Dr. Michael D Gillespie
Assistant Professor of Sociology
Office: 3139 - Blair
Phone: 581-7107
Email: mgillespie@eiu.edu
http://colescountypovertydataproject.wordpress.com/
Michael Gillespie's Vita
Michael D. Gillespie is Assistant Professor of Sociology at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Illinois, which he joined after completing his Ph.D. at Western Michigan University.
Dr. Gillespie teaches courses on social statistics, sociology of the family, contemporary social problems, and introductory sociology, and blogs (sporadically) on issues with social statistics at http://statsliteracy.wordpress.com/ .
Spring 2013 Office Hours
M: 12:30p-3:00p
T/R: 2:30p-3:30p
or by appointment
Dr. Gillespie is also coordinating the development of the Coles County Poverty Data Project, a repository of data and information on poverty in Coles County, Illinois. More information is available at: http://colescountypovertydataproject.wordpress.com/
Current Syllabi
- SOC 3100 001 Spring 2013
- SOC 2750G 1 Spring 2012
- SOC 2750G 2 Spring 2012
- SOC 2830 1 Spring 2012
- SOC 2830 2 Spring 2012
- SOC 1838G 6 Spring 2011
- SOC 3630 1 Spring 2011
- SOC 3630 2 Spring 2011
- SOC 3630 001 Fall 2012
- SOC 3630 002 Fall 2012
- SOC 1838G 8 Fall 2011
- SOC 2830 1 Fall 2011
- SOC 2830 2 Fall 2011
Frequently Taught Courses
Sociology 3630: Statistical Analysis of Social DataSociology 2830: Family and Society
Education
Ph.D. (Western Michigan University)Professional Organizations
American Statistical AssociationMidwest Sociological Society
Society for the Study of Social Problems
Union for Radical Political Economics
World Association for Political Economy
Speakers Bureau
For more information, please visit the Speakers Bureau Webpage.
Family Poverty; Welfare Programs; Applied Research
Research
Dr. Gillespie's doctoral dissertation, "From Reproduction to Consumption: The Economic Deterioration of Families in the United States after World War II", takes the start of the "Great Recession" in 2007 as the end-point of the decades-long decline in the economic wellbeing of middle-, working-, and poverty-class families in the United States. The major argument of this work is that welfare state retrenchments in public assistance combined with the deregulation of financial and non-financial capitalist firms contributed in part to the economic decline of families under growing levels of debt.Currently, his research is focused the poverty and food insecurity in Coles County. He is also using GIS mapping techniques to explore the geography of poverty and insecurity in East-Central Illinois, and within Coles County.
Other broad research interests include the causes and consequences of poverty, historical social welfare policy, the sociology of the family, gendered and racial disparities in public policies, political sociology, and historical-comparative sociology, including the conceptualization and macro-social and economic measurement of social indicators. Dr. Gillespie also has applied research and methodological interests and has worked extensively with social and family welfare programs in conducting evaluations of poverty reduction and child welfare programs.
Publications
Publications
2013 Foster, Gary S. and Michael D. Gillespie. “The Yuma Territorial Prison Cemetery: Cold Cases of Grave Importance”. Illness, Crisis, and Loss. 71(1)
2013 “The Economic Deterioration of the Family: Historical Contingencies Preceding the Great Recession.” American Journal of Economics and Sociology. 73(2)
2013 Review of “Broke: How Debt Bankrupts the Middle Class, edited by Katherine Porter, Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2012.” International Review of Modern Sociology. 39(1)
2012 “The Criminalization of Welfare: A Historical and Contemporary Analysis of Social Control for the Crime of Poverty” pp. 75-84 in K. Bell & R. H. McNamara, eds., Dimensions of Crime as a Social Problem. Durham, N.C.: Carolina Academic Press.
2012 “Capital Accumulation and Family Economic Deterioration: Historical Contingencies and the “Great Recession” of the United States.” The World Review of Political Economy 2(3): 406-40.
2010 Carlson, Susan M., Michael D. Gillespie, and Raymond J. Michalowski. “Social Structures of Accumulation and the Criminal Justice System.” In Understanding Contemporary Capitalism: Social Structure of Accumulation Theory for the Twenty-First Century, edited by Terrence McDonough, Michael Reich, and David M. Kotz. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
