Dr. Rishi Awatramani

Rishi Awatramani received his Ph.D. in Sociology from Johns Hopkins University. His research examines the racial politics of the working-class, and historical patterns of social protest, globally and in the U.S. His research interests are in the fields of race and ethnicity, labor and social movements, urban sociology, and political economy. He employs ethnographic and comparative-historical methods to research the successes and limits of U.S. labor and social movements in a global context. This research agenda takes shape through the study of the historically specific structures and conditions which shape the racial politics of urban working-class neighborhoods, focusing especially on transformations in the structures of capital accumulation, neighborhood-level civil society, and city- and national-level development policies. His research offers new conceptual tools for analyzing the conditions under which the appeals of social movements achieve salience. His research is motivated by his prior career as a community and labor organizer in U.S. social movements.