Name: Irwin Sperber
Academic Rank: Associate Professor
Department: Sociology
Expertise Keywords: Addiction, AIDS research, Alcoholism, Alienation, Cancer, Drug trafficking, Environment, Environmentalism, Medical sociology, Mental illness, PCBs -- the Hudson River, Public health, Science, Social policy, Social policy, Sociology of science
Available For: interviews, essays, speaking
Expertise: ongoing research on ideological factors and funding mechanisms associated with scientific research on environmental hazards. (Some of this research was completed and published in journal dealing environmental hazards in 2000.) Studied medical sociology and sociology of mental illness at UC Berkeley under Erving Goffman and Ernest Becker. Book on Fashions in Science published by U of Minnesota Press, 1991. Was a guest once each month on WKNY-am, in Kingston, NY, hosted by Ann Fitzpatrick 1994-1996: program on health and life-styles.
Currrent Research: Environment and public health; PCBs and social policy; completion of manuscript on medical sociology; comparison of addiction treatment programs in Switzerland and the United States.
Contact Information
Office Phone: 845-257-2772
E-mail Address: sperberi@newpaltz.edu
Home Phone: 845-255-4371
Other Information
Positions held prior to joining SUNY New Paltz:
Assistant Professor, Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario (1970-1972); Assistant Professor, Stanislaus State College in Turlock, California (1968-1970)
Education
| Colleges/ Universities Attended |
Dates Attended |
Degree Conferred |
Year Conferred |
Major Subject |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| U. of California at Berkeley | 1961-1970 | Ph. D. | 1975 | |
| CUNY | 1960-1961 | M. A. | 1961 |
Awards/Grants/Honors
Woodrow Wilson Fellow (1962); scholarships, tuition waivers, teaching assistantships at UC Berkeley from 1961-1970
Other professional activities
Active member, Ulster County TFAC (Tobacco Free Action Coalition of Ulster County); Member of Board of Directors, Mid-Hudson Cancer Awareness Coalition;
Organizational Memberships
see above
Publications
Most significant in relation to above areas: FASHIONS IN SCIENCE: Opinion Leaders and Collective Behavior in the Social Sciences (Minneapolis: U of Minnesota Press, 1991). "Corruption of the Regulatory Process by Junk Science and Corporate Public Relations," in HAZARDOUS AND INDUSTRIAL WASTES: Proceedings of the 32nd Mid-Atlantic Industrial and Hazardous Waste Conference, 2000, pp. 205-214
