Department of Sociology | University of Maryland

Harriet B. Presser
Distinguished University Professor

Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley, 1969

Office: 3119 Art-Sociology Building
Phone: 301 405-6422
Email: presser@socy.umd.edu

Departmental Specialty Areas:
Demography; Gender, Work and Family

Harriet B. Presser is Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Sociology. She was the founding Director of the Center on Population, Gender, and Social Inequality (now the Maryland Population Research Center) at the University of Maryland, College Park, serving from 1988 to 2001. Professor Presser is Past President of the Population Association of America (1989), and was named George Washington University’s 1992 Distinguished Alumni Scholar, having received her B.A. from there in 1959. She has held residential fellowships at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford (1986-87, 1991-92, and 2003-04), the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Science (1994-95), the Russell Sage Foundation (1989-99 and summer 2000), the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Study and Conference Center (March-April 200) and the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Study (February-April 2007).

In 2002, Professor Presser was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). The certificate conveying this honor states: "For innovative research on issues of population, labor force, gender, and social inequality; for exceptional institution building; and for outstanding service to demographic and sociological societies." Most recently, she was named the recipient of the American Association of University Women's 2007 Founders Distinguished Senior Scholar Award. This award recognizes a scholar for her lifetime of outstanding college and university teaching, her impressive publication record, and the impact she has had on women in our profession and in the community--described in her award letter as "phenomenal."

In addition to conducting basic research in social demography, Professor Presser studies population and family policy issues from a national and international perspective and teaches courses in these areas. She has recently completed her book, Working in a 24/7 Economy: Challenges for American Families, published by the Russell Sage Foundation. She has received grants from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the W.T. Grant Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Population Council. Her current grant with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is a 25-year view of shift work over the life course, offering a new perspective on work and family time.

Course Syllabi:

Sociology 641: Work and Family Policy

Sociology 644: Gender, Work and Family

Sociology 731: Population and Family Policy