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Dr. Jerry Hollingsworth
Associate Professor of Sociology
Phone: (325) 793-4645
Office: Cubicle Village 8
Email: jhollingsworth@mcm.edu
 Dr. Hollingsworth discusses homeless children on the radio show “The Professors”
 Listen to Dr. Hollingsworth on women and crime
Ed.D., Nova Southeastern University, Ft. Lauderdale, FL.
M.S.S.W., University of Texas at Arlington
B.A., McMurry University.
A.A., University of Hawaii.
I have worked in the mental health field for the past 13 years, mostly with children and adolescents who have suffered from conduct disorders and psychiatric difficulties. I began teaching at McMurry as an adjunct professor in 1998, and was hired as a visiting professor in 2003. I became an assistant professor in 2004, as I was concluding my doctoral studies.
I still have keen interests in the mental health field, and have maintained scholarly interests in how juvenile delinquency is linked with the juvenile justice system by its mental health components: the foster care system, residential treatment, and in psychiatric institutes. I am also very interested in how criminal activity differs according to gender. I am especially interested in bringing the areas of sociology, social work, and criminology together in an eclectic approach to social problems such as crime.
My research interests over the past few years have included studies in transnational crime, as well as completing ethnographic studies of street children in Latin America and West Africa. I also have keen interests in the areas of Pan-Africanism and the Atlantic save trade. I recently studied at the W.E.B. Dubois Center for Research in Pan Africanism in Ghana, West Africa.
My book Children of the Sun: An Ethnographic Study of the Street Children of Latin America has just been published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
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Dr. Robert Wallace
Professor of Sociology and Chair of the Department
Phone: (325) 793-3895
Office: Maedgen 209
Email: rwallace@mcm.edu
Listen to Dr. Wallace on the radio show “The Professors”
M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D., Columbia University, New York
M.G.S., Miami University, Oxford, Ohio
B.S., Texas Tech University
I came to McMurry in the fall of 1990. My initial scholarship began in the field of social gerontology and shifted when doing Ph.D. work to the sociology of knowledge and the history of sociology. These interests still attract my attention, but it was while teaching at McMurry that my research areas intersected with my curricular responsibilities. The more I taught social stratification, the more I became intrigued with the theoretical and empirical questions it generated. In particular, I have been most concerned with the impact of social class on life chances. For the past few years, I have coordinated a paper session, “Class and Mobility,” at the annual Southwestern Social Science Association meetings. I am currently examining the extent to which we can speak of distinct “class cultures.” For instance, are there different cultural orientations among the working, middle, and upper classes? At this time, the answer to this question is Yes. The upper class cultural orientation is dominated by a norm of exclusivity. The middle class culture is much more concerned with comparison, while the working strata operate more with a pragmatic disposition. So far, my research suggests that these differing class cultures are influential across a number of social factors like family strategies, occupational considerations, educational aspirations, and consumption patterns. Bennett Award, 2007; voted Outstanding Faculty Member, 2010.
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Prof. Danette Cummings
Visiting Instructor of Sociology
Phone: (325) 793-4772
Office: Cubicle Village 10
Email: cummings.danette@mcm.edu
M.S.S.W., University of Texas at Arlington
B.S.W., Tarleton State University.
For twelve years, I worked in the field of child abuse and neglect for Child Protective Services as an Investigator and Community Initiatives Specialist. This continues to be a passion, and I currently serve on the Child Protective Services Board and volunteer as an advocate for the Regional Crime Victims Crisis Center. In addition, I am a member of the Kiwanis Club of Downtown Abilene, a global organization of volunteers dedicated to changing the world one child and one community at a time. For the last 2½ years, I have worked in a therapeutic rehabilitation center with low-income, special needs children. I have my license in clinical social work and continue working as a counselor and conducting home studies for the courts. I began teaching for McMurry University as an adjunct professor in 2007 at the Dyess AFB education center, and was recently hired as a visiting professor.
I have presented at conferences for Texas Council of Child Welfare Boards, Greater Texas Community Partners, and Prevent Child Abuse Texas re: community engagement, volunteerism, and child abuse/neglect. |
