Blackstone Research Proposal Wins ‘Feminist Perspective Award’

Contact: Amy Blackstone, 581-2392; George Manlove, 581-3756

ORONO — UMaine assistant professor of sociology Amy Blackstone has received the Outstanding Research Proposal from a Feminist Perspective Award from the Feminism and Family Studies Section of the National Council on Family Relations.

The research proposal is a study and survey of child-free adults and their decisions not to become parents. The award includes a financial stipend to fund interviews she is conducting this summer and to off-set costs of attending the National Council on Family Relations meeting in Little Rock in November.

Blackstone’s teaching and research interests include social movements and activism, sociology of gender, sociology of work, and research methods. More recent research has included a study of the workplace sexual harassment experiences of males and females in adolescence and young adulthood.

The research project for which Blackstone won the Feminist Perspective Award will explore the processes whereby child-free adults decide to remain child-free and social responses to their choices.