Nicole T. Carr, Ph.D.

I came to South Alabama after completing my Ph.D. at LSU, and still love LSU football (GEAUX TIGERS). My research focuses generally on inequality; I examine inequality, the processes that generate inequality, and uneven outcomes in a variety of settings. One ongoing area of interest involves low quality employment- what we call marginal employment- from the 1970s to the early 1990s. This is a period time characterized by deindustrialization and the expansion of the service sector, increasing levels of education, and the mass movement of women into the labor market. I am interested in patterns of marginal employment in general and differences by gender, and particularly whether this form of employment is becoming a structural feature of the labor market. I also do research in the area of crime and deviance. One funded project, with Dr. Hanks, is a process and outcome evaluation of a juvenile aftercare program. We have developed a new approach to process evaluation combining both quantitative and qualitative methods, and also been able to work with the agency to provide ongoing data on the level of program implementation. Through this project, we have employed several students and included them in this research. We continue to study life histories of women involved in crime through interviews taken at Mobile Metro Jail. Using their narratives, we hope to develop more specific explanations about different paths women take into crime.