Lilliauna Hopkins, soon to be PhD

My dissertation research (title TBD) conducts a two-fold analysis of the social and political meaning of community supervision practices, like probation and parole, and its effect on the social identity and institutional categorization of African American people, while providing an overall critique for the state of American penal leniency, tracing a history of how these practices have developed in the United States.

On the one hand, I will contribute a substantive, critical analysis of the "lenient" alternatives to incarceration, their histories, and their effects on African American racial identity, as legislators seek to mitigate the effects of mass incarceration. 

On the other hand, I will contribute an explorative critique of the development of American political institutions in their resistance to addressing the core issue of several studies such as my own: the overarching, underlying commitment of American institutions to perpetually excluding and socially 'other-ing' African American people.

Ph.D. in Political Science, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2026

M.A. in Political Science, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2023

B.A. in Political Science, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2020

Winter 2025 Race & American Politics (POLSCI 210), University of Massachusetts Amherst

Spring 2023 Intro to World Politics (POLSCI 121), University of Massachusetts Amherst

Fall 2022 American Political Thought (POLSCI 203), University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Spring 2022 Power (POLSCI 273), University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Fall 2021 Intro to Political Theory (POLSCI 171), University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Spring 2021 Public Policy (POLSCI 280), University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Fall 2020 Race and American Politics (POLSCI 336), University of Massachusetts-Amherst

Summer 2019 Introductory University Life, Norfolk State University

Summer 2018 Introduction to Health Science Education, Norfolk State University

“Why Reparations? Race and Public Opinion Towards Reparations.” The Russell Sage Foundation (RSF) Journal of the Social Sciences, 2024. (co-author)

"One Nation Under God, or At Least Some...: Race, Punishment, and the Boundaries of American Citizenship." UMass Question Everything, 2023.

"What Does It Take to Be An American?: Political Liberty and the Founder's Intent." UMass Question Everything, 2023.

"The Ins and Outs of Intersectionality." UMass Question Everything, 2022. 

"Threatening the American Brand: Centering National Security and Racial Policy amid the Civil Rights Movement." UMass Graduate History Association Conference, 2022.

"The Divergence of Feminism: How White Feminist Thought Fails Black Women." Virginia's Collegiate Honors Council (VCHC) Annual Honors Conference, 2020 (cancelled). 

"Opportunistic Oppression: How the Capitalist Elite Maintains Status Quo Using Mass Incarceration." National Association of African American Honors Programs (NAAAHP) Annual Meeting, 2018.