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This concentration focuses on the broad social phenomena of human mobility, and the specific social context of geopolitical borders. Mobility includes movement of people of diverse social categories and varied spatial and temporal ranges; migration is an important subcategory of mobility. The concentration takes advantage of UTEP’s place at the U.S.-Mexico border, but is not restricted to that site. The concentration is allied with existing UTEP research units such as the Socio-Environmental and Geospatial Analysis Laboratory, the Center for Environmental Resources Management, Center for Law and Human Behavior and notably the Center for Inter-American and Border Studies. The latter unit is the foundational site for border studies, and has active research collaborations in Mexico, Canada, Chile, Spain, and Italy, as well as across the United States. Close collaboration with community organizations on both sides of the border is a notable asset of this concentration. Department faculty have a proven record of securing external funding from NSF, DHS, USDA, and other agencies to conduct research on topics such as bilingualism in the economy, child migrants, effects of deportation, transboundary water, and impacts of climate change on vulnerable populations (in the latter two instances, combining forces with the environment and the health concentrations).

This concentration focuses on understanding how cultural and historical forces and social institutions affect individual and collective health behaviors and outcomes. Sociological theories, methods and research reveal how social conditions shape vulnerability and resilience to health conditions, medical training and practices, access to health resources, and experiences of seeking health care in relation to race, ethnicity, gender, (dis)abilities, socioeconomic status, and other markers of social status. The Culture and Health concentration utilizes a transdisciplinary approach to study these issues, allied with existing UTEP research programs such as the Border Hispanic Health Disparities Research Center, the Public Health and Nursing Programs, Interdisciplinary Health Sciences Ph.D. program, the Department of Social Work, Border Biomedical Research Center, and Texas Tech Health Science Center-El Paso. Department faculty have a proven record of funded research from NSF, NIH, TxPEP and other funding sources to conduct research on topics such as immigration and reproductive health, differential access to health care, global health inequities, environmental injustice and health, gender-based violence, mothers with disabilities, major health threats to Hispanics and immigrants, fertility, and other issues. The department is an active participant in BUILDing Scholars, a center of excellence funded through a 23 million dollar grant from the National Institute of Health, to support institutional, faculty, and student development of the next generation of biomedical researchers. D. Morales is co-PI of BUILDing Scholars and a leader in the Research Enrichment Core, while Leyser-Whalen is a member of the Advisory Board and A.Frederick is a Research Fellow. Other departmental participants in the program include Murga, C. Morales, and C. Heckert.

This concentration focuses on understanding how environmental processes affect and are shaped by social relations and practices. Sociological theories and methods examine the intersections of human and non-human environments in local and global contexts. We use a multidisciplinary approach to study the spatial and socio-demographic dimensions of environmental issues, allied with existing UTEP research units such as the Socio-Environmental and Geospatial Analysis Laboratory, Center for Environmental Resources Management, Center for Inter-American and Border Studies, NIH Building Scholars, and the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in Environmental Science and Engineering. Department faculty have a proven record of securing external funding from the EPA, NSF, NIH, USDOT and other agencies to conduct research on topics such as environmental justice, border environments, food and water related inequalities, urban infrastructure, vulnerability to hazards and disasters, and other issues.