Associate Professor
Department of Sociology
University of Tennessee
Phone:
865-974-7024 Fax:
865-974-7013 Email:
lpresser@utk.edu
Lois Presser is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Tennessee. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Human Development and Family Studies from Cornell University, an MBA from Yale University, and a doctoral degree in Criminal Justice/Criminology from the University of Cincinnati. Prior to earning her Ph.D., Dr. Presser worked for 10 years in the criminal justice system in New York City. She worked with and on behalf of both offenders and victims of crime.
Dr. Presser's current research concerns the role of language and discursive forms in social arrangements and action, including criminal action, and the promises and problems of restorative justice approaches to crime and other conflict. She draws on the perspectives of cultural sociology and critical criminology. Her work has appeared in top journals of criminology and sociology. Her first book, Been a Heavy Life: Stories of Violent Men (2008, University of Illinois Press), explores how violent men construct themselves as decent, heroic, and masculine in the face of stigma and under circumstances of captivity. Her next book advances a general theory of harmful action based on narratives.