Sociology Newsletter - April 2025

It’s registration time for the Fall semester! Priority registration appointments are issued prior to open registration and are based on the number of credits completed. Be sure to find your priority registration appointment in your UCDAccess student portal prior to each semester's class registration period. For best course selection, register as soon as possible after your registration time assignment.

A few important dates to remember:

• April 1-16 Registration begins for Fall semester via UCDAccess
• April 6 Last day to withdraw from a Spring class via UCDAccess
• April 7 First day to withdraw from a Spring class with a Late Withdraw Petition Form
• April 17 Open Enrollment for Fall 2024 begins
• May 7 Last day to withdraw from a Spring class with a Late Withdraw Petition Form

Also, make sure to touch base with our expert Undergraduate Advisor, Dr. Maren Scull, to ensure you are taking the correct classes for your major, minor, or certificate.

Are you feeling anxious about how to stay committed to justice, equity, and inclusion amidst the federal transition? Do you want to develop practical tools to combat misinformation and create real change? The CLAS Council on Access and Community Engagement (ACE) is partnering with Christina Dawkins, founder of A4Abolitionist and A4Academy on a three-part programming opportunity for faculty, staff, and students interested in supporting the university’s core values in concrete ways. Learn more about this timely and vital activity and register before April 7 here.

April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month. The Phoenix Center at Auraria will be hosting a series of events throughout the month to raise consciousness around gender violence and support survivors (see Events below). But you can help promote change throughout the year by becoming a helpline volunteer. Volunteers support survivors on the Auraria campus. This is a great chance to learn new skills, acquire volunteer hours, and promote change. Additional details are available here. Apply by Monday, June 16th for summer helpline training.

The CU Denver Writing Center is available to help you with your upcoming writing assignments. Even if you don’t have a paper due tomorrow, the Center is available to meet to talk about your ideas and how you might grow as a writer. You can meet with them in-person or online. To learn more and schedule an appointment, head here!

Alpha Kappa Delta is continuing its workshop series for sociology graduate students: The Graduate Student Lounge. The AKD Grad Student Lounge is an initiative sponsored by Alpha Kappa Delta to support and foster graduate students’ professionalization, well-being, and peer networking. It meets monthly to discuss various topics of interest to graduate students in sociology and offers a grad-only safe space to share tips, ideas, and recommendations. Graduate students are welcome to sign up to be invited using this link.

Alpha Kappa Delta currently provides funding to AKD student members who present at regional sociology conferences. Awards are up to $500/student, although no more than $1,500 may be awarded per chapter. This is another great reason to join sociology’s honor society. For more information about AKD, contact Dr. Jenny Vermilya.  

The CU Denver Lynx Food Pantry responds to the need of CU Denver students for resources to fight food insecurity. CU Denver students have access to free food and hygiene products. All students are allocated 10 points each week to use on items from the pantry, whether it's just to grab a snack for the day or to help out with a meal. Bring your student ID when you visit. The Lynx Food Pantry is located on the 3rd floor of the Wellness Center. 

The Phoenix Center at Auraria will be hosting a series of events throughout the month to raise consciousness around gender violence and to support survivors. Come join us to learn about and engage in sexual violence prevention through the following interactive events, workshops, and self-care.

• Trauma Informed Yoga. The PCA and Auraria Health Center will hold two sessions of trauma informed yoga on Tuesday, April 8th from 11:30AM-12:15PM and 12:30PM-1:30PM in Tivoli 440.
• Keep Talking: End The Stigma. CU Denver’s Case Management Office and The Phoenix Center at Auraria will host the annual Keep Talking: End The Stigma event on Wednesday, April 9th from 3PM-5PM in the Emmanuel Gallery. Keep Talking is a live, storytelling event aimed at decreasing societal and campus stigma around mental health and sexual violence. Students, staff, and faculty are invited to share their experiences with mental health to provide solace to our community in a meaningful and creative way.
• Healthy Masculinity Lunch & Learn. The PCA will host a workshop on Tuesday, April 8th from 12:30PM-1:45PM on the roots of toxic masculinity, the impact of toxic masculinity on our communities, and developing healthy masculinity. Food will be provided to participants.
• Understanding Incel Culture Lunch & Learn. The PCA will host a workshop on Monday, April 14 from 12:30PM-1:45PM on the history of incel culture, the demographics and motivations of people who embrace this culture, and how to combat it. Food will be provided to participants.

• Boxing for Empowerment! The tri-institutional Boxing for Empowerment event is designed to empower participants by using their voice and movement. The event will feature a free kickboxing class. Boxing for Empowerment will be hosted at CU Denver's Lola and Salazar Student Wellness Center in Studio 2 on Tuesday, April 15th from 4PM-5PM. Sign up soon as space is limited!
• Survivor Game Night. The PSA is putting together a cozy night of relaxation with LoFi music, boards games, puzzles, Nintendo Switch games, and food! Survivor Game night will be hosted in Tivoli 440/540 on Wednesday, April 16th from 3:30PM-5:30PM. You do not need to disclose being a survivor to attend. And feel free to bring your own Nintendo Switch and joy cons as well!
• Consent Turns Me On (CTMO) Carnival. Ready for the BEST EVENT of Spring 2025!? The Consent Turns Me On (CTMO) Carnival is back for Sexual Assault Awareness Month! Join us for carnival food, consent-themed games, STI Testing from BeYou Colorado, a consent petting zoo from PAWsitive Recovery, balloon animal making, a Denim Day themed Photo Booth, on-campus & community resources, and SO MUCH MORE! The carnival will be hosted on Wednesday, April 23rd from 10AM-2PM in Turnhalle 250. The 1st 100 people to arrive wearing denim will receive a free denim bucket hat! Folks who participate in our passport activity will receive a free consent grocery tote bag.
• Staff & Faculty Survivor Support Workshop. Staff and faculty on Auraria Campus are invited to join representatives from the Auraria S.A.A.M. Planning Committee to learn more about how to support students who disclose experiencing interpersonal violence, obligations as a responsible employee, and current Title IX regulations. The workshop will be held on Wednesday, April 30^th from 12:30PM-2PM with Zoom registration details to come.

The Sociology Club meets every other Tuesday this semester from 6PM-7:30PM at the Sociology Department Library (Lawrence Street Center 420). Watch your emails and social media for information on future meetings. On March 18, the Club celebrated a movie night. Over 20 students gathered at the Tivoli Theatre in Lynx Connect to take in Fight Club, whose reflections on masculinity and belonging presaged key dynamics shaping our contemporary times. Join us at future meetings and help make the world a better, and funner, place!

RaCAS is a big deal around here. The Research and Creative Activities Symposium (RaCAS) is an annual event where CU Denver undergraduate and graduate students showcase their scholarship. Each year, over 200 presenters share their research and creative projects and celebrate their achievements with peers, faculty, family, and friends. The 28th Annual RaCAS will take place on April 25^th from 9AM-2PM at the Lola and Rob Salazar Student Wellness Center.

Good luck to those of you presenting at RaCAS! And if you’re not presenting this year, put this awesome opportunity to build your research profile on your radar for next year!

It might be difficult to see at the moment, but the finish line to the semester is approaching! To celebrate, our department will be holding an end-of-the-year celebration featuring keynote speakers, critical reflection on the challenges of our current times, and recognition of accomplishments. Plans are in the works. But pencil us in your calendars for Thursday, May 8 from 3:30 to 5:30. More details to come!

“In Peace and Harmony with Nature” (Leo Tanguma, 1994), Denver International Airport

The department is happy to shout out that Audrey Barrett (see photo), Sociology MA student, and Isabella  Luna, Sociology BA student, both presented at the 96^th Annual Pacific Sociological Association (PSA) Conference in San Francisco during Spring Break. Audrey’s talk, “Doctors of Instagram: Implicit Marginalization of Illness and Disability Online”, discussed the marginalization of illness and disability in health-promotional content produced by doctors on Instagram. Isabella’s presentation, “Exploring the Social Identities of First Born Latinas: Examining the Influence of Familial Roles on Romantic Relationships and Mental Health”, explored the influence of Latino familial socio-culturalization on the identity formation, roles, romantic relationships, and mental health of first-born Latinas. Congratulations Audrey and Isabella and thank you for representing us at PSA!

The department would like to give an extra loud shout out to Ven Talley, a sociology major whose art piece, “Strength in Numbers”, is featured in "Guilty 2025: A CU Denver Student Exhibition" at the Emmanual Art Gallery, March 13 - April 10. Ven writes about the piece, “I made "Strength in Numbers" as an editorial prompt for my Illustration 3 course, and the specific direction I went with is based on my evolving feelings surrounding different sociological epistemologies, positivism, and how quantitative data is reduced or misinterpreted to justify true roots of social inequality such as class divide, white supremacy, and colonialism. The model of the bell curve has embedded ties to eugenicist theories of intelligence and work. And so, this piece reflects my struggle of conceptualizing quantitative-centric approaches holistically in my own studies.” Great work Ven and thank you sharing your vision!

On March 13, at the Lawrence Street Center, our campus honored the life and legacy of Dr. W.E.B. Du Bois. Keynote speakers Dr. Reiland Rabaka (see photo), a prominent Du Bois scholar at CU Boulder, and Arthur McFarlane, the great-grandson of Du Bois and chair of the Denver Black Reparations Council, electrified attendees with their energy and insight on Dr. Du Bois’s work. Khalid, Kacey, and Theodore from Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) Denver, meanwhile, captivated the audience with their spoken word presentations. Sociology department chair Keith Guzik helped organize and host the event. And a shout out to all of you who took part in this uplifting event.

George Orwell, the English novelist and social critic, published Nineteen Eighty-Four in 1949 as a warning against authoritarianism, surveillance, and regimentation of thought and behavior in society. An excerpt from 1984 on state manipulation of the truth and facts through language: “The Party said that Oceania had never been in alliance with Eurasia. He, Winston Smith, knew that Oceania had been in alliance with Eurasia as short a time as four years ago. But where did that knowledge exist? Only in his own consciousness, which in any case must soon be annihilated. And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed--if all records told the same tale--then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past,' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.' And yet the past, though of its nature alterable, never had been altered. Whatever was true now was true from everlasting to everlasting. It was quite simple. All that was needed was an unending series of victories over your own memory. 'Reality control', they called it: in Newspeak, 'doublethink'.”

On March 17, Denver immigration and labor activist Jeanette Vizguerra was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and held at an immigration detention facility in Aurora. During the first Trump administration, Vizguerra took refuge in Colorado churches to avoid deportation. ICE says Vizguerra entered the U.S. from Mexico illegally in 1997 and is being held pending deportation. A US District Court Judge issued an injunction to prevent Vizguerra’s deportation as her case works its way through the legal system. Local artists rallied last week to support Vizguerra at a benefit concert to raise funds for her legal fees. You can follow developments on her study in local and national media, including Colorado Newsline and Democracy Now!

Columbia University recently announced that it would overhaul its student disciplinary process, ban protesters from wearing masks, bar demonstrations from academic buildings, adopt a new definition of antisemitism, and put its Middle Eastern studies program under the supervision of a vice provost with control over curriculum and hiring in an effort to restore $400 million of funding that the Trump Administration had cancelled over the university’s handling of student protests against Israel’s war in Gaza. The story has sent chills through higher education for its implications on academic freedom. The New York Times ran an episode of its “The Opinions” column and podcast on what the affair may mean for higher education in general.  

Earth Day will be celebrated on Tuesday, April 22. Glum news about the state of our planet abounds. 2024 marked the first year in modern history that the Earth’s average temperature climbed to more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels for an entire year. But change can still take place. To learn more about the state of our world and how you can make a difference at BBC Earth and Earthday.org.