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Natalia Ruiz-Junco

Natalia Ruiz-Junco

Associate Professor

Sociology Undergraduate Program Director

Sociology, Anthropology & Social Work

Natalia Ruiz-Junco

Contact Me

334-844-5052

ncr0007@auburn.edu

7060 Haley Center

Office Hours

By Appointment

Education

PhD, University of Kentucky

MA, University of Kentucky

About Me

Natalia Ruiz-Junco works in the areas of social theory, social psychology, sociology of emotions, social movements, and qualitative methodology. Her numerous publications in these areas examine the topics of self, identity, emotion, empathy, and social interaction. She has a long-standing interest in interpretive and pragmatist theories. She is co-editor of Updating Charles H. Cooley: Contemporary Perspectives on a Sociological Classic (Routledge, 2019), the Routledge International Handbook of Interactionism (Routledge, 2021) and People, Technology, and Social Organization: Interactionist Studies of Everyday Life (Routledge, 2024). She is currently working on a book manuscript, entitled Empathy in Everyday Life: A Sociological Perspective, and preparing her fourth edited volume, entitled Sensing Life: The Social Organization of the Senses in Interaction. In addition, she is a member of the editorial board of the journal The American Sociologist, and has been an editor of the journal Social Movement Studies. She is also past Vice President of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction.

Research Interests

social theory, social psychology, sociology of emotions, social movements, qualitative methodology

Publications

  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia, Daniel Morrison, and Patrick McGinty. Forthcoming. “Interactionism and Methodological Individualism: Affinities and Critical Issues.” In Palgrave Handbook of Methodological Individualism, edited by Nathalie Bulle and Francesco Di Iorio.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. Forthcoming. “Empathy: Putting Yourself in Someone Else’s Shoes.” In Jacobsen, Michael Hviid. The Emotionality of Social Life. London and New York: Routledge.
  • vom Lehn, Dirk, William Gibson, and Natalia Ruiz-Junco (eds). 2024. People, Technology, and Social Organization: Interactionist Studies of Everyday Life. London and New York: Routledge.
  • vom Lehn, Dirk, Natalia Ruiz-Junco, and William Gibson (eds). 2021. The Routledge International Handbook of Interactionism. London and New York: Routledge.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2021. “Empathy, Intersubjectivity, and the Self.” Pp. 543-557. In Handbook of Classical Sociological Theory, edited by Seth Abrutyn and Omar Lizardo. Springer Nature.
  • Brossard, Baptiste, and Natalia Ruiz-Junco. 2020. “On the Shoulders of Citers: Notes on the Organization of Intellectual Deference.” The Sociological Quarterly
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia, and Daniel R. Morrison. 2019. “Empathy as Care: The Model of Palliative Medicine.” Society
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia, and Baptiste Brossard (eds). 2019. Updating Charles H. Cooley: Contemporary Perspectives on a Sociological Classic. London and New York: Routledge.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia, and Baptiste Brossard. 2019. “Cooley and the Sociological Canon: An Enigmatic Case.” In Updating Charles H. Cooley: Contemporary Perspectives on a Sociological Classic, edited by N. Ruiz-Junco and B. Brossard.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2017. “Advancing the Sociology of Empathy: A Proposal” Symbolic Interaction
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2016. “In Search of Lost Mead” Contemporary Sociology
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2016. “The Persistence of the Power Deficit? Advancing Power Premises in Contemporary Interactionist Theory.” Studies in Symbolic Interaction
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia and Scott Hunt. 2016. “Identity” In Protest Cultures: A Companion. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2013. “Feeling Social Movements: Theoretical Contributions to Social Movement Research on Emotions” Sociology Compass
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2011. “Losing Neutrality in Your Everyday Life:” Framing Experience and Activist Identity Construction in the Spanish Environmental Movement” Journal of Contemporary Ethnography
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia and Salvador Vidal-Ortiz. 2011. “Autoethnography: The Sociological through the Personal.” In New Directions in Sociology: Essays on Theory and Methodology in the 21st Century edited by Ieva Zake and Michael DeCesare. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers.
  • Ruiz-Junco, Natalia. 2011. “Stranger to You and Stranger to Myself? Theorizing Self-estrangement.” Current Perspectives in Social Theory