MICRO-BIO

• Leah is a doctoral student in the American Studies program at the University of Maryland and a practicing qualitative researcher. Her dissertation research centers around an interdisciplinary examination of relationships between popular music, ident...More

  Leah is a doctoral student in the American Studies program at the University of Maryland and a practicing qualitative researcher. Her dissertation research centers around an interdisciplinary examination of relationships between popular music, identity formation, queer theorizing, and age within style based subcultures. She is the recipient of the 2018-2019 Outstanding Graduate Assistant Award from the University of Maryland Graduate School for her work on the mixed-methods Food Access and Student Well-Being Study. Leah also holds and M.A. in American Studies with a Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies and Material Culture, where she undertook a practicum at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. She also holds a B.A. in Sociology from Eastern University. In her spare time, she is a DJ and staff writer for WMUC-FM College Park and a musician in the Baltimore area. 

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EXPERIENCE

• University of Maryland

  • Doctoral Candidate
  • Department of American Studies
  • January 2019 to Present

• University of Maryland

  • Graduate Research Assistant
  • Counseling Center Research Unit
  • July 2017 to September 2019

• University of Maryland

  • Graduate Research Assistant
  • Office of the Dean of Arts and Humanities
  • August 2016 to July 2017

• Smithsonian Institution

  • Program Intern, Sounds of California
  • Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage
  • January 2016 to June 2016

EDUCATION

• University of Maryland

  • PhD American Studies
  • August 2016 to Present

  My proposed dissertation is a qualitative exploration of middle age within style-based subcultures in Baltimore, MD and Washington, D.C. which pulls together sociological analysis, age studies, performance theory, and queer studies to rethink the nature and meaning of what it means to grow older subculturally.

• University of Maryland

  • M.A. American Studies and Graduate Certificate in Museum Studies and Material Culture
  • August 2014 to December 2016

  Thesis: “Alternative Imaginaries, Gothic Temporalities: An Ethnography of the Cultural Construction of Aging in the Goth Subculture”

• Eastern University

  • B.A. Sociology
  • August 2000 to May 2004

  Thesis: “Religiosity and Levels of Peer-to-Peer Harassment in Public and Religious Schools”

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