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Research Interests

Applied Criminology; Policy and Program Evaluation; Canadian and American Policing; Open-air drug markets; Opportunity theories of crime; Quantitative Data Analysis

Supervision

Victoria is actively seeking graduate students to undertake research in the areas of criminology, criminal justice program/policy evaluation, policing, drug markets, and opportunity theories of crime.

Biography

Victoria is an applied criminologist who specializes in policy and program evaluation and quantitative data analysis. She has done evaluations in a wide range of areas, including student mentoring, police run organized-crime countermeasures, and juvenile offender reentry. She has published papers on open-air drug markets and municipal policing and often employs quantitative or mixed methods approaches.

Victoria has taught courses in data analysis, research methods, policing, immigration and crime, organized crime, and youth justice.

Victoria is a co-PI on a U.S. Department of Justice-funded project titled, Exploring Officer Patrol Behaviors Using Automated Vehicle Locator and Body-Worn Camera Data in Kansas City, Missouri.

Victoria is the PI on a SSHRC-funded study titled, An Investigation of the Toronto Police Service Body-Worn Camera Program.

Victoria is a co-PI on a SSHRC-funded study titled, Clandestine Drug Markets and the Methods, Motivations, and Harm Reduction Activities of Peptide Users.

Research Interests

Bail and pre-trial detention; Supervision and conditions of release; Court processing and sentencing; Punishment and social control; Criminal justice policy; Risk management and surveillance; Criminal justice policy

Supervision

I welcome graduate students interested in doing research about bail and pre-trial detention, criminal court processing including plea bargaining and sentencing, community supervision and conditioning, as well as those interested more broadly in the administration of justice, criminal law policy and punishment.

Biography

My work focuses on the pre-trial detention and bail process, community supervision and conditions of release, court culture and organizational risk avoidance, the criminalization of non-criminal behaviour, the administration of justice and criminal law policy. I am interested in plea bargaining and sentencing; how being processed through the system is experienced as punishment; risk management, surveillance and social control through conditions of release; the impacts of lengthy court processing, the use of incarceration for administration of justice offences; accused people’s understanding of the criminal court process; and the provision of publicly funded legal services.

In 2025 I received a SSHRC Insight Grant for ‘“Jail not bail”?: Legal rights, risk and public safety’. For this study I am undertaking an extensive examination of the Toronto Regional Bail Centre (TRBC). Together with a team of research assistants we will observe all operating bail courts for 30 consecutive days, tracking accused across appearances and courts to case resolution. We will also interview criminal justice professionals on their experiences and perceptions of the challenges with the bail process.

Together with a group of criminologists and community stakeholders, led by Dr. Sandra Bucerius at the University of Alberta we were awarded a 7-year SSHRC Partnership Grant (2022) to explore the intersections of marginalization and discrimination in the criminal justice system. I co-lead the Court Node of research in the Partnership. I am currently working with Dr. Marianne Quiroutte and Dr. Chloé Leclerc at the Université de Montréal, on a survey of defence counsel in Ontario and Quebec that explores how counsel work with and represent marginalized clients. During the Partnership we will conduct interconnected research projects including an observational study of plea courts and a quasi-ethnographic and interview-based study of accused’s experiences in the criminal court process exploring how they make decisions about the processing and resolution of their case. I recently completed separate studies with the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (2023) on a follow-up to our 2014 semi-national bail study and with Legal Aid Ontario (2023) exploring racial disparities in bail outcomes.

Using a mixed methodological approach, I have conducted more than 400 days of bail court observation, reviewed over 500 completed criminal case files and conducted in-depth interviews with criminal justice professionals, people who have experiences with pre-trial detention and release in the community subject to conditions and people who have acted as a surety for someone. I have published numerous peer-reviewed academic papers about bail in Canada and presented my research at national and international conferences. I have appeared before the Senate of Canada Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights and the Ontario Legislative Assembly Standing Committee on Justice Policy. My work has been cited by the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Zora, 2020, R. v. Myers, 2019, R. v. Penunsi, 2019 and R. v. Antic 2017.

Teaching

• SOCY 388 Sociology of Criminal Justice
• SOCY/PHIL 406 (Walls to Bridges (W2B)- Othering Through Marginalization and Social Control
• SOCY 935 Criminalization, Social Control and Punishment

Research Interests

My work seeks to understand the roles of science and technology in the making of state power and empire and vice versa in contemporary societies. Drawing on science & technology studies and critical theory approaches, my research investigates how scientists and engineers are mobilized for political purposes, the social and cultural assumptions which inform their activities, and how the products of science and engineering stabilize social order. I mainly study technologies of state power and state violence: security and surveillance technologies, and more recently technologies of algorithmic warfare.

Research Projects

Necro-extractivism: Algorithmic Warfare, “Kill Clouds”, and the Racial Political Economy of Security Imperialism
(SSHRC Insight Grant, 2026-2030)

Infrastructuring the State: Morality, Materiality, Sovereignty
(SSHRC Insight Grant, 2019-2026)

Cybersecurity and the Making of 'Digital Territory'
(SSHRC Insight Development Grant, 2017-2019)

Supervision

I supervise students broadly in the area of science & technology studies (STS). I'm particularly interested in supervising students who want to work on questions of infrastructure and social order, technologies of state violence, infrastructures of empire, techno-politics, the role of science and engineering for state or market power, and science, technology & social inequality. If you're a prospective PhD student and you're interested in working with me, I'm best able to supervise you if you use qualitative approaches, and if you work broadly within the theoretical traditions of STS. If you're not sure if I'm the right person to supervise you, you're welcome to send me an email and we'll talk.

Biography

I have joined ���ϳԹ���Դ Sociology department in Fall 2015. I've been fortunate to work with some amazing people throughout the past years. Since coming here, I have been a Visiting Fellow at the Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa in Lisbon, the in Berlin, and I was affiliated with the Surveillance Studies Centre while it existed. Prior to coming to ���ϳԹ���Դ, I have worked as a researcher at Humboldt-University’s Science Studies department in Berlin, have been a visiting researcher at UC Irvine, and have worked as a researcher at Potsdam University, Germany, which is also where I obtained my PhD. I studied at Passau University, Germany, and at Sapienza University, Rome.

Research Interests

Gender; Sexuality; Cultural Sociology; Social Theory; Globalization; Immigration; Muslim Communities; Islamophobia; Qualitative Methods.

Supervision

As a cultural sociologist interested in understanding how people make and negotiate meanings around sexuality; how they deal with cultural contradictions and cultural change; and how they forge distinctions and belonging, I welcome students interested in cultural sociology, topics related to gender and sexuality, cultural change, and immigration.

My current research examines how Muslim immigrants navigate contemporary moral panics surrounding sex education and “gender ideology” in public schools. This includes both, responses to the imposition of comprehensive curricula in public schools, as well as anxieties around the introduction of “liberal” practices, such as sensitivity around the use of pronouns. I welcome both MA and PhD students interested in any of the following broad topics:

• Sex education (e.g., the comprehensive curriculum, media coverage of the comprehensive curriculums, or parents’, teachers’, or students’ views about the curriculum),
• Moral panics around sexuality, sexual ideology, and public schools from Muslims or other groups (in the US, Canada or elsewhere)
• Questions around the social and cultural integration of Muslim immigrants in western societies (any context). This can include topics such as dating, friendships, headscarves, immigrant experiences with institutions such as schools, integration into the job market etc.
• Islamophobia.

Students interested in topics related to cultural sociology or the sociology of sex and gender are also welcome to reach out.

Biography

Fauzia Husain received her PhD in Sociology from the University of Virginia in 2019, before completing a postdoctoral fellowship at the Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the University of Toronto. Her work has been published in Signs and Poetics and her research has been supported by a number of scholarships and grants, including from the National Science Foundation, the American Association of University Women and the Fulbright Program.

Awards

National (USA)

• 2021 Distinguished Article Award from the Sociology of Sexualities Section, American Sociological Association.
• 2019 Honorable Mention, Shils-Coleman Award, Theory section, American Sociological Association
• 2017 American Association of University Women International Doctoral Fellowship
• 2017 National Science Foundation Dissertation Improvement Grant

International

• 2007 U.S. Fulbright Scholarship.
• 2005 US International Visitors’ Leadership Program, US Dept. of State.

University-wide

• 2018 Bierstedt Prize for best graduate paper.
• 2017 Dean’s Dissertation Completion Fellowship (declined).
• 2016 Albert Gallatin Graduate Research Fellowship
• 2015 The Buckner W. Clay Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship
• 2015 Center for Global Inquiry and Innovation Grant.
• 2015 Arts Humanities and Social Sciences Summer Research Award

Research Interests

Sociology of law; Sociology of professions; Work and occupations; Life course research; Quantitative and mixed methods

Supervision

Professor Kay welcomes graduate students interested in the study of work and occupations and the sociology of law. She also invites students (undergraduate and graduate) to apply for research assistant positions with her team.

Biography

Dr. Fiona Kay is Professor in the Department of Sociology at ���ϳԹ���Դ. Her research is in the areas of inequality, professions, and law. She has examined the impact of gender, race and ethnicity on hiring, mentorship, promotion, and earnings, as well as the ways that organizational practices and workplace cultures shape opportunities and rewards. Her recent work with Dr. Elizabeth Gorman (University of Virginia) examined organizational initiatives aimed at general skills development and the consequences for racial minority diversity within elite professional service firms, as well as the influence of corporate clients in promoting diversity in professional service firms. Her recent work with Dr. Robert Granfield (SUNY Buffalo) explored lawyers’ pro bono (voluntary) service and its contribution to access to justice. In two new projects, Professor Kay examines shifting jurisdictional boundaries within the Quebec legal profession, and the scope of practice and regulation of paralegals in Ontario.

Professor Kay’s research is published widely in a variety of peer-reviewed journals, including: American Sociological Review, Social Problems, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Research in Sociology of Work, Journal of Professions and Organization, Advances in Life Course Research, Sociological Inquiry, British Journal of Sociology, Canadian Review of Sociology, Journal of Criminal Justice, and Crime and Delinquency. Her work has also been published in numerous law and law-related journals, including: Law & Society Review, Law & Policy, Law & Social Inquiry, Canadian Journal of Law and Society, Studies in Law, Politics & Society, The International Journal of the Sociology of Law, The International Journal of Law in Context, McGill Law Review, Osgoode Hall Law Journal, Studies in Law, Politics and Society, and The Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies.

She has also published chapters in several edited volumes and annuals, including Annual Review of Law and Social Sciences, Encyclopedia of the Sociology of Law, Research Handbook on the Sociology of Professions, The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, and Global Pro Bono: Diffusion, Contestation, Learned Lessons. She is author (with John Hagan) of Gender in Practice: A Study of Lawyers’ Lives (Oxford University Press) and editor (with Richard Johnston) of Social Capital, Diversity, and the Welfare State (University of British Columbia Press).

Her research has been covered by media outlets such as Law Times, National Post, National (magazine of the Canadian Bar Association), Lexpert, Precedent, Toronto Star, CBC News, and the Globe and Mail.

Presently, Professor Kay is engaged in three projects: (1) a twenty-seven-year longitudinal study of the careers of lawyers in Ontario; (2) a twenty-five-year longitudinal study of notaries and lawyers in Quebec; and (3) a mixed-methods study of paralegals and professional regulation in Ontario. Research projects have been funded by grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Law School Admission Council, the Law Foundation of Ontario, the Law Society of Ontario, and the Canadian Bar Association.

Teaching

Professor Kay teaches courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels on the sociology of law, sociology of professions, gender and crime, and research methods.

• SOCY458: Law in global context
• SOCY457: Law & social inequality
• SOCY305: Sociology of professions
• SOCY389: Gender & crime
• SOCY210: Social research methods

Awards

2024 Top Cited Article 2022-2023 Canadian Review of Sociology. Wallace, Jean E. and Fiona M. Kay. 2022. “Supportive Relation in a Feminized Occupation: How Male and Female Veterinarians Compare.” Canadian Review of Sociology 59: 4-22. See: https://doi.org/10.1111/cars.12366.

2024 Best Paper Award, Journal of Professions and Organization: Kay, F., and Gorman, E. (2024). “The Customer is Always Right? Corporate Client Influence and Women’s Attainment in Large U.S. Law Firms.” Journal of Professions and Organization, 11(3). See: https://doi.org/10.1093/jpo/joae005

2024 Lorne Tepperman Outstanding Contribution to Teaching Award, Canadian Sociology Association.

2022 Recipient of The Chancellor A. Charles Baillie Teaching Award, ���ϳԹ���Դ.

Research Interests

Science and Technology Studies (reproductive technologies, genetic engineering, human anatomy and manufacture); Feminist Social Thought; Visual Culture.

I am currently working on a new project: a graphic manuscript explaining civic action in the City of Kingston over development of the historic downtown. A long term study continues of the Busatti textile manufacturer in Anghiari Italy in terms of strategic branding amid socio-economic crises. A focal study of surrogate mothers’ experience in Canada has been reactivated following the pandemic.

Research Interests

• Criminology
• Young Offenders

Stephen Baron's interests relate to the study of criminology. His work is primarily in the area of street youth and their criminal behaviour. He is concluding a research project that examines how poverty and unemployment influence street youth's involvement in crime and substance abuse.

Research Interests

Disability Studies, Sociology of Health and Illness, Medical Sociology, Digital Platforms and Assistive Technology, Social Inequality, Social Policy, Sociological Theory, Qualitative Research

Supervision

I am accepting prospective graduate students, and undergraduate thesis supervisions, for the 2026-2027 academic year. I'm especially open to students with interests in disability studies, sociological theory, and the sociology of health and illness.

Please include a CV and draft project statement if you get in touch with me via email.

Biography

Before coming to ���ϳԹ���Դ in 2018, I was a SSHRC postdoctoral fellow in the department of Social Justice Education, OISE / University of Toronto (2014-2016), and later, a Killam postdoctoral fellow at Dalhousie’s department of Sociology and Social Anthropology (2016-2018). I completed my doctoral work at Carleton’s Department of Sociology and Anthropology.

I’m currently working on three main projects. The first is historical, exploring disability policy in Canada, the US, and France after the second world war. Here I'm doing archival research to see how governments, activists, and other groups organize disability politics around conceptions of freedom. The second project is qualitative, exploring how disabled youth use digital platforms in their romantic lives. Finally, I continue to work with colleagues in the rehabilitation sciences, exploring how disability is managed and made meaningful in the clinical space. Most recently, I've been looking at how clinical disability measures are translated into income support program eligibility.

Teaching

I teach courses on the sociology of health and illness, sociological theory, and disability studies.

In 2025-2026:

• SOCY 200: Sociology of Health
• SOCY 301: Disability and Society
• SOCY 410: Sociology of Health, Illness, and Disability (Undergraduate Seminar).
• SOCY 425: Sociology of Health, Citizenship, and Welfare (Undergraduate Seminar).

In the past I have taught:

• SOCY 226: Central Concepts in Sociological Theory
• SOCY 227: Theorizing Contemporary Society
• SOCY 936: Disability Studies (Graduate Seminar)