Department News

Professor Eyal was part of a panel titled "Will Machines Have Free Will? Shaping the Future of AI" alongside other prominent Columbians including Joseph Stiglitz and Clare Huntington.

A political sociologist, Professor Ollion is a permanent research fellow at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) and an Associate Professor at l’Ecole polytechnique. Welcome, Étienne!

Professor Wimmer received the honor at the university's annual commemoration ceremony, which was also attended by Her Majesty the Queen of Danmark. Congratulations, Andreas!

On a recent episode of the Science Sessions Podcast, Mario discussed his research about neighborhood travel and racial segregation. The conversation is based on a fantastic paper that Mario published in the journal this past July. 

The department chair and Quetelet Professor of Social Science was honored with the Robert and Helen Lynd Award for Lifetime Achievement, which "recognizes distinguished career achievement in community and urban sociology"

Zheng is a co-winner of the Political Sociology section's 2024 Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship for a Paper by a Graduate Student Award. The award is in recognition of her paper "Missing Binds: How Absent Ties Unshackles Labor Militancy Under an Authoritarian Regime."

Katy is a co-winner of the Labor and Labor Movements section's 2024 Distinguished Student Paper Award. The award is in recognition of her paper "Towards a Gig Economy: A Case Study of Non-Platform Firms’ Use of Platforms in California’s Grocery Industry.”

A recent edition of the magazine devotes an article to Professor Small's working paper, which provides evidence that neighborhood "third-spaces" like Starbucks foster the creation of new companies. 

The Committee on Academic Affairs of the Board of Trustees approved the promotion of Adam Reich to Professor of Sociology. Adam first joined the department in 2012 as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholar, and became an Assistant Professor in 2013. Congratulations, Adam! 

Professor Western will continue in his roles as Professor of Sociology and Social Policy and Director of the Justice Lab into 2025, and will take up the role of President at the Russell Sage Foundation in July 2025.

Jonathan Cole's new edited volume, Smoother Pebbles: Essays in the Sociology of Science, is out now through Columbia University Press. The book is composed of journal articles that span Professor Cole's entire career, and that trace the development and institutionalization of the sociology of science. 

Supported by a three-year $1.7 million grant from the Mellon Foundation, the Lab aims to build the United States' first archive to center the political ideas and movement-building of incarcerated individuals.