Rebecca West

Rebecca J. West is Lecturer in the Department of Humanities, History, and Social Sciences at Columbia College Chicago.

Ms. West is currently a Ph.D. candidate at Loyola University Chicago in Sociology. She earned her M.A. at Loyola University Chicago as well, and her B.A. from Texas Tech University in Sociology with a concentration in Social Psychology.

Ms. West’s dissertation, “’I’m Not ‘Just Like You’: The Serious Business of American Girl Doll Collecting,” analyzes how participation in online communities alters both racial attitudes and consumer behavior, as well as examining the structure of online communities and how identity is established in virtual spaces.

Ms. West has presented her work at both national and regional conferences including the American Sociological Society, the Southwestern Social Science Association and the Popular Culture Association.

At Columbia, Ms. West teaches in both sociology and cultural studies. Her courses include Race and Ethnic Relations, Cybercultures, Women in U.S. Society, and Theories of Media, Culture and Society. For Fall 2012 she designed a new course, Quantatitative Toolkit: Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics, which is a course designed to give cultural studies students experience with using statistical methods in the cultural studies framework.

As well as teaching at Columbia College Chicago, Ms. West has taught at Loyola University Chicago, Roosevelt University, and Dominican University.

Contact Prof. West:

Mail:
Rebecca West
Columbia College Chicago
Department of HHSS
600 S. Michigan Ave.
Chicago, IL
60605

Phone:
312.369.7167

Email:
rwest@colum.edu