Welcome to the website for Hephzibah V. Strmic-Pawl.

I am a fifth year graduate student in the department of sociology at the University of Virginia. My research and teaching interests are race and ethnicity, family, intersectionality, and qualitative methods. My research primarily centers on the intersection of race and family and focuses on racism, multracial identity/multiracialism, and African American families.

I defended my dissertation proposal in April and am currently working on my data collection. My dissertation is an investigation of multiracial identity; I plan to interview 90 Asian/White biracials and Black/White biracials who are first generation biracials and second generation biracials (offspring of a biracial parent and a single race parent). I will analyze how these individuals choose to racially identify, and how one's chosen racial identity might align with experiences and perceptions of racism in the United States.

Professional Memberships:

American Sociological Association: Student Forum Advisory Board (Elected Position: 2009-2011) Yahoo Group
American Sociological Association (Sections: Racial & Ethnic Minorities, Race, Class & Gender, Asia/Asian American)
Society for the Study of Social Problems (Sections: Racial & Ethnic Minorities, Family, Teaching Social Problems)Sociologists for Women in Society (Sections: Racial & Ethnic Relations, Race, Class & Gender, Qualitative Methodology)