Latimer appointed
Chair of Division of Sociology and Anthropology

Morgantown, WV, June 2, 2006:  Associate Professor of Sociology Melissa Latimer has been named Chair of the Division of Sociology and Anthropology, housed in the School of Applied Social Sciences in the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences at West Virginia University.

“I feel honored and fortunate to be named chair,” Latimer said. “With the second largest number of student majors in the college and with such outstanding faculty, it’s a great time to be head of the division.”

Latimer received her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in sociology from the University of Kentucky. Her research has focused on the major ways in which gender, race, and class inequality are constructed and reconstructed through labor market processes and welfare policies. Much of her published work involves understanding individual experiences with social insurance and social assistance programs and how these experiences vary by gender, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, age, and place. More recently, her research has concentrated on federal welfare reform’s short-term and long-term effects on individuals in economically disadvantaged areas.

Latimer has been a member of the Interdisciplinary Research Task Force on Welfare Reform at West Virginia University since 1998. This research group has conducted four representative surveys of West Virginia welfare recipients. The task force also published the 2004 book Welfare Reform in West Virginia, which was selected as one of the top twelve finalists for the Book of the Year Award in Political Science in ForeWord Magazine. The task force’s work was also featured in a Washington Post article in July 2005.

For more information, contact Latimer at (304) 293-5801 ext. 3209, or at Melissa.Latimer@mail.wvu.edu.

W-V-U