Research and Writing

Research

Research Interests

• Work and Occupations
• Social Inequality (Race/Class/Gender)
• Sexuality
• Social Theory
• Aging and Life Course

Current Research

Publications

Books

• The Hungry Cowboy: Service and Community in a Neighborhood Restaurant. 2009. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi.
• Feminist Waves, Feminist Generations: Life Histories of a Movement. Hokulani Aikau, Karla Erickson and Jennifer Pierce, eds. 2007. University of Minnesota Press. 

Articles

• “A Constructive Controversies Approach to Case Studies.” Sharon R. Bird, and Karla A. Erickson. 2010. Teaching Sociology 38 (2) 119-131.
• “Service Smiles and Selves: Representations of Labor and the Sociology of Work.” Karla A. Erickson. 2009. Cinematic Sociology, eds. Jean-Anne Sutherland and Kathy Feltey. Sage Press.
• "Farewell to the Organization Man: The Feminization of Loyalty in High-End and Low-End Service Jobs." Karla Erickson and Jennifer Pierce.Ethnography, Vol 6 (3): 283-313, Fall 2005. 
• "Bodies at Work: The Dance of Service in American Restaurants." Space and Culture, Vol. 7 Issue 1, January 2004: 76-89. 
• "To Invest or Detach? Coping Strategies and Workplace Culture in Service Work." Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 27, Issue 4, Fall 2004: 549-572.
• "Three Women Writing/Riding Feminism's Third Wave." Hokulani K. Aikau, Karla Erickson, and Wendy Leo.Qualitative Sociology, Vol. 26, No. 3, Fall 2003:397-425.
• "Service, Smiles and Selves: Representations of Labor and the Sociology of Work." In Cinematic Sociology, edited by Kathy Feltey and Jean-Anne Sutherland. Sage Press, 2009.
• "Farewell to the Organization Man: The Feminization of Loyalty in High-End and Low-End Service Jobs." Karla Erickson and Jennifer Pierce. 2008. In The Gendered Society, edited by Michael Kimmel, Oxford: Oxford University Press: 339-363.
• "Tight Spaces and Salsa-Stained Aprons: Bodies at Work in American Restaurants." Chapter 1 in The Restaurants Book: Ethnographics of Where We Eat, eds David Sutton and David Berriss, Berg Publishers, 2007: 17-23.
• "Work in the 'New' Global Economy." ASA Teaching Collection on Gender and Work, eds. Sharon Bird and Patti Giuffre (3rd edition), March 2006.
• "Transformations in Labor: Work in the 'New' Economy." The Sociology of Work and Occupations. American Sociological Association. June 2005.
• "Workers and Consumers in the Global Economy." The Sociology of Work and Occupations. American Sociological Association. June 2005.
• "Americans at Work in Poetry Film and Non-Fiction." The Sociology of Work and Occupations. American Sociological Association. June 2005.