Department of Sociology Faculty

Katherine Chen

Professor Katherine K. Chen’s research and teaching focuses on organizational theory, behavior, and culture, work and occupations, and economic sociology. Her other research and teaching interests include social movements, cultural sociology, and gender, race, and ethnicity.

Prof. Chen received her Ph.D and M.A. in Sociology from Harvard University and an A.M. in Sociology and an A.B. in Human Biology from Stanford University. Her research was, in part, supported by a National Science Foundation Fellowship. Prior to joining William Paterson University, she conducted research as a postdoctoral fellow at the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning at Harvard University. She also taught as a lecturer in the Social Studies Program at Harvard University and the Sociology department at Boston University. In addition, she taught in the Sociology and Psychology departments at Harvard University. As a fellow, Prof. Chen also participated in the Social Science Research Council’s “Corporation as a Social Institution” program. She has worked as a summer associate at RAND corporation, a non-profit think tank, and she conducted organizational research via Abt Associates, the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard Business School, and Stanford Business School.

Her latest research project, a multi-year ethnographic study, examined the growing organization behind the annual Burning Man event (www.burningman.com). Prof. Chen has presented several papers on this research at the American Sociological Association conference and other conferences, including the Eastern Sociological Society, and she was an invited presenter at the 2006 Davis Conference on Qualitative Research.

At William Paterson University, Prof. Chen has taught Sociology of Organizations, Contemporary Issues of the Workplace, Sociology of the Family, and Introductory Sociology (Principles of Sociology). Prof. Chen also serves as the Sociology department representative at the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) union and Technology Across the Curriculum (TAC) committee, and she is a member of the Asia Studies Faculty Network and Integrating Asian Studies into the Curriculum.

Prof. Chen lives in New York City. Her pastimes include enjoying design and the arts.

Pending publications

Chen, Katherine . Structuring Creative Chaos: The Organization Behind the Burning Man Event. Advance book contract signed with University of Chicago press in Dec. 2006. Manuscript has been fully revised and is now under review. This manuscript focuses on how the Burning Man organization navigated between under-organizing, in which an organization’s structures are too few or insufficient to support members’ efforts, and over-organizing, in which an organization has too much structure, such as entrenched bureaucracy, that impede members’ efforts.

Chen, Katherine and Siobhan O’Mahony. “The Selective Synthesis of Competing Logics.” Article under review at peer-reviewed academic journal. This paper compares the development of the organizations behind the Burning Man event and several Open Source projects.

Chen, Katherine. “Bureaucracy” and “Oligarchy.” Accepted by the Encyclopedia of Social Problems. Vincent N. Parrillo, ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Papers in progress

Chen, Katherine. “Charismatizing the Routine: Story-telling in the Burning Man Organization.”

Chen, Katherine. “Merging Consumption and Production in the Burning Man Art World.”

 Chen, Katherine. “Can I Tell My Story?: Counternarratives in the Burning Man Organization.”

Selected academic publications

Chen, Katherine . 2005. “Incendiary Incentives: How the Burning Man Organization Motivates and Manages Volunteers.” Pp. 109-128 in AfterBurn: Reflections on Burning Man. Eds. Mark Van Proyen and Lee Gilmore. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press.

Chen, Katherine . 2003. “Coordinating members and their efforts: how the Burning Man organization forms an ‘alternative’ artistic community in the Nevada Black Rock Desert.” Pp. 56-61 in People Shaping Places Shaping People Environmental Design Research Association (edra) proceedings 34, a peer-reviewed publication. Eds. Julia W. Robinson, Kathleen A. Harder, Herbert L. Pick, and Virajita Singh.

Selected other publications

Chen, Katherine . 2003. “Burning Man lights a fire. The Nevada desert event doesn’t just produce art, it produces citizens.” Voted best article. http://inthefray.com/html/article.php?sid=123

Chen, Katherine . 2003. “Growth at Burning Man: An Anthropological View.” Blacktop Gazette. Decompression Edition 2(3): 2. http://www.burningman.com/whatisburningman/2003/btg03_decom.pdf

Chen, Katherine . 2002. “The Alternative in the Desert: On the Burning Man Organization.” Alumni QuarterlyColloquy: 16. The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Harvard University.

Selected media interviews about research

Radio West for NPR-affiliate KUER & XFM radio (2007)

Jessica Bruder for Burning Book A Visual History of Burning Book (2006), Associated Press (2002), Village Voice (2001), CNN (2001)