Formally Introducing The Cheer Professors
Hopefully, you’ve met the Cheer Professors informally (if not, visit the About page). While we said they have too many accolades to count, we’re going to try our best here. Here’s a peek into each professor’s personal research interests as well as the first announcement of their chapters in Cheer Matters!
Natalie Adams
Natalie Adams is our team captain and fearless leader. She is a professor at the University of Alabama who has spent her career studying cheerleading and other activities associated with girls and women. Alongside Pamala Bettis, she explores the role of cheerleading in American life in her 2003 book Cheerleader: An American Icon and was featured on the internationally popular Netflix series Cheer. She is the editor of the upcoming anthology, Cheer Matters, and the author of the chapters “Monopolizing Spirit: Varsity and the Building of a Cheerocracy” and “Pump it Up: Cheerleading Fights for Sports Legitimacy” with Amy Moritz.
Laura Grindstaff
Laura Grindstaff is Professor and Chair of Sociology at UC Davis. She is the author of the award-winning book, The Money Shot: Trash, Class, and the Making of TV Talk Shows (University of Chicago Press) and co-editor of two editions of the Handbook of Cultural Sociology (Routledge). Her research on cheerleading has appeared in Social Problems, Sociology Compass, Text and Performance Quarterly, and Routledge Handbook of Cultural Sociology. Check out her chapter with Emily West in Cheer Matters, “Between Legitimacy and Femininity: Cheerleading and the Politics of Gender in Sport.”
Emily West
Emily West is a Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is the author of Buy Now: How Amazon Branded Convenience and Normalized Monopoly (2022, MIT Press) and co-editor of The Routledge Companion to Advertising and Promotional Culture, 2nd edition (2023). Her work on cheerleading has been published in Social Problems, Sociology Compass, and Text and Performance Quarterly. Check out her chapter with Laura Grindstaff in Cheer Matters!
Barbara Jane Brickman
Barbara Jane Brickman is an Associate Professor of Media and Gender Studies at the University of Alabama. She authored the books New American Teenagers: The Lost Generation of Youth in 1970s Film (2012), Grease (2018), and Suffering Sappho! Lesbian Camp in American Popular Culture (2023), which was recognized as the 2024 Judy Grahn Award for Lesbian Nonfiction. Her work has appeared in Camera Obscura, The Journal of Film and Video, Discourse, and Journal of Popular Music Studies. Check out her chapter in Cheer Matters, “Queering the All-American Girl: Cheerleading, Same-Sex Desire, and the (not-so) Good Girl.”
Amy Mortiz
Amy Moritz is a former sportswriter and an adjunct professor at St. Bonaventure University. She is the author of “Cheerleading: Not Just for the Sidelines Anymore” which was published in Sport & Society. Check out her chapter with Natalie Adams in Cheer Matters, “Pump it Up: Cheerleading Fights for Sports Legitimacy.”
Isabelle Bennington
Isabelle Bennington is a soon-to-be University of Alabama graduate and our resident GenZ intern who manages our social and digital content. She is a self-described cheer addict with industry experience as an athlete, coach, and now researcher. Her paper “Cheerleading, the Gendering of Sport, and How Femininity’s Historical Lack of Value is Harming Athletes” won the Elizabeth Meese Memorial Award in Research on Women. Check out her chapter in Cheer Matters, “For the Love of All Things Cheerleading: An Insider’s View.”
Lauren R. Nowosatka
Lauren R. Nowosatka’s Master’s Thesis examined constructions of femininity and empowerment on the reality television show, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making the Team. Her research interests are heavily drawn upon and inspired by her experiences growing up as a high-level gymnast. She is a doctoral student in Physical Cultural Studies in the Department of Kinesiology at the University of Maryland. Her upcoming dissertation analyzes the varying forms of abuse in USA Gymnastics. Check out her chapter in Cheer Matters, “Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders: Making America’s Sweethearts.”
Amira Rose Davis
Amira Rose Davis is an Assistant Professor in the Department of African and African Diaspora Studies at the University of Texas-Austin. Her work has appeared in numerous scholarly and popular outlets, such as the Washington Post and LA Times and she is completing her first book, “Can’t Eat a Medal”: The Lives and Labors of Black Women Athletes in the Age of Jim Crow (UNC Press). Davis is the co-host of the feminist sports podcast, “Burn it All Down” and the host of Season 3 of “American Prodigies: A History of Black Girls in Gymnastics.” Check out her chapter with Paulina Serrano in Cheer Matters, “Sidelined No More: Cheerleading, Embodied Activism, and the Politics of Racial Belonging.”
Paulina Serrano
Paulina A. Serrano’s research interests focus on 20th-century U.S. history, gender, race and sport, and migration. She is currently working on a book entitled Deportistas! Mexican Women, Sporting Citizenship, and Belonging in Twentieth Century America. She is the Carlos E. Castañeda Postdoctoral Fellow with the Center for Mexican American Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Check out her chapter with Amira Rose Davis in Cheer Matters!
Caitlyn M. Jarvis
Caitlyn M. Jarvis is an Assistant Teaching Professor of strategic communication and advertising in the Communication Studies department at Northeastern University. Her research addresses the intersection of organizational and health communication through attention to new media, identity, and resilience. Check out her chapter with Ashleigh Shields in Cheer Matters, “Cheerleading and the Body: Disordered Eating, Public Surveillance, and Self-Regulation.”
Ashleigh n. Shields
Ashleigh N. Shields is an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Department of Health Sciences and Communication Studies at Northeastern University (Boston). Her work explores the intersection of health and interpersonal communication through attention to disclosure, listening, and stigmatized health topics. Check out her chapter with Caitlyn Jarvis in Cheer Matters!
Lauren C. Hindman
Lauren C. Hindman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Management and Entrepreneurship at Hofstra University. Her research focuses on issues related to diversity, equity, and inclusion in the sports industry, particularly the gendered experiences of employees in sports organizations. Check out her chapter in Cheer Matters, “Professional Cheerleading in a Post-#MeToo World: Constructing Meanings of Professionalism, Gender, and Race.”
Zoie Comer
Zoie Comer is a student at The University of Alabama School of Law. She is a Capstone Scholar and a Senior Editor of the Law & Psychology Review. She is a Summa Cum Laude graduate of Mississippi State University with a major in Wildlife, Fisheries, and Aquaculture, and minors in French and Chemistry. Check out her chapter with Stanley Murphy in Cheer Matters, “Gimme an F: Cheerleading Goes to the Supreme Court.”
Stanley Murphy
Stanley J. Murphy is an attorney in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and a member of the bars of Alabama, Florida, the District of Columbia, and the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a graduate of Haverford College and the University of Alabama School of Law. He is a former Senior Counsel for the University of Alabama System and is an adjunct professor at its law school, where he teaches advanced seminars on Higher Education and Civil Immunity law. Check out his chapter with Zoie Comer in Cheer Matters!
Dwaine Plaza
Dwaine Plaza is a Professor of Sociology at Oregon State University and the co-editor of Carnival is Woman: Feminism and Performance in the Caribbean Mas and Higher Education Beyond COVID: New Teaching Paradigms and Promise. He has written extensively on the topic of Caribbean migration within the international diaspora. He also publishes in the area of race, and gender relations in the United States. Check out his chapter with Kathleen Stanley and Michelle Inderbitzin in Cheer Matters, “From Campus Leaders to Rowdy Boys: Masculinity in College Cheerleading.”
Michelle Inderbitzin
Michelle Inderbitzin is an Associate Professor of Sociology in the School of Public Policy at Oregon State University and the lead author of Deviance & Social Control: A Sociological Perspective (3rd edition). Her research centers around juvenile justice, prison culture, and transformative education. Check out her chapter with Dwaine Plaza Kathleen Stanley in Cheer Matters!
Kathleen Stanley
Kathleen Stanley is a retired Senior Instructor of Sociology at Oregon State University. Her courses were wide-ranging with many focusing on gender issues in society and popular culture. Check out her chapter with Dwaine Plaza and Michelle Inderbitzin in Cheer Matters!
