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Speaking appearances (selected):

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On Connective Labor and What It Means to Be Human Now 

 

Plenary speaker, Pacific Sociological Association, Oakland CA, March 2027.

 

Public lecture, Series on "Critical AI: Justice, Labor, and Knowledge in the Age of Artificial Intelligence," Munroe Center for Social Inquiry, Pitzer College, The Claremont Colleges, February 2027.

 

Plenary speaker, Council of Independent Colleges’ 2027 Presidents Institute, San Diego, January 2027.

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Invited speaker, Future Forum, Salzburg Global, August 2026.

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“The Last Human Job in the AI Century.” Science and Cocktails, Copenhagen.  June 2026

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“Connection, Meaning and the Future of Work in the AI Century.” Highsmith Distinguished Scholar lecture, University of North Carolina, Asheville. March 2026.

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“Choosing Friction: The Art and Science of Human Connection.” Keynote address, Creativity & Connection in the Age of AI Symposium. College of Humanities and Social Sciences, California State University at Fullerton. March 23, 2026

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“Working Toward Connection: Finding Our Way to Each Other and Why It Matters.” Keynote address, Week of Wellbeing, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, February 11, 2026.

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“Seeing the Other: Human Value in the Age of AI.”  Featured Speaker, Annual Meeting of the Association of American Medical Colleges.​, San Antonio, Texas, November 2025.

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Keynote speaker, "The Roads to Development: Work, Markets and Institutions​​​​." Pamplona, Spain, October 2025..

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“When Machines Have Time But People Do Not:  Connective Labor and Physician Health.” Keynote speaker, American Conference on Physician Health, Boston MA, September 2025.

 

“What Makes Us Human in the Age of AI.” Honored Keynote Speaker, SPARC Festival, Mount St. Mary’s University, Maryland. April 2025.

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"The Last Human Job." Future of Work Initiative, Michigan State University, April 2025.

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 "Re-imagining the Other/Ourselves: Finding the Human in the Age of AI." The Cressman Lecture, Oregon Humanities Center, April 2025.

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“The Last Human Job: AI, Depersonalization and the Industrial Clock.”  Public lecture, London School of Economics, February 2025.

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“The Last Human Job: The Social Stakes of Automating Recognition.” Sciences Po, Paris, France, January 2025.

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November 21:  "The Last Human Job:  When Machines Have Time for Us and People Do Not."  With Martina Verba.  Weil Art Gallery, 92nd Street Y, New York City.  November 2024.

 

With Nick Hatzis, MD.  Family Action Network, Latin School of Chicago, Wrigley Theatre, 59 W. North Blvd., Chicago, October 2024.  See the video here!

 

Invited participant, “Consultation on AI: Threats and Opportunities.”  St. George’s House, Windsor Castle, UK. October 2023.

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Keynote speaker. “Real Work in the Virtual World” conference. Helsinki, Finland, August 2019.

 

Presidential Panel, "Systematizing Human Connection: Contemporary Relationship Work." Eastern Sociological Society (ESS) meetings, Philadelphia, February 2017.

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On the Broader Impacts of Job Insecurity

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Keynote speaker, Micro-conference on “Poverty, Inequality and Work Today.” 20th anniversary of the Shepherd Program for the Interdisciplinary Study of Poverty and Human Capability.  Washington and Lee University. November 9, 2017.

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"Gender and the Emotional Geographies of Insecurity:  Managing the Unrequited Contract at Work and at Home."  Lecture to the Social Sciences Faculty, University of the Ruhr, Bochum, Germany.  June 2013.

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"The Coral Society: Reframing the Choice between Family Stability and Family Diversity."  Migra! Network, University of the Ruhr, Bochum, Germany.  June 2013.

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"The 'Common Sense' of Insecurity:  Cultural Strategies at Work."  University Rhein-Waal, Kleve, Germany, June; Faculty of Gender and Work, University of Bielefeld, Germany, July; Hans Böckler Foundation, Dusseldorf, Germany, July 2013.

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On Qualitative Methods

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“Data as Theory, Theory as Data.”  Junior Theorists Symposium. New York, August 2026.

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“Culture, Contradiction and Resonance:  The Uses of Qualitative Methods for Work-Family Scholarship.”  Special Symposium “Insights from Qualitative Methods Practices in Work-Family Scholarship.” Work Family Researchers Network (WFRN) Biennial Conference.  New York, June 2022.  

 

“Resonance and Reflexivity in Ethnography: On Ambivalence and Contradiction in an Era of ‘Transparency.’” Ethnography Workshop.  Northwestern University.  February 2022.

 

Invited Presenter. ASA webinar "Qualitative and Quarantined: Techniques and Ethics of Online Interview Research."  September 2020.

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“Beyond the ‘Trust Me’ Fallacy: Value, Rigor and Resonance in Qualitative Methods.”  Gender and Sexuality Workshop, Department of Sociology, University of Michigan. Ann Arbor, MI, October 2018.

“The Paradox of Voice:  What We Can Do with What People Tell Us.”  ASA Presidential Panel, "Methodological Disagreements: Comparing the Value of Qualitative Interviews and Participant-Observation." San Francisco, August 2014.

 

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On Children, Families and Inequality

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“Disrupted Belonging? AI and the Neoliberal Child.” Lecture at the Belong Project, Oslo Metropolitan University, Norway. June 2025.

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Expert panelist. “The Sociology of the Family: Taking Stock of the Field and Imagining the Future.”  On the 50th anniversary of the “Changing Women in a Changing Society” issue of the American Journal of Sociology. Zoom webinar, November 2022.  

 

Expert Panelist. “Technological Futures of Care.”  Scholars-in-Dialogue session. Carework Virtual Symposium on “Moving Past Emergency Responses: Care as Essential Infrastructure.” March 2022

 

Keynote speaker.  “Understanding Inequality: Children, Consumer Culture and Compassion.”  Child and Teen Consumption Conference.  Aalborg, Denmark, April 2016.

Keynote speaker and Jackson Memorial Lecture, “The Hidden Injuries of Childhood Inequalities.”  At the “Childhood and Diversity – Multiple childhoods?” conference of the International Association of Francophone Sociologists – Research Committee on the Sociology of Childhood, and the Canadian Sociological Association, Halifax, Nova Scotia.  June 2013.