The recent legalization and regulation of cannabis production and consumption in California represent an unprecedented change in public policy that may have profound impacts on the environment and communities across the state. At this moment of change, there is a critical need for scholarship on cannabis-producing communities and their relation to the natural environment. This […]
Research Team
Research Team
Community Conversations on Sexual Violence and Harassment: Narratives of Activism, Inclusion, Confidentiality, Accountability, and Healing
Incidents of sexual violence and sexual harassment (SVSH) have been a focus of national headlines this year as a social and political movement swept the country. SVSH is also a longstanding topic of interest among social science researchers nationally, and UC Berkeley administrators and practitioners are making efforts to improve SVSH support, procedure, and policy […]
Research Team
Comparing the Politics of Computer Vision in the United States, China, and Europe
Artificial intelligence is increasingly being used to visualize the social world, and computer vision technologies are being developed according to divergent standards in different countries. This Matrix Research Team will study, discuss, and provide perspective on the emerging comparative political economy of computer vision. The group’s work will focus on three case studies—United States, China, […]
Research Team
Causal Conversations
The proliferation of data sources and the advent of computationally intensive analytic algorithms have multiplied the possibilities for non-experimental (i.e., observational) research. Much of that research highlights prediction, yet remains agnostic about cause, a successful strategy as long as the causal structures undergirding the phenomena remain stable. This raises concerns, as practical action or public […]
Research Team
Native/Immigrant/Refugee: Crossings and Divides
In the current moment of resurgent populist nationalism, understanding how rhetorical and legal claims are made about the “native,” “immigrant,” and “refugee” is an urgent project of critical social importance. Understanding the complex nature of these categories in relationship to each other—as by turns antonymous, overlapping, oppositional, and precarious—even as the laws and policies that […]
Research Team
The DNA of Media Accounts on Genetic Ancestry Testing
A growing number of people are taking genetic ancestry tests (GAT), and companies like FamilyTreeDNA, AncestryDNA, and 23andMe now make up a multibillion-dollar industry dominating both popular and academic discourse. Literature on GAT largely attributes consumer participation to a desire for individuals to identify biological relatives, validate genealogical records, fill gaps in family histories, and […]
Research Team
Berkeley Black Geographies
The Berkeley Black Geographies (BBG) project will foster intellectual creative space and proposes an intervention into the colonial canon of academic disciplines. BBG looks at the ways that many disciplines utilize Black radical thought and geographic methods in order to mobilize rigorous and meaningful theory and praxis for interdisciplinary projects while countering the anti-Black and […]
Research Team
Child Marriage and Youth Empowerment: Directions for Future Research, Practice, and Training
Child marriage refers to a union—formal or informal—in which one or both members of a couple marry before the age of 18. Annually, an estimated 15 million girls marry before their 18th birthdays. Evidence shows that marriage below the age of 18 increases risks related to health, education, opportunity and, well-being. It increases girls' exposure […]
Research Team
Queer Ecologies: Constructions of Gender and Sexuality in Animal Behavior Science
The Queer Ecologies Prospecting Team will examine how historically exclusionary and hierarchical ideas of race, sex, and gender are both replicated and disrupted by contemporary laboratory and fieldwork practices, as well as theoretical innovations, in animal behavior sciences. The group conceives of animal behavior sciences—such as studies of mate choice and sexual display—as cultural, social, […]
Research Team
Masculinity and Capitalism
Recent decades have brought about a striking increase in inequality among men across many scales. Within the regime of globalized financialized capitalism, manufacturing has been relocated to low-wage regions, and many of the jobs have simply disappeared because of automation. At the same time, in the upper echelons of financial capitalism, elite men continue to […]
Research Team
Gender and Technology
UC Berkeley is an ideal place from which to study the tech industry. The San Francisco Bay Area serves as the headquarters of most large tech companies, including Google, Facebook, Apple, LinkedIn, as well as countless startups. UC Berkeley also produces a large number of tech workers. Yet no groups on campus are currently working […]
Research Team
Matrix GRAD SLAM
Graduate students from UC Berkeley's Social Science Departments are invited to participate in the first-ever Social Science Matrix GRAD SLAM, which is modeled after the UC Grad Slam and Three-Minute Thesis competitions organized by universities around the world. Join us for this fun event, learn about each other's work, and forge connections across fields in […]