Welcome to the University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Center for Justice, Law, and Societies
A New Website Is Forthcoming!
Events
UMass School of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Democracy in Troubled Times Initiative
April 24: Paul Collins, Alyx Mark, and Allison Harris – Federal Courts and the Future of American Democracy4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., Integrative Learning Center, Communication Hub (3rd floor)
Join us for a discussion between Paul Collins (UMass Amherst), Alyx Mark (Wesleyan University), and Allison Harris (Yale University) on the federal courts and the future of American democracy .
Northeast Law and Society Retreat:
Thank you for a very successful event! Look out for the 2026 Retreat
September 27, 2024 ● University of Massachusetts Amherst Campus Center
September 27, 2024 ● University of Massachusetts Amherst Campus Center
Announcements
Meet our Graduate Fellows
CJLS Welcomes Its Fourth Graduate Fellow Cohort. Graduate students will receive mentorship from the CJLS community, help select speakers of the Five College CJLS Speaker Series, and receive up to $1000 to attend an interdisciplinary law related conference.
Justin Burnworth is a 4th year Political Science graduate student. He aims to develop a working understanding of who the Justices cite most often, what those legal scholars share in common, and the significance of the Justices turning to law professors in the pursuit of shaping the law as they best see fit.
Eric Ross is a 3rd year History graduate student. He aims to examine the largely overlooked role of grassroots anti-nuclear activists in the mid to late 1970s in laying the foundation for this later broad-based and influential movement of the early 1980s.
Aishwarya Marathe is a 2nd year comparative literature graduate student. She is working on the portrayal of sisterhood in the two most recent novels by Pakistani-British author Kamila Shamsie, Best of Friends and Home Fire, looking at class, citizenship, and the legal system.
Kerli Solari Diaz is a 2nd year graduate student in Afro-American Studies. She is writing about racist discrimination against Black children in the Peruvian basic education system as a human rights violation.
Jaeye Baek is a 5th year graduate student in Political Science. Her dissertation focuses on legal mobilization for wartime sexual violence across South Korea, Japan, and the US.
Eric Ross is a 3rd year History graduate student. He aims to examine the largely overlooked role of grassroots anti-nuclear activists in the mid to late 1970s in laying the foundation for this later broad-based and influential movement of the early 1980s.
Aishwarya Marathe is a 2nd year comparative literature graduate student. She is working on the portrayal of sisterhood in the two most recent novels by Pakistani-British author Kamila Shamsie, Best of Friends and Home Fire, looking at class, citizenship, and the legal system.
Kerli Solari Diaz is a 2nd year graduate student in Afro-American Studies. She is writing about racist discrimination against Black children in the Peruvian basic education system as a human rights violation.
Jaeye Baek is a 5th year graduate student in Political Science. Her dissertation focuses on legal mobilization for wartime sexual violence across South Korea, Japan, and the US.
Meet our 2024 RISE Undergraduate Fellowship Teams
This fellowship, now in its third year, provides full time summer funding for undergraduate students in the Remedying Inequity through Student Excellence (RISE) Program to work with a faculty mentor on research.
Paulina Ortiz Orive, Isenberg School of Management
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Allison Butler, Department of Communication
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The project, The Judgment of Gender, explores patriarchy as a form of censorship, focusing on how women who speak, act, or challenge norms are silenced. It uses case studies of women like Sinéad O'Connor, Britney Spears, and Anita Hill, as well as cultural phenomena like NDAs and Gamergate, to examine the intersections of gender, race, and class in media portrayals. The text begins with Roe and Dobbs’s cases on reproductive rights and concludes with a critical media literacy framework to deconstruct and resist the media's treatment of women.
Saniya Jain, Department of Economics
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Viviana Wu, School of Public Policy
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This project investigates how is foundation grantmaking adapting to prioritize social justice, with a focus on marginalized communities. Using a mixed-methods approach, the study will combine administrative data, network analysis, and qualitative research to examine grantmaking patterns and decision-making processes. The goal is to identify how foundations may perpetuate or address social inequalities through their funding practices.
Prisha Dayal, Political Science Department
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Toussaint Losier, Social Thought and Political Economy (STPEC) Program
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The project involves reviewing recent literature on prisoner activism, updating statistics on mass incarceration, and incorporating new scholarship on marginalized groups for the second edition of Rethinking the American Prison Movement. The revisions will enhance the current chapters while also expanding attention to Indigenous, Puerto Rican, immigrant, and LGBTQ organizing, as well as historical cases like Japanese American incarceration during WWII.
Génesis López, Sociology Department
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Jonathan Wynn, Sociology Department
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Housing plays a crucial role in shaping life opportunities, and audit studies are a powerful tool for detecting discrimination in housing and employment. These studies involve sending pairs of individuals with similar qualifications but different racial, ethnic, or class backgrounds to test for bias. Despite the method’s success, little attention has been given to the personal experiences of the testers. This project seeks to explore the backgrounds, perceptions, and challenges faced by these testers, shedding light on the ethical complexities and human aspects behind this important research tool.
The Center for Justice, Law, and Societies (CJLS) strives to foster research, teaching, and public engagement related to bias, inequity, and inequality in the law. We provide a vehicle to support interdisciplinary research that is policy-relevant and also theoretically generative. We bring together faculty and graduate students across the university working on Law and Society topics that are vital to domestic governance, such as access to justice for vulnerable populations, how court decision making shapes public policy, and the relationship between law and new technologies. In addition to our expertise in domestic law and society, we also pressing global challenges, supporting research related to international law, globalization, migration, and cross-border conflict resolution.
Want to Support the
UMass Center for Justice, Law, and Societies?
If you are interested in supporting the Center and its mission, follow the link below and list the Center for Justice, Law, and Societies under "gift designation" and "special instructions". Your support can go to research opportunities for students, public events, or other designated activities.
Thank you!
Thank you!