Social Sciences/Humanities Summer Research | Department of Sociology

Students are invited to apply to the Social Sciences/Humanities Summer Research Program, designed to expand research opportunities for students in the Social Sciences and Humanities fields for summer 2026. Students can apply to each opportunity by including a resume and cover letter addressed to the faculty member listed in the job description. The application deadline is Sunday, April 12.  

Humanities/Social Sciences Summer Research Program | Department of Sociology

Faculty Member: Professor Nora Taplin-Kaguru

Job Description 

I have been invited to submit a literature review paper to Economic Sociology: Perspectives and Conversations (https://econsoc.mpifg.de/) for a special issue on wealth. I am seeking one or two students to assist me on gathering and organizing literature for this paper. The student researchers would conduct literature searches, write critical analytical summaries of relevant papers and books, collect citation information and organize citations thematically on Zotero. Student researchers could also read and help to edit sections of the paper. Students will develop their library research and literature review, writing and editorial and their social science analysis skills. 

The proposed paper is titled “The Paradox of Housing as an Investment and Housing a Right”. We will review economic and sociological literature on housing to better understand the contradiction of housing as an investment and housing as a right. 

Housing is one of the most fundamental and essential human needs. Housing is named as a right in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. At the same time, particularly in the United States, homeownership is understood as one of the most important investments households can make. Homeownership is thought to be an important financial pathway to the middle class and a tool by which middle class households can solidify their financial standing. Indeed for most homeowners in the US, home equity represents their largest investment. In 2021, for US homeowning households a median of 45% of their wealth was home equity. This percentage was even higher for Black and Hispanic households (63% and 66% respectively) even though they tend to have smaller absolute amounts of home equity (Kochhar and Moslimani 2023). But, there is a fundamental contradiction between the housing as human right and housing the most important tool for wealth building in the middle class. For homeownership to function as a wealth building tool, especially for households where the home is a large portion of their overall assets, the house must be guaranteed to gain value at a very high rate, faster than inflation (Hertz 2015). When home prices rise, housing becomes less accessible, and a greater share of the population is denied this basic human right. 

In the US, Black and Hispanic households bear the brunt of this contradiction between housing as a right and housing as an investment. Their homes typically rise in value more slowly or decline (Howell and Korver-Glenn 2020). Lower incomes, lower wealth and disparities in access to credit make it harder to buy a home in an increasingly expensive market. They are more likely to live in older homes that require more maintenance and even more likely to be cited for required maintenance, making the asset especially risky (Bartram 2022). Furthermore, the extent to which most American households are extremely dependent on homeownership for wealth building may lead American voters to support policies that restrict access to housing (for instance strict zoning laws that make it more difficult to build more housing units), making it more difficult for Black and Hispanic households trying to access housing to do so. 

Finally, on a more philosophical level, universal homeownership in the US was promoted in large part as a means of social control, ensuring the commitment of a larger class of homeowners to mainstream values and a rejection of more radical political ideas (Taylor 2019). In the US, those mainstream ideas include a rejection of universal welfare policies, including housing access (Prasad 2012). Widespread homeownership and the reliance on homeownership for financial stability and the ability of households to smooth their consumption during periods of economic instability, produces political support for neoliberalism and diminishes support for universal housing access. 

Students will contribute to the preparation of this invited paper which is due in September 2026. We will meet daily throughout the summer research program for training on literature review and citation management skills, discuss progress on student’s tasks and to refine their searches as work on the paper progresses. This will be an intensely collaborative experience but students will also be expected to demonstrate initiative and independence on their research tasks.

Works Cited 

Bartram, Robin. 2022. “Stacked Decks: Building Inspectors and the Reproduction of Urban Inequality.” in Stacked Decks. University of Chicago Press. 

Hertz, Daniel. 2015. “American Housing Policy’s Two Basic Ideas Pull Cities in Opposite Directions.” The Atlantic, October 14. 

Howell, Junia, and Elizabeth Korver-Glenn. 2020. “The Increasing E[ect of Neighborhood Racial Composition on Housing Values, 1980–2015.” Social Problems. doi:10.1093/socpro/spaa033. 

Kochhar, Rakesh, and Mohamad Moslimani. 2023. “Wealth Surged in the Pandemic, but Debt Endures for Poorer Black and Hispanic Families.” 

Prasad, Monica. 2012. The Land of Too Much: American Abundance and the Paradox of Poverty. Harvard University Press. 

Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. 2019. Race for Profit: How Banks and the Real Estate Industry Undermined Black Homeownership. UNC Press Books.

Skills or Training 

The student would ideally have some experience with Zotero or other citation management software. The should also have experience reading research papers and monographs in the social sciences. Having taken upper-level courses in Sociology, Economics or another social science discipline would be ideal preparation for this role.

Class Year Eligible: Current students in the Classes of 2027, 2028, and 2029.

Majors:  I will consider any social science or related interdisciplinary majors or minors.

Length: This position is full-time (minimum of 240 hours, over 8 weeks). The estimated start date is July 6, 2026. The estimated end date is August 29, 2026.

Internship Format: Remote or Hybrid at Bryn Mawr College 

(Note: There would be some advantage to the student having in person access to the library at Bryn Mawr but this is not completely necessary for them to be effective in supporting this research this summer, so there could be flexibility).

Funding Award: This opportunity includes a funding award of $5,000 (minus 15-20% taxes). 

Questions about this opportunity? Please contact Katie Krimmel at kkrimmel@brynmawr.edu and Professor Taplin-Kaguru at ntaplinkag@brynmawr.edu