used in an Indymedia movie called "Gigante: Despierta! Giant: Awake! May Day 2006." From there, the clips were used by the History Channel Latin America LLC and Anima Films.

My other current video and research project will examine the post-modern condition of the body, gender, and self-representation through the use of heavy tattooing. This research will examine the ways in which women both get heavily tattooed and/or perform as tattoo artists in this male dominated profession--as acts of feminist subversion to gender codes of normative behavior and hegemonic beauty standards. I am currently conducting video interviews with participants across the country. An article describing the video appeared in Tattoos for Women #81 (2008) entitled "Rebel Ink Grrls."

I also have my manuscript Jane WTO: Jail Solidarity, Law Collectives and the Global Justice Movement under consideration with publishers. From this manuscript, the article "The Global Justice Movement's Use of Jail Solidarity as a Response to Police Repression and Arrest: An Ethnographic Study," was published in Qualitative Inquiry (2007).

Education, I graduated in 2006 with a Ph.D. in Sociology from the New School for Social Research. For my dissertation, I conducted an ethnographic study of fifty participants in high-risk direct action at Global Justice mass demonstrations of financial institutions in the United States, from 2000-2006. I also earned a Master's Degree in Sociology from the New School. From San Diego State University, I received a Master's Degree in Women's Studies. I was the fifth graduate of the SDSU Women's Studies Master's program, entering the brand new program in its second year. I wrote on postmodern identity formations' challenges to static, binary, and single identity models. My Master's thesis focused on ethnographic research with women who were both mixed race and bisexual and created an alternative theory of identity that did not segment individuals into boxed in categories. I graduated from my local, hometown college--Eastern Washington University--from which most of the town graduated, including my mother, godmother, and other family and friends. My father and godfather both taught at this institution for most of their careers. My father was a Professor of Mathematics (and Physics once upon a time) and is also known as Dr. Thompson. My great uncle R. Franklin Thompson was the also a President of the University of Puget Sound from 1942 to 1973 and had a hall named after him. Finally, I also attended the other local institution that most of the town attended: Spokane Falls Community College. I earned an Associate's Degree when I was seventeen years old. Before college, I was much more in tune with studying at my own swift pace, outside of the stifling parameters of public education, and I never attended high school, but instead, home-schooled. I think that home schooling is a great alternative for focused, disciplined, and young free-thinkers.

Research, I love applied research. With a background in social activism, and an education that emphasizes social issues; I like to conduct research that is aimed at providing practical solutions to large-scale, institutional, social problems. I worked with the Leadership for a Changing World organization as a documentation specialist and doing data coding and analysis. This organization provides grants of $100,000 to social change organizations that exhibit new styles of collaborative leadership. Before that, I was the Project Manager for the Scholar-Practitioner team in Anthropology at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. We conducted a large-scale, multi-year, Kellogg funded, research project that examined the impact of welfare reform policies on women of color in Manhattan. We produced this manuscript entitled "The Impact of Welfare Reform on Two Communities in New York City." I also worked as a corporate research for the HERE Union Local 100, where I conducted research that could actively assist the ongoing labor struggle at the Met Opera in New York City. I was also an intern with the War Resisters League, and a researcher for the African American Studies Department at Columbia University under Manning Marable.

Publications, a chapter of my dissertation entitled, "The Global Justice Movement's Use of Jail Solidarity as a Response to Police Repression and Arrest: An Ethnographic Study," was published in Qualitative Inquiry in 2007. "The Price Of "Community:" Bisexual/Biracial Perspectives," appeared in That's Revolting! Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation (2004). The manuscript on the Kellogg funded research on welfare reform, "Working It Off: Welfare Reform, Workfare and Work Experience Programs in New York City," is available on the Internet (2003). From this research, we published a paper in Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society (Vol 5. No 2, Spring 2003), also titled "Working It Off."Other articles include"Memories from a Mixed Race Childhood," published in Iris: A Journal About Women (2002). "Towards A Multiracial/Bisexual Theory" was published in Amsterdam, in the journal Thamyris' Mythmaking From Past to Present. Special Issue: "Overcoming Boundaries: Ethnicity, Gender and Sexuality." Vol. 7, No. 1&2, Summer 2000, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. "Fence Sitters, Switch Hitters, and Bi-Bi Girls: An Exploration of Hapa and Bisexual Girls" appeared in Frontiers: A Journal of Women's Studies for the Special Issue: "Asian American Women." (2000). A few essays were published on the multiracial activists in 2000: "On Defining My Own Identity," "Longing for Life Outside the Box," and "Being Bi in a Mono-Culture: Towards a More Inclusive Perspective on Race and Sexuality." My essays have also been republished in several journals and text books: The Frontiers Reader: Asian American Women (2004) and Women: Images and Realities, A Multicultural Anthology (2003).

Presentations, I have given a lot of presentations, mostly on identity politics, bisexual-mixed race theory, and the global justice movement. Some of the places that I have presented include:

Justice or Just Us? April, 2008. Radio program on KUCI. Irvine, CA.
Southeast Women's Studies Association. 2008. North Carolina.
Sociologists for Women in Society (Winter meeting). 2008. Las Vegas, NV.
Oral History Association. 2005. Providence, RI.
National Women's Studies Association Conference. 2005. Orlando, Florida.
First International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry.2005. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
New England Sociological Association Conference. 2004. Endicott College; Beverly, Massachusetts.
SUNY Stony Brook Ethnography Conference. 2004. Stony Brook, New York.
Global Studies Association. 2004. Brandeis University; Waltham, Massachusetts.
National Lawyers Guild Annual Convention. 2002. Pasadena, CA.
History Matters Conference. 2002. Graduate Faculty, New School University; New York. Women's History Month Conference. 2002. Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, NY.
Asian Pacific America. 2001. Museum of Natural History, New York, NY.
Colloquium Presentation for Women's History. 2000. Sarah Lawrence College; Bronxville, NY.
National Women's Studies Association Conference. 1999. University of New Mexico; Albuquerque, NM.
Women's Studies Thesis Presentations Series. 1999. San Diego State University; San Diego, CA.
Geographies of Feminism: Annual Graduate Student Conference. 1999. University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA.
6th Annual SDSU Crisis Carnival Conference. 1998. San Diego State University, San Diego, CA.
Annual National Women's Studies Association Conference. 1998. Oswego State University, Oswego, New York.
Women's Studies Lecture Series. 1997. Eastern Washington University, Cheney, WA.

I would love to come and give a presentation to your school or organization. Please contact me for arrangements.