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Melissa
A. Milkie
Professor
Ph.D.
Indiana University, 1995
Office: 4133 Art-Sociology Building
Phone:
301 405-6428
Email: mmilkie@socy.umd.edu
Specialty
Areas:
Social
Psychology; Gender, Work and Family
Melissa
Milkie received her Ph.D. from Indiana
University in 1995, and joined the faculty at
Maryland that year. She is currently Associate
Professor of Sociology, and an affiliate faculty
of the Women’s Studies Program. She is part
of two of Maryland’s specialty areas: Social
Psychology and Gender, Work & Family.
 Professor
Milkie’s work takes note of the dramatic
changes within work and family life over recent
decades, notably the massive entry of women and
minorities into college and higher status positions
in the paid labor force. These changes, as well
as cultural shifts arising in part through the
civil rights and feminist movements, have transformed
gender and ethnic expectations, ideals and stereotypes.
Yet stereotypes remain. Her scholarship reveals
the complex, subtle aspects of stratification
occurring through cultural ideals and examines
how these are reflected in the experiences of
individuals. It addresses how cultural meanings
attached to social statuses and roles—for
example the “ideal” female, the “good”
father, or the stereotyped African-American—become
manifest in people’s attitudes, behaviors,
and identities, and how these are contested and
change.
 Much
of Professor Milkie’s recent research assesses
cultural ideals about gender and family life and
how these may clash with people’s realities,
and thus have implications for well-being. With
Professors Suzanne Bianchi and John Robinson,
she has written a book Changing Rhythms of
American Family Life, which focuses on trends
in parents’ time with children and spouses,
and on work and leisure over four decades. The
book also examines how current American parents
feel about the time they spend with their children,
their spouses, and for themselves. Some of her
other recent projects have examined 1) mothers’
and fathers’ ideals about the division of
childrearing labor versus their actual practices,
and how these affect parental well-being; and
2) mothers’ and fathers’ objective
measures versus subjective perceptions of time
spent with children. Her work has been published
in journals such as Social Psychology Quarterly,
American Sociological Review, and Journal
of Marriage and the Family.
Course Syllabi:
Sociology
624: Lives and Times: Socialization Across the
Life Course
Sociology 642: The Sociology
of Mental Health and Illness
Sociology 645: Sociology
of the Self-Concept
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