Selected Senior Project Titles
Below are the titles for a sample of all of the senior capstone projects, which you can find in the sociology department in 332 Milbank Hall. Students may come into the office to read senior theses and research papers.
2023
Haz ya waz! Transgressing Borders and Boundaries Through Fun
Stigma Within the Filipina Caregiver: A Psychosocial Approach to Women OFW's Presence in Care Work in the United States
"I am surprised more teachers didn't leave": Grief, Reconciliation, and Sense-making of the Covid-19 Pandemic Amongst Current and Former New York City Educators
The Effect of Parasocial Rerlationships on the Identity Development of Young Women
Queer Identity and Cultural Intersectionality: Exploring Queer-Identifying and International Ivy League Student Navigations of Gender and Sexuality
Privilege, Responsibility, Screen Time, and Childcare: What They Say vs. What They Do in White Affluent Families in New York's Upper East Side
A New Path Forward for Women's Prisons: Feminist Prison?
The Swell, The Sell, The Self: Sociocultural and Campus Culture Links to Risky Bodily Practices Among College Men
An Era of Representation: Mapping the Deviation of Hollywood Tropes about Muslim Women
Constructions of Non-Binary Gender Identities for Second Generation Chinese American Young Adults
Cyborg Earth? Fossil Fuel Empire, Geoengineering, and a Political Myth of Direct Air Capture
Purple Neck: An Analysis of the Power of Critique in Film + Television
The Transformation of Bitch and Cunt, from Slur to Slang
Do it for the gram: Experiencing and Performing Identity on Instagram
The Beauty App Paradox: Examining the Doubling of Labor for Asian-identified College Women in New York City
Exceptional Loyalty: An Analysis of Officer Attitudes in the Los Angeles Police Department
Recovery vs Discovery and the Need for a New Story: Transgender and Gender Non-Binary Experiences in Spaces of Healing
Joint Legislation: NYC Cannabusiness Putting Neoliberalism in Smoke
Allyship or Advertising? The Racialization of Queer Performance in Pop Culture
Reality TV's Woke Efforts in Post-BLM America: The Emergence and exploitation of the "Forgiving Education"
The Joke Is On You: Comedians As Curators of "Cancel Culture" In A New Public Sphere
Hot Gossip: The Unlikely Positive Effects of Gossip for Women of Color
The Phenomenality of Nature
Public Perceptions of Leadership During Times of Crisis: A Study of Cuomo's Covid-19 Briefings and FDR's Fireside Chats
Asian Students and Attitudes Towards Mental Health Services
Man Doth Not Comprehend all the Things which the Lord can Comprehend: An Analysis of Boundary Maintenance within the LDS Church
Inherited Racial Trauma: What Epigenetics Tells Us About Socially Determined Health Conditions for Black Americans
Social Media, Politics, and the Barnard Experience
Navigating Racism, Sexism, and Geopolitical Tension: Experiences of East Asian Women in U.S. Higher Education Institutions
Halfway There: The Efficacy of College Diversity Management Programs
Biting Down on a Double-Edged Promise of "Liberation": "Jazz" Performance & Embodied Inflections of Agency in the Allied Occupation of Japan 1945-53
Who Can Cry in Hong Kong Supermarket: How Ethnic Grocery Stores Curate a Sense of Belonging
Unearthing Resistance: An Examination of Agricultural Practices within the Hmong American Farmers Association
2022
The Deen of the Diaspora: Black Islamic and Cultural Symbols in Inner-City Mosques
KPOP, Cultural Appropriation, and Anti-Black Racism Within KPOP Fan Transnational Racial Discourse
Too Much and Never Enough: Sacrifice, Racial Melancholia, and Racial Dissociation in Asian-American Women College Students
Bold, Brilliant, Belonging: A Study of First-Generation and Low-Income and Non-First-Generation nor Low-Income Barnard College Students
Impacts of Social Identities on Environmental Activist Expression
Bridging the Gap: Education Inequality, Black Students, and the Utility of College Access Programs
3rabs fe Amreeka: Processes of Racial Identity Formation Among non-Black, Gen Z, Female-identifying Arab Americans
Pictures of a Postdigital Humanity: A Series of Explorations into the Social Conditions of Portraiture Made After the Internet
The Museum Experience Reimagined: New Horizons for Inclusion
Food Habits and Food's Impact on Cultural Connection: From Adoptee's Perspective
The Social and Academic Experiences of Black Boys and Girls at a Racially-Mixed Suburban High School
Becoming a Developmental Neuroscientist in the Biomedical Age
The Mechanisms of Algorithmic Bias: A Sociotechnical Perspective
Mental Health of Venezuelan Forced Migrants
When Race, Gender, and Neurodiversity Intersect: The Lives of Black Women Undergraduates Diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyper-Active Disorder
Reclaiming Identity through Cultural Community at Columbia University: A Sociological Examination of the Construction of Indigenous Identity Among College Educated Young Adults
New Kids on the Block: The Impact of Gentrification on Local Public Schools and the Urban Teacher Experience
Navigating Private Universities While Being Undocumented
The Midwifery Intervention: An Antidote to the American Social Construction of Birth
Social Networks within Pro-Israel Grassroots Movements: A Case Study
Analysis of Global, National, and Local Discourse on Abortion and Post-Abortion Care (PAC) in Uganda
The Ethno-Cultural Identities of Mixed-Ethnicity Jewish People
An Investigation of the Self-Perceived Sense of Belonging and Experience of International Students at Barnard College and Columbia University
A Sociological Analysis of the Cultural Challenges in Criminal Justice Reform
Iranian Americans and Self-Identification Post 1979 Revolution
Second-Generation East Asian-American Dating and Self Identity
The COVID Cashier: Labor and Love During a Pandemic
Which Way Do You Swing?: The Performance of Heterosexuality in Lindy Hop
El Barrio No Se Vende (East Harlem is NOT for Sale): An Ethnographic Study on Anti-Displacement, Immigrant Activism, and Community Building in El Barrio
Dios Me Lo Bendiga: An Exploration of Pentecostalism and Health Perceptions in Post-Civil War Guatemala
(Re)Imaginative Resistance: Black Women's Community Creation On Twitter and Instagram
Normalized Sexism: The Experiences of Female Software Engineers in Male-Dominated Workplaces
2021
The Burden of the Bypass: an Exploration of the Courts, the Judges, and the Girls Themselves
Queer in Quarantine: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Gender Transformation During the Covid-19 Pandemic
Identity Construction and Intrafamily Differences: How the Development of Chinese Identities in Transracial Adoptive Families is Linked to Parents' Boundary Making and Color Blindness
"Are you the Nurse?" How Female Physicians are Uniquely Burdened by Gender
Concealing the Concealment: A Brief Sociological Study on the "No-Makeup" Makeup Look
The Influence of Neoliberal Development Ideology on Menstrual Hygiene-Management in India
The Illusion of Choice: a Reflective Analysis of Women's Attitudes Towards Work and Motherhood
A Message of Survival: Changing Media Narratives of Sexual Violence in the Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford Reports
Constructing Queerness: One Family, Five Models
Compensatory Inversion in the time of COVID-19: How Vaccine Accessibility and Hesitancy Differs Among Racial and Ethnic Groups
Dealing with Trust in the COVID-19 Pandemic
"I Just Try:" How Race Has Impacted the Experiences of Working Mothers During the COVID-19 Pandemic
"What Are You": Identity Formation in Middle School and Beyond
Cultural Capital in Columbia University: How Student Clubs and Organizations Reproduce Inequality
Structural Reproductions of Trauma: Women's Healthcare in United States Correctional Facilities
A House of Scars: The Precariousness of Pandemic Life for South Korean Domestic Violence Survivors
How Theatre Gives Gender--Acting as a Corporeal Catalyst for Queerness
Inclusion and Exclusion at Exeter
The Gendered Meaning of Money Across Geopolitical Contexts: Experiences of Chinese Women Studying Abroad in the U.S.
Caught Between Devotions: Balancing Paid Employment and Motherhood Amongst White Middle Class Women
Borderlands Claims: A Study of Spatial-Legal Claims in the US-Mexico Borderlands
"We Get to Rewrite the Rules": Resistance to and Acceptance of Zionist Socialization Among LGBTQ+ Jews
Good Girls Gone Bad: Gender Roles in Contemporary Liberal and Conservative Pakistani Dramas
Feeding for Two: A Black Mother's Perspective on Navigating Pregnancy in their Neighborhood
"We Shotgun LaCroix at Tailgates": A Study of Liberty University, YouTube Vlogging, and the Evolution of Fundamentalist Christians from Separatists to Being In and Of Secular Culture
Second Generation Latinx Students and their Access to Elite Institutions
2020
When Tech Racially Discriminates: The Consequences of Algorithms and Big Data
The Reproduction of Privilege in All-Girls Private Schools
Lawbreaking Lawmakers: How NYC Lawmakers Create Policies Surrounding Immigration on Their Own Terms
"Platinum Elites" and Working Families: Hotel Guests' Online Engagement with the 2018 Marriott Strike
The Dehumanization of Immigrants: How Language Can Be Weaponized in Media to Strip Immigrants of Their Humanity
The Pedagogy of the Parterx: Birth Work as Community Transformation
Understanding the Role of Positionality in Determining the Narrativization Processes Used by Black Trans Individuals Pursuing Sexual Reassignment Surgery
The Language of News: Emotional Language Use and Immigrants in Southern California
Why is it Still Cold Even with all These Women Here? Women in STEM
Urban Renewal and Social Change in New York City
Englewood, NJ: A Case Study of the Simultaneous Segregation and Integration within a Small City
"Social Class? Do People Still Talk About That?"
Teacher Resistance and No Child Left Behind
The Invisible Influence of Community: how women in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont identify, perceive, and engage with feminism
Driving a Further Wall into Immigration Border Enforcement: Trump's Border Wall
All Tractors Ain't Green": Navigating Taste Culture on an Elite College Campus
Media Framing's Effect on The Inclination to Participate in Collective Action: An Experiment
The Classroom as Social Control: How Learning Immigration Law Affects Students
To Whom Does a Museum Belong: The Role of the Metropolitan Museum in Defining the Public's Relationship to Art
Lower Case "C" Conservative Jews
The Ascension of Universities as Anchor Institutions and the Threat of Gentrification: Evaluating Columbia University's Manhattanville Project
Identifying English Language Learners in an Anti-Immigrant Political Climate: Why Parents (Un)Intentionally Misidentify Their ELL Children
Negotiating Multiple Identities Within Social Movements: A Case Study of the Palestinian Liberation Movement at Columbia University
A Sociological Analysis of the 1968 New York Teachers Strike
2019
Maid or Mother? An Exploration of the Relationship Between the Children of Lebanese Employers and their Live-in Filipina Domestic Workers
Softboys: Mapping a Masculinity
Making The Wire: A Venture into the Sociology of Artistic Innovation
Sexual Scripts Outside the Binary: The Gender Non Conforming Community
Casting Call: Cultural Labor, Racial Inequities, and Diversity Challenges on Broadway's Stages
Political and Cultural Mobilization among Arizona Latino Immigrants
"Given the Benefit of the Doubt": Experiences of White Students in a Desegregated, Majority-Nonwhite High School
Asian American Cultural Politics: Patchwork Identity, Kinetic Historiography, and Urban Dance
Hearing the Silent Voices: The Impact of Political Correctness on Campus Dialogue
The Immigrant Assimilation Experience: An Analysis of the Relationship Between Income and Educational Attainment in the United States
Biography of Inequality: How Frameworks for Understanding Inequality Are Built Among College Students
This Kitchen is not My Prison: The Lineage of Southern Recipes and What it Means to be a Woman
Tragic Heroes: How Hollywood depicts the male experience of heterosexual romantic love
The Rise of the Economically Oppressed - How Low-income Students are Powering Their Way Through Elite Institutions
Ethnic Salience and Racial Identity amongst International Students of Color
Preferences of Attraction and Intimacy in Columbia University Males
Queer Femmes: Language, Identity, & Agency
Sticking Together as the "Outsider Within": Black Students' Strategies for Navigating Elite Independent Schools
Not Asian Enough: Understanding Race and Ethnicity through Second Generation Filipino-Americans
Gender and Sexuality Across Borders: Experiences of Iranian-Born Women in the U.S.
Super Moms: Mothers of Color vs. Postpartum Depression
Race and Interactions with Medicine in Chronic Illness
Motherhood as Redemption: Resistance to Dehumanization in Women's Prison Writings
Domestic Dynamics in The Black Middle Class
Studying the Political Identities of Romanian Immigrants in a Post-Trump America
"Dealing" with Gender: Gender Negotiation Amongst a Woman-Led Drug Enterprise
2018
Wake Up Call? The Role of Homeownership in the American Dream After the 2008 Financial Crisis
The Spanish Food Code: How Social Meanings and Rituals Around the Spanish Table Translate Into a Larger Cultural Pattern
An Evaluation of the Modern Study Abroad Experience
Bedford-Stuyvesant's Third Spaces: The Negotiated Ownership of a Gentrifying Neighborhood
Sugar Baby Currency - Authenticity, Intimacy, and Emotional Labor
Finsta: A Mental Health Resource for the Modern Age - How Finsta Culture is Radically Reshaping Our Understanding of and Engagement with Privacy, Communication, Self-Presentation, Self-Expression, and Vulnerability
Negotiating Race in the Boston Suburbs: Host Community Students and the METCO Program
Black, Muslim, and Female at Columbia University
Reggaeton: from the Island to the Globe
The Socialization of Low-Income Black and Latina Students Attending Elite Private Schools
Intergenerational Transmission of Child Abuse and Punitive Disciplinary Practices in the United States: Implications for Legal and Clinical Practice
Urban Environmental Stewardship Groups: The Organizational Life of Green Space, Civic Engagement, and Neighborhood Character in New York
Mexican American Curanderismo as Alternative Healthcare
American Inequality and the Incorporation of Church in State: How Traditionalist Christian Ideology Resists Social Change
Packaging the Priceless: An Investigation into the Use of "Authenticity" in Modern American Branding
The Walt Disney Corporation's Involvement in the World War II American War Effort
We put up with anything for justice:" Greedy organizations, contested commodification, and emotional management in social movement organizations
Personal Choice and Scrutiny: Understanding How Female Students Navigate College Gyms
The New Chronic Condition: An Observation of The Medicalization of Poverty in Urban Emergent Care
The Navajo Water Problem: An Analysis of Settler Colonialism as a Way to Understand Frame Development and Blaming Processes
Not Another John: The Commodification of Intimacy Through Sugar Babies' Sexualized Labor
Living Single: Black Women's Dating and Relationship Experiences at an Elite University
What's The Deal With Identity: An Exploration of a Modern Comedic Sensibility
Rebel Jew
Maternal Incarceration: Adolescent Girls' Experiences and the Social Context of Race
Q is for Queer and also for Questioning: Millennial Relations to Queerness and their Sociological Ramifications
2017
The Expression of Gender Politics on Saturday Night Live From 1975 Until Today
Closed Doors: Exclusion of Low-income Students in Higher Education and its Role in Perpetuating Economic Inequality
Poor Girls in the Family: How Low-Income White Mothers and Daughters Labor and Relate in the Home
Spring Turns to Winter: Opportunities and Constraints in Community Organizing Around Development in the Bronx
Bodies and Battlegrounds: How American Sexual and Reproductive Health Care Clinics Respond to Crises of Access and Equality
Affirmative Action in Regard to Antecedent Adolescent Education: Can Higher Educational Equity Foster Social Equality?
"Nothing New Under the Sun": Models of Continuity and Discontinuity in Modern Observant Jewish Women
Going Ivy: How Elite College Athletics Transform Hegemonic Masculinity
Harnessing Marginality and [Re]Shaping Identity: How BlackWomen Executives Make Leadership Work for Them
Underground Sounds: Recognizing and Rediscovering the Folk Subculture of 2016
"Why am I Single?" A Qualitative Analysis of the Interracial Connections made by Black Women in an Elite and Predominantly White University
Making "Lemons" out of Lemonade: An Analysis of the Phases in Beyoncé’s Journey to Empower the Black Female Audience
The Impossible Alternative? Diffusion of Restorative Justice in Costa Rica and Peru
2016
The Symbolic Black Space, A Study on Race, Nightlife and Harlem
America's Schooling System: Separate and Unequal
Comparing Views of Undocumented Latino Couples and Mixed Status Latino Couples on Machismo from the Perspective of the Wives
Healthy Food in Harlem: The Double-Edged Sword of Commercial Gentrification
The Organizational Culture of Immigration Detention Officers and Its Effects on Treatment of Immigrants
Growing Up Gay: Understanding the Transition into Adulthood for LGBQ Young Adults
Kink It's Not Just Sex Anymore: BDSM Isn't Most of the Things People Think It Is
From the Floor to the Pulpit: Black Women's Strives to Leadership in the Black Church
The Emergence of a Dominant Identity: How Jewish institutions influence the dominant identity of their constituents
The Interplay of Class Privilege and Subjective Measures in the Exploration of Adulthood
Accessing Queerness: On Sexual Fluidity and Sexual Identity Among Students At Women's Colleges
How Should Computers Be Searched With Respect to the Fourth Amendment?
Socioeconomic Status: A Potent Pill for Differing Views on Volunteering?
Holocaust Consciousness: What's Being Jewish Got to Do with It?
2015
The Decline of the Gueguense: Performance and State in Nicaragua
But I'm 18, Aren't I an Adult?
Analyzing the experience of women in the restaurant industry
Navigating Marriage in the Transition to Adulthood
Welfare Reform: The Undeserving Stigma of the Underserved
Ascribing the Meaning of Uptalk: It's Not the Talk Itself, but the Emotional Key Evoked
Performing Health: A Study Exploring the Internalization of Health Norms Among Students at Columbia University
How the Cookie Crumbles: An Analysis of Gender and Diversity in Girl Scouts of the USA
Hook-Up Culture and the Transition to Adulthood
The Fight for 15 Movement through the Lens of Social Movement
Just Justice and the Myth of the Self-Made Man: An Examination of the American Dream, American Values, and American Criminal Justice
Columbia Catholic Ministry, Catholic Identities, and American Pluralism
"Just one, I'm a few. No Family Too. Who am I?": The Search for Gender Identity in Science Fiction Television
Here and There: on the Formation of Cultural Identity in First and Second Generation Palestinian Americans
Outsourcing responsibility for maternal and infant health in New York City: Neoliberal governmentality and racial health disparity in the Infant Mortality Reduction Initiative
Feminism, A Pop Culture Buzzword: Feminist Media Positioning of African American Female Musicians
Financial Independence and Perceptions of Adulthood