Jennifer McGovern

• Monday: By Appointment
• Tuesday: By Appointment
• Wednesday: 1-2:30pm
• Thursday 10-11:30am

Jen McGovern, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science and Sociology at Monmouth University who is passionate about teaching and learning sociology. She specializes in understanding how sport both reflects and challenges social inequalities, such as social class, race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, and sexuality.

Her previous research focused on the ways that professional baseball’s institutional structures have grown and changed and how local baseball fans tell narratives about baseball players as the game has grown more global in scope. Her current research focuses on female athletes. She has written about female athlete attitudes about sexual assault and is currently researching Latina women’s experiences in sport. In addition, she has worked on a  community needs assessment with various Asbury Park stakeholders and is currently partnering with colleagues in the MU Health and Physical Education department to deliver and research after school physical education programs in Asbury Park.

Sociology of Sport. Race, Ethnicity, & Immigration. Statistical & Research Methods. Gender Studies.

Scholarly Articles

• (2017).  Strong Women Never Mumble: Female Athlete Attitudes About Sexual Consent. Journal of Interpersonal Violence.
• (2017). The Boundaries of Latino Sport Leadership: How Skin Tone, Ethnicity, and Nationality Construct Baseball’s Color Line. Sociological Inquiry, 87(1)
• (2015). Does Race Belong on Sports Blogs? Solidarity and Racial Discourse in Online Baseball Fan Forums. Communication & Sport. 4(3), 331-346
• (2013). Fan perspectives on race and baseball in the city of brotherly love. The National Pastime, 116+.
• Groff, E. R., Taylor, R. B., Elesh, D. B., McGovern, J., & Johnson, L. (2014). Permeability across a metropolitan area: conceptualizing and operationalizing a macrolevel crime pattern theory. Environment and Planning A, 46(1), 129–152.

Popular Press

•  (2017). #SheBelieves, But Who is She? Race, Ethnicity, and the U.S. Women’s Soccer Team. https://thesocietypages.org/engagingsports/2017/02/28/shebelieves-but-who-is-she-race-ethnicity-and-the-u-s-womens-soccer-team/
•  (2015, June 21). @ISSUE: Should U.S. be melting pot or beautiful mosaic?: Blend Cultures Into Something Stronger. Asbury Park Press, p. 2AA.
• (2016) With Patrick Murray. Consent Communication: What Does it Mean for Student Athletes? (NCAA Research and Innovations Grant). http://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/McNeil_Consent%20Communication.pdf

• North American Society for the Sociology of Sport (NASSS), Web & Communications Chair