

Research/Areas of Interest:
Media, Political Culture, Extreme Incivility, Identity-Based Attacks Online, Public Discourse, Gender, Social Movements
Education
- PhD, Sociology, University at Albany, State University of New York, United States, 2002
- MA, Sociology, American University, United States, 1997
- BA, Political Science, State University of New York at Geneseo, United States, 1993
Biography
Sarah Sobieraj is an award-winning teacher and researcher with expertise in US political culture, extreme incivility, digital abuse and harassment, and the mediated information environment. Her most recent book, Credible Threat: Attacks Against Women Online and the Future of Democracy (Oxford University Press, 2020), examines the impact of identity-based digital abuse on women's participation in social and political discourse. She is also the author of The Outrage Industry: Political Opinion Media and the New Incivility (Oxford University Press, 2014) with Jeff Berry, and Soundbitten: The Perils of Media-Centered Political Activism (NYU Press, 2011). Professor Sobieraj edited (with Rob Boatright, Danna Young, and Tim Schaffer) A Crisis of Civility?: Political Discourse and Its Discontents (Routledge, 2019). Additionally, she is currently co-editing the Oxford Handbook on Sociology and Digital Media with Deana Rohlinger, which is due out this semester. Professor Sobieraj's most recent journal articles can be found in Information, Communication & Society, Social Problems, PS: Political Science & Politics, Poetics, Political Communication, and Sociological Theory. Her work has also been featured in venues such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, Politico, Vox, CNN, PBS, NPR, the American Prospect, National Review, the Atlantic, Pacific Standard, and Salon. Sobieraj serves on the advisory board of the Social Science Research Council's Disinformation Research Mapping Initiative, is a member of the National Institute for Civil Discourse Research Network, and is a faculty associate with the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. In her free time, Professor Sobieraj enjoys listening to storytelling podcasts, talking politics, hiking, playing cards, and indulging in a good binge-watch.