Mikaila Mariel Lemonik ArthurResearchDissertation
Abstract
This dissertation explores the ways in which new interdisciplinary areas of academic inquiry become institutionalized in American higher education institutions. It compares four key models for curricular change—those based in market forces, neoinstitutionalism and diffusion, faculty initiative, and student movements—to determine how well each one can explain the emergence of women’s studies, Asian American studies, and queer/LGBT studies over the past few decades. The dissertation uses a multi-methods strategy, including regression analysis, network analysis, fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), and archival cases studies. First, I test market-based and neoinstitutionalist arguments using regression analysis on an original dataset of sixty randomly-selected colleges and universities. Data for this portion of the dissertation has been collected from institutional websites, preexisting quantitative data, and surveys of college and university administrators. Second, using information on peer institutions during the first phase of the project, I test neoinstitutionalist and diffusion-based arguments using regression and network analysis techniques on a larger dataset of over 500 colleges and universities which includes network data. Third, I return to the smaller dataset, using fsQCA explore institutional political context and other internal characteristics which may be necessary and/or sufficient for curriculum change to occur. Finally, I conduct a series of archival case studies to more closely observe processes of student and faculty mobilization and counter-mobilization around curricular change. My research findings suggest that market forces are weak predictors of curriculum change for the type of interdisciplinary programs I am studying but that neoinstitutional explanations may be useful in understanding the spread of more institutionalized areas of academic study. On the other hand, pressure by students and faculty is key for the development of new programs. The dissertation proposes a new model, the institutional contextual model, for understanding the ways in which students and faculty work together as insider activists to create institutional change. Publications Mikaila's work is featured in The Encyclopedia of Racism in the United States, edited by Pyong Gap Min; The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology, edited by George Ritzer, and on glbtq.com. Mikaila has also published in Teaching Sociology; Contexts; Teachers College Record; Sexualities, Evolution, and Gender; and The Archives of Sexual Behavior; and has presented papers at the American Sociological Association and Eastern Sociological Society Annual Meetings. For more information, view the CV. Writing samples are available upon request.  |