Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, Ph.D.

Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, Ph.D.

Title: Assistant Professor
Dept/Program: Sociology and Criminal Justice Studies
Office: Olin 231
Phone: 330-972-8267
Email: da18@uakron.edu
Website: https://danielajauk.com/
Curriculum Vitae: Download in PDF format

Biography

Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, PhD, is an Assistant Professor for Sociology and Criminal Justice at the University of Akron, Ohio. She is a qualitative researcher and Certified Clinical Sociologist with the Association for Applied and Clinical Sociology; the heart of her interest, passion, and work is feminist clinical sociology. As a clinical sociologist, she develops sociologically informed interventions and programs that she evaluates and advances with community-engaged qualitative methodologies. With a feminist lens and qualitative methods, she focuses on how oppression and privilege shape lived experiences in the U.S. and utilizes her research to make space for marginalized women’s and LGBTQIA+ individual’s voices and experiences.

Dr. Jauk-Ajamie’s research is located at the intersections of Gender Justice, Environmental Justice, and Criminal Justice. In seeking to research and address the dearth of women’s programming and the lack of sustainability and fresh food in carceral settings, she has practiced and researched therapeutic horticulture with incarcerated women through an innovative educational garden program she helped develop a community corrections facility. More broadly, she is interested in the larger project of advancing research on eco-social programming in US corrections. At the intersections of gender justice and environmental justice, she also examined women’s mass incarceration from a global perspective via research on the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and its impact on incarcerated women.

Her research at these three intersections has led to comparative research on reproductive justice.  Her most recent project, in collaboration with Dr. Melissa Thompson (Portland State University, Oregon) for the project Race, Gender, and Reproduction in the Carceral Field addresses access to contraception and abortion, as well as systemic injustices against criminalized women and their families. Dr. Jauk-Ajamie collects primary qualitative data in all her projects and collaborates with scholars nationally and internationally.

Dr. Jauk-Ajamie is a first-generation student who received an M.A. in Sociology from the University of Graz in her home country, Austria. She started her career as a social worker in feminist contexts and served as Independent Women’s Representative of the City Council Graz. She completed her doctoral work in Sociology as a Fulbright student at the University of Akron/OH, specializing in Qualitative Research Methodologies and Sociology of Deviance and Gender Studies. Her dissertation examines gender movements in and around the United Nations. In her early career, she also focused on experiences of (trans)gender violence, and spent substantial time engaging in and researching gender movements on an international level.

Her interventionist research informs and interacts with her service to students and different communities. She loves working with students and enjoys developing new teaching tools. For instance, she records the Corrections Close-Up podcast featuring interviews with corrections professionals and produces the Why Sociology? podcast. She co-founded the Ohio Innocence Project Chapter on campus, for which she served as a faculty mentor from 2020-2024. She now mentors the Sociology Club on campus. She is involved in the community as a board member of the Red Bird Center and actively serves her professional community in the publication committee of Sociologists in Women for Society and the Board of the International Sociological Association’s RC 46 on Clinical Sociology.

Her future research agenda is linked to parallel and larger efforts to contribute to a strong applied and clinical sociology program at the University of Akron, which will contribute to social justice, de-criminalization of survival, and more egalitarian life chances for all individuals in our communities.

Research

Current Research Interests

Sociology of Gender, Corrections, Environmental Justice, Gardening in Corrections, Reproductive Justice, Feminist Pedagogies, Qualitative Methods, Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.

Select External Sponsored Research Support

Peralta, Robert, Juan Xi, and Daniela Jauk-Ajamie. 2023. Funded. Policing, Trauma, and Health among African Americans in a Midwestern City. Co-PI. $15,658.40.

Thompson, Melissa and Daniela Jauk-Ajamie. 2022. Funded. Race, Gender, and Reproduction in the Carceral Field – A Comparative Study of Contraception and Fertility Choices. In collaboration with Dr. Melissa Thompson, Professional Development Grant, Portland State University. $5000,00 and $1200,00 for participant incentives.

Jauk, Daniela. 2020. Not funded. “Serenity in the Garden - Applied Qualitative Sociology Utilizing NVivo to Improve Social, Environmental, and Food Justice for Incarcerated Women and Their Communities.” QRR-IIQM Research Grant Proposal for Early Career Researchers. $ 25,000.

Select Internal Sponsored Research Support

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela and Christopher Coles. 2023. Funded. Freedom First Concert, an interdisciplinary community event for Rethinking Race. Dean Innovation Fund. BCAS. $1500.00.

Jauk, Daniela. 2021. Funded. “Online Service Learning with and for a hidden community: Experiential Learning through pen paling with incarcerated individuals.” Faculty Development Initiative. The University of Akron. Twice received $1000,00.

Jauk, Daniela. 2020. Funded. “Serenity in the Garden – A Local Pilot-Study Utilizing Applied Qualitative Sociology to Improve Social, Environmental, and Food Justice for Incarcerated Women and Their Communities.” The University of Akron Faculty Research Committee 2019-2020 Summer Fellowship. $ 10,000.

Publications

Book

Everhardt, Sharon, Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, Stephen Carmody, and Brenda Gill. 2024. Gardens Behind Bars. Clinical Sociology and Food Justice in Incarcerated Settings. New York, London: Springer - Clinical Sociology: Research and Practice, Series Editor: Jan Marie Fritz.

Peer Reviewed Articles

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela. 2023a. “Global Governance and Climate Stress of Incarcerated Women: The Case Of The U.S.” International Journal of Comparative and Applied Criminal Justice 47(2): 115-129. https://doi.org/10.1080/01924036.2022.2146731 (2022 Impact Factor: 1.1). Referenced in Open Letter from Women Beyond Walls addressed to all UN High-Level Forums on women’s rights, July 17, 2023, 220+ signatories

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela; Sharon Everhardt, Christie Caruana, Brenda Gill. 2022. “Bourdieu in the Prison Garden: Why We Need Sociological Theory, Sociological Practice, and More Gardens for Incarcerated Women.” Journal for Applied Social Sciences 17(1): 92-110. https://doi.org/10.1177/19367244221129185 (2022 Impact Factor: 0.900, Flagship Journal of Association for Applied and Clinical Sociology)

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela and Andria Blackwood. 2022a. “’I Grow Every Day, Like Plants.’ An Evaluation of a Gardening Program for Women in a Residential Community Corrections Setting.” Women and Criminal Justice. https://doi.org/10.1080/08974454.2022.2053031 (2022 Impact Factor: 1.0)

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela and Andria Blackwood. 2022b. “Gardening Works: Lessons Learned from a Sustainable Garden Program in A Residential Community Correction Setting For Women.” Advancing Corrections. Journal of the International Corrections and Prison Association. 13: 110–24. ISSN: 2789-5246

Klinger, Sabine, Daniela Jauk, and Nicole Pruckermayer. 2019. “Teaching with/out the F-Word.” Journal für Psychologie 27(1):30–50. https://doi.org/10.30820/0942-2285-2019-1-30 (2022 Impact Factor: 2.211)

Klinger, S, Jauk, D. & N. Pruckermayr. Teaching with/out the F-Word. Journal für Psychologie 27, no. 1 (November 7, 2019), pp. 30–50. https://doi.org/10.30820/0942-2285-2019-1-30.

Jauk, D. (2017). Feminist Scholar Activism Goes Global: Experiences of “Sociologists for Women in Society” at the UN. Brock Education Journal 27(1).

Jauk, D. (2014). Insiderness, Outsiderness, and Situated Accessibility - How Women Activists Navigate UN’s Commission on the Status of Women. Societies Without Borders, 9 (1), 69-95.

Jauk, D. (2013). Gender Violence Revisited – Lessons from Violent Victimization of Transgender Individuals. Sexualities, 16(7), 807-825.

Elman, C.; Feltey, K.; Wittman, B. & Jauk, D. (2013) “Drawn to the Land: the Life Course Consequences of Frontier Women’s Settlement over Two North Dakotan Land Booms, 1880-1910,” Social Science History, 37(1), 27-69.

Peralta, R. & Jauk, D. (2011). Drink, Gender and Sociology: A Brief Feminist Review & Critique of the Sociology of Alcohol-Use and Substance-Abuse Treatment Approaches. Sociology Compass, 5 (10), 882-897.

Peer-reviewed Book Chapters

Phillips, Samantha, and Daniela Jauk-Ajamie. Forthcoming 2025. “Growing Women’s Community Beyond the Fence - Notes from the Field” in Ecologies of Justice, under contract with Rutgers University Press, eds. DelSesto, Matthew, Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, Elizabeth Lara, Karen Hall, and Shea Zwerver.

DelSesto, Mathhew, Daniela Jauk-Ajamie, Elizabeth Lara, and Shea Zwerver, S. 2023. “An Introduction to Socio-Ecological Initiatives in Prisons, Jails, And Communities Impacted by Incarceration.” Pp. 186-205 in Handbook of the American Society of Criminology’s Division on Corrections & Sentencing, edited by Danielle Rudes, Gaylene Armstrong, Kimberly Kras, TaLisa Carter. London and Oxon: Routledge. ISBN 9781032449906.

Jauk-Ajamie, Daniela. 2023b. “Women And Girls Behind Bars in The United States: A Hidden And Vulnerable Population in Pandemic Times,” Pp. 245-261 in Women and COVID-19: A Clinical and Applied Sociological Focus on Family, Work and Community, edited by M. Seedat and Z. Toyo, London: Routledge. ebook ISBN 9781003267133

Jauk, Daniela, Brenda Gill, Sharon Everhardt, and Christie Caruana. 2022. “Systemic Inequality, Sustainability, and COVID-19 in US Prisons: A Sociological Exploration of Women’s Prison Gardens in Pandemic Times.” Pp. 185-209 in Systemic Inequality, Sustainability and COVID-19 (Research in Political Sociology, Vol. 29), edited by S. Aladuwaka, B. Wejnert, and R. Alagan. Bingley: Emerald Publishing Limited, DOI:10.1108/S0895-993520220000029015.

Jauk, Daniela, Sabine Klinger, and Nicole Pruckermayer. 2020. “Process Not Product: Rethinking Feminist Teaching Across Disciplines With Autoethnographic Trialogues.” Pp 73–90 in Ethnography in Higher Education, edited by C. Wieser and A. Pilch-Ortega, A. Berlin: Springer. DOI:10.1007/978-3-658-30381-5_5 I.

Jauk, D., S. Klinger & Pruckermayer, N. (2020). Process not product: Rethinking feminist teaching across disciplines with autoethnographic trialogues. In: Rethinking Ethnography in Higher Education, edited by Wieser, C. & Pilch-Ortega, A. Berlin: Springer.

Scambor, E.; Jauk, D.; Gärtner, M. & Bernacchi, E. (2019). Caring Masculinities in Action: Teaching Beyond and Against the Gender-Segregated Labor Market, in Feminist Perspectives on Masculinities. Teaching and Learning beyond Stereotypes edited by Magaraggia, S.; Mauerer, G. and Schmidbaur, M. London: Routledge. pp. 59-77.

Scambor, E. & Jauk. D. (2018). Mander es isch Zeit - Akteur_innen, Denkformen, Diskurse und Argumente antifeministischer Männerarbeit in Österreich. Edited by Peters, U., Lang, J. & Claus, R. Hamburg: Marta Verlag.

Jauk, D. (2016). International Trans*gender Movements. Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Gender and Sexuality Studies. Naples, N. et al (eds). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

Jauk, D. (2013). Invisible Lives, Silenced Violence: Transphobic Gender Violence in Global Perspective. Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 13, Emerald Publishing. Editors: Segal, M. & Demos, V., 111-136. ISBN: 978-1-78350-110-6.

Reprints of Published Works in Book Chapters

Jauk, Daniela. 2013. “Gender Violence Revisited – Lessons from Violent Victimization of Transgender Individuals.” reprinted in Gendered Lives, Sexual Beings: A Feminist Anthology. 2017. Edited by J. Misra, M. D. Stewart, and M. A. Brown. 2017. SAGE Publications.

Peer-reviewed Teaching Materials & Podcasts

Jauk, Daniela and Angela Adkins. 2022. “Why Sociology? Mini podcast interviews with applied and clinical sociologists.” in TRAILS: Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology, November. Washington DC: American Sociological Association. https://trails.asanet.org/article/view/why-sociology-podcast-interviews-with. Podcast available at: https://why-sociology.simplecast.com/

Jauk, Daniela. 2021. “Art as Sociology.” Assignment published in TRAILS: Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology. Washington DC: American Sociological Association. https://trails.asanet.org/article/view/art-as-sociology 

Jauk, Daniela. 2020. “Corrections Close Up - Podcast.” Assignment published in TRAILS: Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology. Washington DC:  American Sociological Association. https://trails.asanet.org/article/view/corrections-close-up-podcast, featured in the ASA Member News and Notes, November 2021. Podcast available at: https://uakron.hosted.panopto.com/Panopto/Pages/Sessions/List.aspx#folderID=%2251ed2659-ae47-4459-b06f-aab1014d4c26%22

Other Publications in Journals, Newsletters, and Online

Park, I. and Jauk, D. Community|Corrections|Connections. Thinking together (Community)Corrections and Teaching to Create Win-Win Situations. Poster presentation at NEXT. New Explorations in Teaching Conference. The University of Akron/OH, March 12-13, 2020. (postponed due to Covid-19)

Adler-Klausner, E., Jauk, D., Mayer, S., Scambor, E. (2017). Gleichberechtigte Wissenschaft. Fundiert argumentieren für Gender Studies. (Engl: Well-founded Arguments for Gender Studies to counter anti-feminist discourses) Ed.: Koordinationsstelle für Geschlechterstudien und Gleichstellung, Universität Graz.

Jauk, D. and Pruckermayr, N. (2016). Sex (and Genders) in der Seestadt - (De!-) Konstruktionen von Geschlecht im öffentlichen urbanen Raum.
(Engl.: Sex and Genders in Seestadt: De/constructions of gender in public urban space) in fiber. werkstoff für feminismus und popkultur, 25. 117-119.

Jauk, D. (2013). Fact Sheet on Gender, Sexualities, & Human Rights in the context of the UN. Commissioned by Sociologists for Women in Society.

Awards

2024 -- EX[L] Campus Community Collaboration Award for Reproductive Justice event series in collaboration with Dr. Mary Triece and Elizabeth’s Bookshop and Writing Center

2023 -- “Above and Beyond” Award by the Dean of the Buchtel College of Arts and Sciences for Ohio Innocence Project campus chapter (founding and student mentoring)

2023 -- Inaugural cohort ACE Fellow, Akron Community Engaged Scholar, EX[L] Center

2022 -- Transformative Justice Scholar-Activist of the Year Award for 2022, Save the Kids

2022 -- University of Akron Achievement Award “Outstanding Teacher”

2021 -- EX[L] award “Experiential Learning Recognition,”

2020 -- Most Valuable Professor Award, University of Akron Women’s Soccer Team

2014 -- Outstanding Author Contribution in the 2014 Emerald Literati Network Awards for Excellence

2013 -- Outstanding Peer Mentor Award, University of Akron, OH

2007-2012 -- William S. Fulbright Study Award, Austria/U.S.

2010 -- Outstanding Student Service Award, Department of Sociology, University of Akron, OH

2010 -- Graduate Committee on Research on Women and Gender - Award for feminist scholarship, University of Akron, OH

2008 --  “Allied Student Activist of the Year 2008,” Transgender Illumination Award of the greater Cleveland LGBT community, November

2007-2008 -- World Fellowship, Delta Kappa Gamma Honorary Society, U.S.

2002 -- Award recipient of the Styrian Labour Chamber (for master thesis) & best thesis-nominee of the College of Social and Economic Sciences, University of Graz, Austria

Education

  • Ph.D. in Sociology, University of Akron - Ohio, US, 2013
  • MA in Sociology, University of Graz, Austria, 2002
  • BA in Social Work, Academy of Social Work Graz, Austria, 1996

Courses

  • SOCIO 100 Introduction to Sociology (face to face, fully online, and hybrid formats)
  • SOCIO 365 Sociology of Gender, Sex and Sexualities (in person, online live)
  • SOCIO -325 Sociology of Women in a Global Society (in person)
  • SOCIO special topics Unclass: Urban Bio Justice (with Petra Gruber)
  • SOCIO special topics Career Pathways in the Social Sciences (with Rebecca Erickson)
  • CRJU-103 Introduction to Corrections(online)
  • CRJU-385 Crisis and Trauma: Assessment and Interventions
  • CRJU-100 Introduction to Criminal Justice (online)

Dr. Jauk-Ajamie has (team) taught several innovative teaching formats in the areas of gender studies and qualitative methodologies, new media, antifeminism, feminist media activism, gender and public space, as well as international gender movements at several Austrian and US universities.