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Dorow, Sara

Associate Professor, Sociology
Director, Community Service-Learning Program
PhD (Sociology)
University of Minnesota
6-11 HM Tory Building
780-492-4301 phone
780-492-7196 fax
sara.dorow@ualberta.ca

Research and Teaching Interests

My research and teaching are guided by interests in the political economy of im/migration, neoliberal globalization, practices and imaginaries of community, processes of racialization, and constructions of kinship, gender, and childhood.

 Three (sometimes overlapping) areas of scholarship define my current work:

 Globalization and Community 

I teach globalization courses, and am leading a major research project that uses global ethnography to study formations and limits of community within the broader political economy (especially labour migration) of the northern Alberta oilsands.

 Transnational Adoption 

For more than a decade I have researched and published in the area of transnational adoption, with a focus on the adoption of Chinese children in North America. Intersections of race, culture, and kinship inform this work as well as my teaching of the sociology of family, and ethnic and minority relations.

Scholarship of Engagement/Community Service-Learning

Since 2003 I have directed the development of a community service-learning (CSL) program in the Faculty of Arts and beyond. CSL offers undergraduate and graduate students the opportunity to do community-engaged projects as a regular part of course work, in fields from drama to linguistics to sociology. For more information, see www.arts.ualberta.ca/csl. I also integrate CSL into my globalization course.

 
Courses Taught
 
Sociology of Family
 
Sociology of Globalizaton
 
Ethnic and Minority Relations
 
Qualitative Methods
 
Gender and Family

 
Recent Grants

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Standard Grant (2008-2011)

Killam Cornerstone Grant (2008-2009)

“Social Landscapes of Neoliberal Growth: The Case of Fort McMurray, Alberta”

Prairie Centre for Excellence in Research on Immigration and Integration Grant (2005-2006)

“Chinese/Canadian Adoption: Immigrant Families, Cultural Integration, and Transnational Networks”

The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation (2005-2010) for the development of the Community Service-Learning Program

Recent Awards and Honours

Public Sociology Award. Sociology Department, University of Minnesota (2008)

Winner-Researcher (poster). Urban Region Research Forum, University of Alberta (2005)

Excellence in Teaching Award. University of Alberta Students’ Union (2003-2004)

 

Recent Publications

 Transnational Adoption: A Cultural Economy of Race, Gender, and Kinship. New York: New York University Press (2006)

“Producing Kinship through the Marketplaces of Transnational Adoption.” In M. Goodwin (ed.) Baby Markets. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2008)

 “Racialized Choices: Chinese Adoption and the ‘White Noise’ of Blackness.” In M.K. Jung, E. Bonilla-Silva, and J. Costa Vargas (special issue eds.) Critical Sociology (2006)

 “Transnational Adoption: An ‘Exceptional’ Form of Immigration?” With Terry Lepatsky. Canadian Issues/Themes Canadiens (Spring 2006)

 “Adopted Children’s Identities at the China/U.S. Border.” In D. R. Gabaccia and C. W. Leach (eds) Immigrant Life in the U.S.: Multi-disciplinary perspectives. London and New York: Routledge (2004)

 “’China R Us?’: Care, Consumption, and Transnationally Adopted Children.” In D. Cook (ed) Symbolic Childhood. New York: Peter Lang Publishers (2002)

 Narratives of Race and Culture in Transnational Adoption. In P. Kivisto and G. Rundblad (eds) Multiculturalism in the United States: Current Issues, Contemporary Voices. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press (2000)