Caterina Fugazzola is a sociologist whose research interests include social movements, gender and sexuality studies, transnational sociology, and qualitative research methods. Her book, Words Like Water: Queer Mobilization and Social Change in China (2023, Temple University Press), focuses on sexual identity organizing in the People’s Republic of China, and examines strategies for social change in a political context that precludes avenues for direct political engagement. Her work is based on ethnographic fieldwork, interviews, and rhetorical analysis of online contexts, and takes the contemporary tongzhi (LGBT) movement in the People’s Republic of China as a case in which grassroots groups have achieved significant social change in virtual absence of public protest, and under conditions of tightening governmental control over civil society groups. Her future work will continue engaging with the tactical use of language and culture, looking at the way narratives, discourses, and identities interact with—and contribute to—processes of social change.
She holds a PhD and an MA in Sociology from the University of Chicago, an MA in Asia Pacific Studies from the University of San Francisco, and a BA in Languages and Economic and Legal Institutions of East Asia from Ca’Foscari University of Venice. Prior to joining the Global Studies Program, she was an Earl S. Johnson Instructor in Sociology in the Master of Arts Program in the Social Sciences (MAPSS) at the University of Chicago.
Courses:
- GLST 23102 Global Studies II
- GLST 23129 Transnational Queer Politics and Practices
- GLST 25199 Digital Ethnography
- GLST 25245 Serious Play: Video Games and Global Politics