Fall 2025
Abortion in American Life- Oral History Project
This digital oral history project captures and shares women’s abortion stories from before Roe v. Wade to the present, using abortion as a lens through which we can consider the myriad ways women have grappled with issues of identity, family, motherhood, religion, politics and the legal system of the United States. To date, the project has captured the stories of five women. Our next goal is to revise our protocol, capture stories from a broader and more diverse second cohort (estimating 12 oral histories over the fall semester), and begin to design the digital repository/exhibit space. (fall 2025)
Responsibilities: The undergraduate fellow will help to identify participants, revise our protocol, conduct and transcribe oral histories. The fellow will also help with preliminary design of the digital repository.
Supervisor: Melinda Marchand, History
Spring 2026
Qualitative study of community organizations and organizers in American cities
Community organizing—a process in which community members develop relationships, identify social changes they need, and build collective power to achieve them—is one of the most enduring, impactful forms of civic engagement among working class, nonwhite, and immigrant communities in the United States. During the 20th century, much of this work took place within religious congregations, historically key anchors of community in American cities. Congregations provide ethical imperatives and social connections that organizers can translate into lasting commitments to, and ultimately power for, enacting social change. Hence, from the 1970s through 2010s, faith-based community organizing emerged as a leading paradigm for community empowerment in cities across the U.S.
Today, however, membership in and attendance at religious congregations is declining across all major religious traditions and all racial and ethnic groups in the U.S. As a result, community organizers who have previously relied on congregations must develop strategies for organizing in other community settings. Understanding how the methods that made faith-based community organizers successful can be transported into other community contexts is essential for practitioners aiming to grow their movements as well as for scholars who wish to understand and promote civic engagement in the contemporary U.S. This study seeks, therefore, to understand how contemporary community organizing groups are building power in settings beyond religious congregations, and with what effects.
To address these questions, this project will undertake a qualitative study of community organizations and organizers in American cities, including in-depth ethnographic work with the Massachusetts Community Action Network and its local affiliate Worcester Interfaith as well as interviews with community organizing leaders nationwide. Results will reveal how the evolving contexts of urban community are altering community organizers’ practices, and provide organizers with practical insights on how their methods might evolve to suit the less-religious nature of their contemporary constituencies.
Skills:
- Has completed a research methods course in the social sciences (Sociology, Political Science, Psychology, Geography, Education, CYES, or Economics)
- Can manage time effectively and complete tasks with few reminders or follow-ups needed
- Experience with library research, i.e. using research databases to find relevant scholarly literature
- Strong reading comprehension skills, i.e. can gain information from a text while reading efficiently
- Experience with, or a willingness to learn, effective file management and data management practices
- Effective oral and written communication skills: professional communication over email and phone, conciseness and clarity in analytical and descriptive writing, emotional maturity and personal humility in one to one conversations, potentially about sensitive topics
Responsibilities:
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- Assist in the identification of community organizing leaders to interview
- identify relevant organizations by consulting IRS lists, scouring research literature, and talking with academic and practitioner contacts
- contact organizations’ executive directors for permission to conduct interviews with their staff
- contact potential interviewees (community organizers) to arrange details and schedule interviews
- Review research literature to help develop theoretical framework and interview guide
- document trends in the changing practices and contexts of community organizing
- prepare theoretical briefs to inform selection of organizations and focus of interviews
- propose and vet interview questions
- Assist in transcription of interviews
- transcribe interviews from audio recordings
- prepare reaction memos based on transcription process
- As training and interest allow, conduct research interviews
- RA candidates with qualitative methods training will have the opportunity to conduct interviews if they choose
- Assist in the identification of community organizing leaders to interview
Supervisor: Jack Delehanty, Sociology